In the manner of the Creole tradesmen of Louisiana, whose lagniappe to their patrons is legendary, the Editor offers a similar bonus to readers of the Review. Instead of trifling presents added to a purchase, however, our lagniappe will be notes and documents illustrative of the evolution of business enterprise.

Although historians have thoroughly discussed the impact of transformations in the workplace and the corporate structure that accompanied the rise of modern business enterprises, Professor Santos argues that they have ignored the traditional firms that continued to exist amid these changes. Constituting a significant portion of companies operating in the industrial economy, firms like Byers employed simple systems of managerial control based on the entrepreneurs' personal authority and property interest in the business. While labor policy at modern corporations was shaped by the managers' need to establish administrative control over the production and distribution systems, Byers's labor policy was defined by family attitude and the company's history.

As Great Britain expanded its economic sphere at the turn of the century, what was the nature of the relationship between the imperial government and private firms seeking profits within the free trade empire? Was there a “well-planned and consistent program directed from the top,” or was the government's so-called “high policy” toward business actually the result “of ad hoc compromises among various departmental heads” buried three and four levels deep in the Colonial Office? The experience of the Tanjong Pagar Dock Co. of Singapore suggests that the opportunities for British firms to exploit the resources of British controlled territories could be seriously circumscribed by the “arbitrary paternalism” of “crusading bureaucrats.”

As the American South recovered from the Civil War, railroads and the businessmen who managed them were important ingredients in the process of economic change. But who were the railroad leaders of the first generation of the “New South” and what were their personal and corporate goals? What were the effects of their actions on the course of southern restoration? Sharply at odds with the usual “carpetbagger” demonology, Professor Klein suggests an alternative explanation and analysis.

Part of the eighteenth-century Spanish crown's attempt to restore national power through the promotion of trade and manufacturing was a campaign to eradicate the aversions of the nobility toward commerce and industry. Don Juan de Goyeneche was most often held up as the model of what the state expected of its noblemen. But Professor Callahan concludes that Goyeneche's significance lies more in symbol that in accomplishment.