Part 2 — REVIEW OF NEW BOOKS.

The Prelude; or Growth of a Poet’s Mind. An Autobiographical Poem. By William Wordsworth. New York: D. Appleton & Co. 1 vol. 12mo.

The Excursion. By William Wordsworth. New York: C. S. Francis & Co. 1 vol. 12mo.

It was known as long ago as 1814, that Wordsworth had written the present poem, and that it would not be published until after his death. It now appears that it was commenced as far back as 1799, and was finally completed in 1805. The purpose of the poem is to exhibit the gradual growth of the poet’s mind, from its first development of imagination and passion, to the period when he conceived he had grown up to that height of contemplation which would justify his attempt to realize the great object of his life—the production of a philosophic poem on Man, Nature, and Society. “The Prelude,” is addressed to Coleridge, the poet’s intimate friend; and the egotism of the narrative is much modified, by its being thus seemingly intended, not for the public, but for the poet-metaphysician into whose single heart and brain its revelations are poured. The character of the poem is essentially psychological, the object being to notice only those events and scenes which fed and directed the poet’s mind, and to regard them, not so much in their own nature, as in their influence on the nature of the poet. The topics, therefore, though trite in themselves, are all made original from the peculiarities of the person conceiving them. His childhood and school-time, his residence at the university, his summer vacation, his visit to the Alps, his tour through France, his residence in London and France, are the principal topics; but the enumeration of the topics can convey no impression of the thought, observation, and imagination, the eloquent philosophy, vivid imagery, and unmistakable Wordsworthianism, which characterize the volume.

It must be admitted, however, that “The Prelude,” with all its merits, does not add to the author’s great fame, however much it may add to our knowledge of his inner life. As a poem it cannot be placed by the side of The White Doe, or The Excursion, or the Ode on Childhood, or the Ode on the Power of Sound; and the reason is to be found in its strictly didactic and personal character, necessitating a more constant use of analysis and reflection, and a greater substitution of the metaphysical for the poetic process, than poetry is willing to admit. Though intended as an introduction to “The Excursion,” it has not its sustained richness of diction and imagery; and there is little of that easy yielding of the mind to the inspiration of objects, and that ecstatic utterance of the emotions they excite, which characterize passages selected at random from the latter poem—as in that grand rushing forth of poetic impulse, in the Fourth Book:

Oh! what a joy it were in vigorous health,

To have a body (this our vital frame

With shrinking sensibility endued,

And all the nice regards of flesh and blood,)

And to the elements surrender it

As if it were a spirit! How divine,

The liberty, for frail, for mortal man

To roam at large among unpeopled glens

And mountainous retirements, only trod

By devious footsteps; regions consecrate

To oldest time! and, reckless of the storm

That keeps the raven quiet in her nest,

Be as a presence or a motion—one

Among the many there; and while the mists

Flying, and rainy vapors, call out shapes

And phantoms from the crags and solid earth

As fast as a musician scatters sounds

Out of an instrument; and while the streams

(As at a first creation, and in haste

To exercise their untried faculties)

Descending from the region of the clouds,

And starting from the hollows of the earth

More multitudinous every moment, rend

Their way before them—what a joy to roam

An equal among mightiest energies;

And haply sometimes with articulate voice,

Amid the deafening tumult, scarcely heard

By him that utters it, exclaim aloud,

“Be this continued so from day to day,

Nor let the fierce commotion have an end.

Ruinous though it be, from month to month.”

“The Prelude” has many fine descriptions of nature, but nothing which rises to the beauty and sublimity of the following passage from “The Excursion”:

—when a step,

A single step, that freed me from the skirts

Of the blind vapor, opened to my view

Glory beyond all glory ever seen

By waking sense or by the dreaming soul!

The appearance, instantaneously disclosed

Was of a mighty city—boldly say

A wilderness of building, sinking far

And self-withdrawn into a wondrous depth,

Far sinking into splendor—without end!

