M. P. H. Roessingh’s introduction explains that his guide “provides a survey of the sources, documents, manuscript, maps, and topographical reproductions in the Netherlands for the history of Latin America.” The work carries out its declared purpose in polished prose and in good taste. It is most comprehensive and wide-ranging, and it probes in depth. The author shows versatility and ingenuity in researching the field, and although his subject could often be dry and dull, he manages to relieve this with tolerance and a tinge of dry wit. One marvels at the nooks and crannies into which he delves and the oddities which he uncovers. No foreign reader will fail to be enlightened by his observations on many obscure points in the history of the Netherlands.

A very worthwhile feature is the three pages of chronology which constitute annals from 1588 until 1662. There are separate indices of the contents of many of the divisions. Also, a so-called Concise Bibliography is, in reality, a comprehensive one divided into subjects. Geographically, the Guide does not wholly restrict itself to the Netherlands, but also leads one to very closely related institutions in foreign locations such as Dutch consulates or agencies abroad.

The second monograph, by M. A. P. Meilink-Roelofsz, is reprinted from “de West-Indisehe Gids” (The West Indies Guide XXXV, 1954/5) and by its very nature is limited as to sources and scope. Nevertheless, it is a very scholarly compilation—far from a mere survey—a veritable thesaurus containing bits of economic, political, and social history that make up the annals of the Netherlands Indies. The assiduous and gifted compiler opens many doors for further research.

Meilink-Roelofsz begins with the assertion that the greater part of the archives of the first West-Indische Compagnie are lost, having been done away with in 1674 when the W.I.C. was reorganized.

Worse yet, almost all the surviving papers were sold by the W.I.C. for scrap paper in 1821. The compiler then leads us through the labyrinth in official records of the Netherlands Antilles. We learn how the Central Board of the potent Heren Nineteen was cut to ten members in 1674. We read of the successive shifts of sovereignty from Dutch to French to English and Spanish, with complete alteration of nationality of local courts and customs.

There were in the Netherlands itself various archives in the States General, in the provincial legislatures, and in the separate admiralties. Then in 1791 the West India Company was abolished by Dutch law. Four years later from 1795 to 1813 (the French period) the Dutch Republic lost its freedom and underwent many changes ending in 1810 in the incorporation of the French kingdom of Holland into the French Empire.

In the next century and a half after 1816, when Dutch sovereignty was restored in the Antilles, an enormous mass of governmental records was transferred to the Netherlands. The indefatigable Meilink-Roelofsz has met the challenge with a masterful job of classification. He also has sought out and set up many files of private and public institutions, as well as of private individuals. Both compilers have placed students of Dutch history deeply in their debt.