Book review;

              Bulletin HASKINS & SELLS 55
Hatfield, Henry Rand. Accounting.
(New York, D. Appleton and Company,
1927. 548 p.)
It would indeed be with regret that one
would give up such a friend as Hatfield's
Modern Accounting, if it were not for the
fact that Accounting, its supplanter, is
written by the same author. Modern
Accounting, published in 1909, was one of
the earliest American contributions to
accounting literature presenting the theory
of accounts as distinguished from book­keeping
technic. That, eighteen years
later, this volume should still maintain its
high position in the literature of accounting,
is sufficient evidence that the frequent
reference to this work as an "accounting
classic" is well merited.
Accounting is, in some measure, a revi­sion
of the author's earlier book. The last
two decades, however, have been so
fruitful in the progress which has been
made that this later volume must be con­sidered
something more than an ordinary
revision. The author has extended his
comments on many of the matters dis­cussed
therein and also has introduced
new material in two chapters on the con­solidated
balance sheet and the inter­pretation
of the balance sheet respectively.
The introductory chapters on the theory
of double entry bookkeeping have been
omitted in the present volume.
The book is not an elementary one. It
does not attempt to treat the mechanics of
bookkeeping. The author has presented
the problems of current accounting prac­tice
in a dispassionate, rather than argu-mentative,
manner. In view of the fact
that there is no uniformity of opinion upon
many questions, the author's purpose is, as
quoted from the preface to the earlier pub­lication,
" . . . to show the existing varia­tions
rather than to attempt to formulate
rigid rules. The comparative study of
accounting practice will, perhaps, be a
greater service to accounting science than a
more dogmatic treatise." Professor Hat­field
accordingly has drawn freely from
current practice for his illustrations. The
frequent citation of court decisions, the
numerous references to other writers,
European and American, and to the legal
provisions of the European countries, give
one the feeling that nothing has been left
undone to make the work a thorough one.
The tolerant attitude which Professor
Hatfield exhibits toward differences of
opinion is soothing when compared with
arbitrary statements of others that the
only correct procedure in a given instance
is thus and so.
The theoretical argument, as given on
page 162, that depreciation might be con­sidered
a function of profits is interesting
indeed, especially in the light of the efforts
which have been made to eliminate this
procedure in practice. As Professor Hat­field
later points out, accountants are
agreed that to charge off more depreciation
in prosperous years and less when profits
are less is improper.
Chapters X , X I , and XII on profits and
dividends are noteworthy indeed. The
argument in favor of permitting a cor­poration
operating wasting assets to pay
Book Review