Fabric it seemed of diamond and gold,

With alabaster domes, and silver spires,

And blazing terrace upon terrace, high

Uplifted; here, serene pavilions bright,

In avenues disposed; there, towers begirt

With battlements that on their restless fronts

Bore stars—illumination of all gems!

By earthly nature had the effect been wrought

Upon the dark materials of the storm

Now pacified; on them, and on the coves

And mountain-steeps and summits, whereunto

The vapors had receded, taking there

Their station under a cerulean sky.

Oh! ’twas an unimaginable sight!

Clouds, mists, streams, watery rocks and emerald turf,

Clouds of all tincture, rocks and sapphire sky,

Confused, commingled, mutually inflamed,

Molten together, and composing thus,

Each lost in each, that marvelous array

Of temple, palace, citadel, and huge

Fantastic pomp of structure without name,

In fleecy folds voluminous, enwrapped.

Right in the midst, where interspace appeared

Of open court, an object like a throne

Under a shining canopy of state

Stood fixed; and fixed resemblances were seen

To implements of ordinary use,

But vast in size, in substance glorified;

Such as by Hebrew prophets were beheld

In vision—forms uncouth of mightiest power

For admiration and mysterious awe.

Below me was the earth; this little vale

Lay low beneath my feet; ’twas visible—

I saw not, but I felt that it was there.

That which I saw was the revealed abode

Of spirits in beatitude.

Not only do we see the superiority of “The Excursion” in such passages as these, but the didactic thought is more assured, is more colored by imagination, and melts more readily into soft, sweet, melodious expression. Take the following, for instance:

Within the soul a faculty abides,

That with interpositions, which would hide

And darken, so can deal, that they become

Contingencies of pomp; and serve to exalt

Her native brightness. As the ample moon,

In the deep stillness of a summer even

Rising behind a thick and lofty grove,

Burns, like an unconsuming fire of light,

In the green trees; and, kindling on all sides

Their leafy umbrage, turns the dusky veil

Into a substance glorious as her own,

Yea, with her own incorporated, by power

Capacious and serene: like power abides

In man’s celestial spirit; virtue thus

Sets forth and magnifies herself; thus feeds

A calm, a beautiful, and silent fire,

From the encumbrances of mortal life,

From error, disappointment—nay, from guilt;

And sometimes, so relenting justice wills;

From palpable oppressions of despair.

If “The Prelude” has thus fewer “trances of thought and mountings of the mind” than “The Excursion,” it still bears the marks of the lofty and thoughtful genius of the author, and increases our respect for his personal character. The books devoted to his residence in Cambridge, his tour to the Alps, and to the influence of the French Revolution upon his genius and character, are additions to the philosophy of the human mind. We believe that few metaphysicians ever scanned their consciousness with more intensity of vision, than Wordsworth was wont to direct upon his; and in the present poem he has subtily noted, and firmly expressed, many new psychological laws and processes. The whole subject of the development of the mind’s creative faculties, and the vital laws of mental growth and production, has been but little touched by professed metaphysicians; and we believe “The Prelude” conveys more real available knowledge of the facts and laws of man’s internal constitution, than can be found in Hume or Kant.

We have not space for many extracts from the poem. Its philosophical value could not be indicated by quotations, and we shall content ourselves with citing a few random passages, illustrative of its general style and thought. The following lines exhibit the tendency of Wordsworth’s mind, when a youth at college:

I looked for universal things; perused

The common countenance of earth and sky:

Earth, nowhere unembellished by some trace

Of that first Paradise whence man was driven;

And sky, whose beauty and bounty are expressed

By the proud name she bears—the name of Heaven.

I called on both to teach me what they might;

Or turning the mind in upon herself,

Pored, watched, expected, listened, spread my thoughts

And spread them with a wider creeping; felt

Incumbencies more awful, visitings

Of the Upholder of the tranquil soul

That tolerates the indignities of Time,

And from the centre of Eternity

All finite motions, overruling, lives

In glory immutable.

