Frederick Scott Oliver's biographical study, "Alexander Hamilton: an Essay on American Union," is of that class of historical works which are intended not to reveal new facts but to envisage a man and his age from a new angle. Such enterprises are always of interest and often of practical bearing, especially when carried out with such discrimination and literary skill. It would be clear, had our author not revealed it in his closing pages, that the great lesson of the book is the necessity of consolidating the British Empire; and Hamilton, the firm administrator and grand visionary, moved by a passion for an imperial American nation, is the figure that Mr. Oliver presents to his British compatriots.