—

To every natural form, rock, fruit, or flower,

Even the loose stones that cover the high-way,

I gave a moral life: I saw them feel,

Or linked them to some feeling! the great mass

Lay bedded in a quickening soul, and all

That I beheld respired with inward meaning.

In the following stern description, he records his condemnation of life as he found it at the great English university of Cambridge:

For, all degrees

And shapes of spurious fame and short-lived praise

Here sat in state, and fed with daily alms

Retainers won away from solid good;

And here was Labor, his own bond-slave; Hope,

That never set the pains against the prize;

Idleness halting with his weary clog,

And poor misguided Shame, and witless Fear,

And simple Pleasure foraging for Death;

Honor misplaced, and Dignity astray;

Feuds, factions, flatteries, enmity, and guile

Murmuring submission, and bold government,

(The idol weak as the idolater)

And Decency and Custom starving Truth,

And blind Authority beating with his staff

The child that might have led him; Emptiness

Followed as of good omen, and meek Worth

Left to herself unheard of and unknown.

The most remarkable line in the poem, a line almost equal to Milton’s “Thoughts that wander through eternity,” is that which concludes the following passage on the statue of Newton at Cambridge:

And from my pillow, looking forth by light

Of moon or favoring stars, I could behold

The antechapel where the statue stood

Of Newton with his prism and silent face,

The marble index of a mind forever

Voyaging through strange seas of thought, alone.

With the lingering, mysterious music of this line sounding in our ears, it would be an impertinence to continue these loose remarks on “The Prelude” any further; and we close by commending the poem to the thoughtful attention of thinking readers.

Christian Thought on Life: In a Series of Discourses. By Henry Giles, Author of Lectures and Essays. Boston: Ticknor, Reed & Fields. 1 vol. 16mo.

The author of this beautiful volume is a born orator, whose written style instinctively takes the form of eloquence, and whose strong and deep emotions are at once the inspirers and guides of his pen. He has given us here a dozen discourses, full of living thoughts and winged words, and with not a page which is open to the charge of dullness or triteness. When his theme compels him to introduce common thoughts he avoids commonplaces, and we cannot recognize the old acquaintance of our brain in the fresh and sparkling expression in which it here appears. Mr. Giles, indeed, is so thoroughly a thinker, and his mind is so pervaded by his sentiments, that where he lacks novelty he never lacks originality, and always gives indications of having conceived every thought he expresses. Nobody can read the present volume without being kindled by the vivid vitality with which it presents old truths, and the superb boldness with which it announces new ones. Among the many eloquent and impassioned discourses in the volume, that entitled “The Guilt of Contempt” is perhaps the sharpest in mental analysis, and closest and most condensed in style. It will rank with the best sermons ever delivered from an American pulpit. Another excellent and striking discourse is on the subject of spiritual incongruities as illustrated in the life of David. The five discourses on the Worth, the Personality, the Continuity, the Struggle, the Discipline, of Life, are remarkable for their clear statement of Christian principles, and the knowledge they evince of the inward workings of thought and emotions. Prayer and Passion is a sermon which securely threads all the labyrinths of selfishness, and exposes its most cunning movements and disguises.

We will give a few sentences illustrative of Mr. Giles’ mode of treating religious subjects, and the peculiar union of thought and emotion in his common style of expression. Speaking of the Psalms of David, he says—“They alone contain a poetry that meets the spiritual nature in all its moods and in all its wants, which strengthens virtue with glorious exhortations, gives angelic eloquence to prayer, and almost rises to the seraph’s joy in praise. . . For assemblies or for solitude, for all that gladdens and all that grieves, for our heaviness and despair, for our remorse and our redemption, we find in these divine harmonies the loud or the low expression. Great has been their power in the world. They resounded amidst the courts of the tabernacle; they floated through the lofty and solemn spaces of the temple. They were sung with glory in the halls of Zion; they were sung with sorrow by the streams of Babel. And when Israel had passed away, the harp of David was still awakened in the church of Christ. In all the eras and ages of that church, from the hymn which first it whispered in an upper chamber, until its anthems filled the earth, the inspiration of the royal prophet has enraptured its devotions and ennobled its ritual. And thus it has been, not alone in the august cathedral or the rustic chapel. Chorused by the winds of heaven, they have swelled through God’s own temple of the sky and stars; they have rolled over the broad desert of Asia, in the matins and vespers of ten thousand hermits. They have rung through the deep valleys of the Alps, in the sobbing voices of the forlorn Waldenses; through the steeps and caves of Scottish highlands, in the rude chantings of the Scottish Covenanters; through the woods and wilds of primitive America, in the heroic hallelujahs of the early pilgrims.”

Specimens of Newspaper Literature. With Personal Memoirs, Anecdotes, and Reminiscences. By Joseph T. Buckingham. Boston: Little & Brown. 2 vols. 12mo.

The author of these volumes has been long extensively known as one of the leading editors of the country; and his age and experience peculiarly qualify him to do justice to the subject he here undertakes to treat. His own recollections must extend back some sixty years; and during that period he has been constantly connected with newspapers, either as printer’s apprentice, journeyman, or editor. He knew intimately most of the editors and writers for the press, who took prominent parts in the political controversies at the formation of the government, and during the first twenty years of its administration, and he is thoroughly acquainted with all the New England newspapers which appeared before the Revolution and during its progress. The work, therefore, is a reflection of the spirit of old times, giving their very “form and pressure,” and exhibiting, sometimes in a ludicrous light, old political passions in all their original frenzy of thought and form of expression. The specimens given of newspaper literature, in verse and prose, are all interesting either for their folly or wisdom, and some of them are valuable as curiosities of rhetoric and logic. Not only is the work valuable to the antiquary, the historian, and the members of “the craft,” but it contains matter sufficiently piquant to stimulate and preserve the attention of the general reader.

The author of these volumes is a marked instance of that inherent strength of character which pursues knowledge under difficulties, and is victorious over all obstacles which obstruct the elevation of the friendless. Without having received even a school education, and passing the period that boys usually devote to Lindley Murray in a printing office, he is one of the most vigorous and polished writers in New England, and in thorough acquaintance with classical English literature has no superiors. Every thing he writes bears the signs, not merely of intellect and taste, but of forcible character; and we believe that a selection from his newspaper articles would make a volume, which for originality of thought, and raciness of expression, would be an addition to our literature.

Songs of Labor, and Other Poems. By John G. Whittier. Boston: Ticknor, Reed & Fields. 1 vol. 12mo.

Whittier’s popularity, great as it is, must be increased by these Songs of Labor. In them, the Ship-Builders, Shoemakers, Drovers, Fishermen, Huskers and Lumbermen, are gifted with vigorous and melodious utterance, in songs whose chime is the very echo of their occupations. The other poems of the collection are of a merit as various as their themes. The best is the poem entitled “Memories,” one of the most exquisitely tender, thoughtful and imaginative poems in our literature. “Pious IX.” and “Elliott,” are essentially battle-pieces, and the rhymes clash together like the crossing of swords. Fierce and hot as the invective of these poems is, we still think the business of wrath is much better done in “Ichabod,” in which rage and scorn take the form of a dirge, and smiting sarcasms are insinuated through the phrases of grief. Throughout the volume we are impressed with the great nature of the author, and the superiority of the man to any thing he has yet produced. He unites, in a singular degree, tenderness with strength, delicate fancy with blazing imagination, sensitive sentiment with sturdy character; and his most exhilarating and trumpet-voiced lyrics have the air of impromptus. In the following lines, for instance, from a poem in the present volume on “The Peace Convention at Brussels,” he extemporises as good heroic verse as Campbell’s:

Still in thy streets, oh Paris! doth the stain

Of blood defy the cleansing autumn rain;

Still breaks the smoke Messina’s ruins through,

And Naples mourns that new Bartholomew,

When squalid beggary, for a dole of bread,

At a crowned murderer’s beck of license, fed

The yawning trenches with her noble dead;

Still, doomed Vienna, through thy stately halls

The shell goes crashing and the red shot falls,

And, leagued to crush thee on the Danube’s side,

The beamed Croat and Bosniak spearman ride;

Still in that vale where Himalaya’s snow

Melts round the corn-fields and the vines below,

The Sikh’s hot cannon, answering ball for ball,

Flames in the breach of Moultan’s shattered wall;

On Chenab’s side the vulture seeks the slain,

And Sutlej paints with blood its banks again.

Rural Hours. By a Lady. New York: George P. Putnam. 1 vol. 12mo.

To judge from the dedication, the authoress of this goodly duodecimo must be the daughter of Cooper, the novelist. She has much of her father’s remarkable descriptive power, but is happily deficient in that fretful discontent which disturbs the harmony of his later productions. The volume will be found a delightful companion both to the denizen of the city and country. The writer wins upon the reader’s sympathies with every page. Her intelligence is clear and quiet, enlarged by intimacy with nature and good books, and elevated by a beautiful and unobtrusive piety. We hope this will not be her last production.

Sleep Psychologically Considered with reference to Sensation and Memory. By Blanchard Fosgate, M. D. New York: George P. Putnam. 1 vol. 12mo.

This thin volume is devoted to a subject which, though its discussion involves a consideration of topics properly metaphysical, has more general interest than any other in the science of metaphysics, because its phenomena stimulate the curiosity of all who, like Richard the Third, are troubled with dreams. The author supports, with great power of illustration and argument, three propositions, viz., that during sleep the mental faculties are as active as during wakefulness; that memory is no criterion by which to judge the mind in sleep; and that the mind is dependent upon the integrity of the organs of external sensation for a remembrance of what transpires during this state. The discussion of these topics is enlivened by many curious examples.

Europe, Past and Present. By Francis H. Ungewitter, LL. D. New York: George P. Putnam. 1 vol. 12mo.

This is a thick volume of some seven hundred pages, completely crammed with facts relating to the history, geography, and present condition of every state in Europe. The index, containing ten thousand names, will convey an idea of the amount of matter which the author has compressed into his volume. Though a work of vast labor, we presume that its value, as a work for constant reference, will amply repay the expense of compiling it. Every man who reads European news should possess the book, provided he desires to read news intelligently. It gives accurate ideas of the relative importance of the various States, by exhibiting their financial condition as well as their territory, population, and productions.

Chronicle of the Conquest of Grenada. (Irving’s Works, vol. 14.) New York: George P. Putnam. 1 vol. 12mo.

Every lover of the romantic and picturesque in history will heartily welcome this re-issue of Irving’s charming Chronicle. By assuming the position of a contemporary, he is enabled to exhibit the prejudices of the time with almost dramatic vividness, and to give events some of the coloring they derived from Spanish bigotry without obscuring their real nature and import. The beautiful mischievousness of the occasional irony which peeps through the narrative, is in the author’s happiest style. The book might easily be expanded into a dozen novels, so rich is it in materials of description and adventure. In its present form it is replete with accurate history, represented with pictorial vividness.

Domestic History of the American Revolution. By Mrs. Ellet, Author of the Women of the American Revolution. New York: Baker & Scribner. 1 vol. 12mo.

The theme which Mrs. Ellet has chosen is an important one, and absolutely necessary to be comprehended by all who wish to understand the American Revolution as a living fact. The great defect of most of our national histories and biographies is their abstract character, neither characters nor events being represented in the concrete, and brought directly home to the hearts and imaginations of readers. The result is, that most of us, when we attempt to be patriotic, slide so readily into bombast; for having no distinct conceptions of what was really done and suffered by our forefathers and foremothers, we can only glorify them by a resort to the dictionary. Mrs. Ellet’s book is devoted to those scenes and persons in our revolutionary history, in exhibiting which the novelist is commonly so far in advance of the historian; and she has performed her task with much discrimination in the selection of materials, and no little pictorial power in representing what she has selected.

The Vale of Cedars; or The Martyr. By Grace Aguilar. New York: D. Appleton & Co. 1 vol. 12mo.

This is Grace Aguilar’s last work, in the most melancholy sense of the word, she having died of consumption shortly after its completion. The story is one of much interest; the sentiments beautiful and pure; the style sweet and pleasing. We have read none of her novels with more satisfaction than this. At a period when romance writing has been so much perverted from its true purpose, it is delightful to find a novelist who, to a talent for narrative, united a regard for the highest and purest sentiments of human nature.

Norman Leslie: A Tale. By C. G. H., author of the “Curate of Linwood,” etc. New York: D. Appleton & Co. 1 vol. 12mo.

This novel, in title the same as one by Theodore S. Fay, is in matter and style very different. It is a historical novel of the period of the religious wars in Scotland, and though not peculiarly excellent in characters, is filled with stirring events and attractive scenes. The publishers, without much increasing the price, have printed it in a style of much neatness. Large type and white paper are a blessing not commonly vouchsafed to American novel readers.

Margaret Percival in America. A Tale. Edited by a New England Minister, A. M. Boston: Phillips, Sampson & Co. 1 vol. 12mo.

“Margaret Percival,” by Miss Sewall, has had a large circulation in this country, and it is but right that the present novel, which not only represents Margaret as a more tolerant Christian, but describes the process by which she became so, should be read by all who have been influenced by the English Margaret.

Life, Here and There: Or Sketches of Society and Adventure at Far-Apart Times and Places. By N. P. Willis. New York: Baker & Scribner. 1 vol. 12mo.

This thick and handsome duodecimo contains many of the most charming and sprightly of Mr. Willis’s popular compositions, evincing that singular combination of sentiment and shrewdness, of poetic feeling and knowledge of the world, in which he has no American rival. The style, airy, graceful and fluent, is distinguished by a “polished want of polish,” a fertility of apt and fanciful expression, and a gliding ease of movement, which take the reader captive, and bear him on through “long reaches of delight.”

The Berber: Or the Mountaineer of the Atlas. A Tale of Morocco, By William Starbuck Mayo, M. D., Author of “Kaloolah,” etc. New York: George P. Putnam. 1 vol. 12mo.

This novel has hardly the fresh, dashing, daring character of Dr. Mayo’s first romance, but it still has sufficient raciness and audacity to serve for a score of common novels. The author has great tact in so choosing his scenes and characters that the peculiar powers of his mind can have free play. In “The Berber” the incidents follow each other in such quick succession that we make no demands for originality or power of characterization. In respect to the latter, Dr. Mayo is so far deficient, though he gives evidence of being capable of drawing characters as well as telling a story.

The Companion. After-Dinner Table-Talk. By Chetwood Evelyn, Esq. New York: Geo. P. Putnam. 1 vol. 12mo.

The idea of this volume is capital. It consists of short and spicy selections from eminent authors, and anecdotes of distinguished men, of a character very different from those which form the staple of jest-books. The principal source whence the editor has derived his brilliancies, is that most gentlemanly of wits and humorists, Sydney Smith; and a fine portrait of him very properly adorns the title page. The book would have been even better than it is, if the author had drawn his matter from a wider circle of reading.

Reginald Hastings; a Tale of the Troubles of 164-. By Elliott Warburton, Author of “The Crescent and the Cross,” etc. New York: Harper & Brothers.

This novel has been absurdly puffed in England, but it is nevertheless an interesting and well written one, worthy the pen which wrote “The Crescent and the Cross.” The period in which its events and characters are laid, the Great Rebellion, so called, has not recently been treated, but it has great capabilities for romantic and humorous characterization, which Warburton has employed, not indeed with the sagacity and genius of Scott, but with much skill and with dramatic effect.

Memoirs of the Life of Anne Boleyn, Queen of Henry VIII. By Miss Benger. From the Third London Edition. With a Memoir of the Author, by Miss Aiken. 1 vol. Philadelphia: A. Hart.

In some respects we prefer this memoir to that by Miss Strickland. The only fault we have to find with Miss Benger, indeed, is that she is too eulogistic. No one, in this age, doubts that Anne Boleyn was an innocent woman, who fell a victim partly to political intrigue, partly to her husband’s fickleness; but it is useless to deny that she had ambition, and ridiculous to claim for her the character of a saint. She was, in a word, a witty, graceful, well-read, fascinating female, vain of applause, a little free in her manners, a fast friend, and a bitter enemy. She never loved the king, as she might have loved Percy, had not Wolsey crossed her path, and converted her into a haughty, scheming, ambitious woman; but she never, on the other hand, violated her vows toward Henry, or failed in the discharge of any wifely duty. Her conduct during the two years that the divorce was in progress is the most censurable part of her life. We cannot forgive her for wringing the heart of the unoffending Catharine. Nor for her favor toward Henry at this time can we esteem her as we would have wished. But from the period that she became the lawful wife of the king her character visibly improves. She was affable to the low, courteous to the high, charitable to the needy, just to all. As her sorrows increase her character rises in loveliness; her frivolity is cast aside, the haughtiness departs, and the true nobleness of her heart shines forth. Nothing in history is more pathetic than the story of her arrest, trial, and execution. In a court where she had scarcely a friend, she bore herself with the fortitude of a martyr, asserting her innocence with an earnestness that carried conviction even to those who condemned her; and on the scaffold, though her over-wrought nerves occasionally found vent in hysterical gayety, her lofty and heroic soul triumphed over the terrible spectacle of the axe, the block, the gaping crowd. Her closing career, indeed, has all the grandeur of a tragedy. We read of it with eyes dim with tears, and with a heart execrating her murderers.

The volume is beautifully printed, and embellished with a portrait, copied from the celebrated picture of Holbein.

Lynch’s Dead Sea Expedition. A new and Condensed Edition. 1 vol. Philadelphia: Lea & Blanchard.

The original edition of this work was printed on such costly paper, and illustrated with so many engravings that hundreds of persons, who desired to purchase it, were withheld by the necessarily high price. To meet the wishes of this class, the present cheap edition has been issued. There has been no material change in the letter-press; the few alterations that have been made are for the better; but the engravings are omitted; the volume is printed on poorer paper, and the page is not quite so large. On the whole we think this edition more desirable than the first. So much valuable information is embraced in the narrative of Lieutenant Lynch, that persons curious respecting the Holy Land, and especially respecting the Dead Sea, will find themselves amply repaid by a perusal, and even a re-perusal of this work. Numerous popular fables respecting the Jordan, the Sea of Galilee, and the dread Lake of Gomorrah are exploded in this volume; and a mass of instructive evidence imparted respecting the geographical character of Palestine, its former fertility, and the general habits of its inhabitants. It is impossible to read this work without obtaining new light in the understanding of Scripture.

Life and Correspondence of Andrew Combe. M. D. By George Combe. 1 vol. Philadelphia: A. Hart.

Andrew Combe was almost as universally celebrated for his works on physiology as his brother, George, is for his writings in connection with phrenology. The present biography is a tribute, by the elder brother, to the usefulness of the younger. As the story of a life, made beneficial to the human race through a compassionate and wise heart, and this amid constant ill-health, it is one of the most valuable offerings of the century to biographical literature. Apart from this, however, it has a merit in the narrative of Dr. Combe’s protracted illness, and the means used successfully by him to prolong life. An early victim to consumption, he arrested the progress of disease, and protracted his existence for more than twenty years, during which period all of his best works were written. The volume teaches two important lessons: the first, that in the study of physiology, alleviation may be found for much of human suffering; the second, that, even in sickness and sorrow, it is possible, instead of remaining entirely a burden to others, to be a benefactor of our race. We have read this work with deep interest, and believe it will afford equal satisfaction to others.

Picturesque Sketches of Greece and Turkey. By Aubrey de Vere. 1 vol. Philadelphia: A. Hart.

The author of this volume is known, in England, as a poet of some merit. In the present work he has attempted a new role, and has succeeded in it, we are free to confess, in the very best manner. Mr. De Vere is at once a scholar and a gentleman. The former qualification renders him a peculiarly fitting traveler on the classic soil of Greece; the latter enables him to depict what he has seen in a manner not offensive to good taste. We have had so many cockney books on Greece, we have seen flunkeyism so rampant even in Constantinople, that it is refreshing to find a work like the present, in which the knowledge of the man of the world, the stores of the student, and the enthusiasm of the poet are all combined. The volume first arrested our attention by its elegant appearance, and, having once begun it, we could not lay it aside till we had finished it. There is much in the book, it is true, which a well-read man will recognize as old; but then the style makes even this have an air of freshness. On the other hand the work really contains a good deal that is new.

The Phantom World; or the Philosophy of Apparitions, Ghosts, etc. By Augustus Calmet. With Introduction and Notes by the Rev. Henry Christmas, M. A. 1 vol. Philadelphia: A. Hart.

A pleasant, perhaps instructive book, though this last is as people view it. For our part we hold that the way to make folk believe in ghosts is to cram them, especially in childhood, with stories of apparitions. Personally, we have little faith in phantoms. However “chacun à son gout;” and therefore, to those who like speculating about ghosts, we recommend this work.

Reminiscences of Congress. By Charles Marsh. 1 vol. New York: Baker & Scribner.

We have here a number of lively and trustworthy sketches of public men, written in a style that reminds us of Grant’s sketches of The English Parliament. We had intended devoting some space to the work, as one peculiarly deserving consideration, but for want of room, are obliged to defer, and perhaps abandon our purpose.

Extraordinary Popular Delusions. By Charles Mackey. 2 vols. Philadelphia: Lindsay & Blackiston.

This is a readable book, especially at this crisis, when Rochester knockings, Clairvoyance, and other wonders fill the public mind. The author has compiled a history of all the popular delusions, with which different generations have been misled; nor has he confined himself merely to mysteries like the knockings, but has discussed the South Sea Bubble, the Mississippi Scheme, and other vagaries of a similar character.

Echoes of the Universe; or the World of Matter, and the World of Spirit. By the Rev. H. A. Christmas, M. A. 1 vol. Philadelphia: A. Hart.

The publisher characterizes this work as a companion to the “Vestiges of Creation;” but he might, more justly, have described it as an antidote to that skeptical volume. We cordially recommend the book.

A Modern History, from the Time of Luther to the Fall of Napoleon. By John Lord, A. M. Philadelphia: T. Cowperthwait & Co. 1 vol. 12mo.

The author of this work is well known as an accomplished lecturer on history in the principal cities of the Northern and Middle States. The present work shows great power of compression as well as wealth of information. Though the work is designed for colleges and schools, it will be found of much value to the general reader as a guide to historical studies.

History of the Polk Administration. By Lucian B. Chase, a Member of the 29th and 30th Congresses. New York: Geo. P. Putnam. 1 vol. 8vo.

The author of this volume, though a political supporter of the late President, has written an interesting account of the important events which occurred in his administration. The partisan character of the work prevents it from coming properly under the name of “history,” but it contains a well arranged statement of a vast mass of facts, valuable both to the intelligent Whig and Democrat.

The American Quarterly Register and Magazine. Conducted by James Stryker. December, 1849. Vol. III., No. 2. Philadelphia: Published by the Proprietor.

The second number of the third volume of this work is now before us. That which Judge Stryker undertook to perform he has faithfully complied with, and the public are now secure in the permanent existence of a periodical which will prove a treasury of information, and which was long since needed. The deficiency is now supplied, and ably supplied; and we can safely predict that it will command a liberal and generous support.