thing. We need not expend any criticism upon a book whose heroes-intended for polished and perfect gentlemen-talk such unfortunate syntax and rhetoric as this: "It is nothing; merely the recurrence of a little attack similar to which I am often subject, and will soon pass away.""A strong eye will beard a lion."—"I attend you, certain "-" the brothers will please draw around the desk in a circular form, and so spread themselves out that every one can see and be seen." First to take a circular form; then to spread themselves out. We think we have seen one of the Ravels do something of . that kind; and the result was that he presented the discoid appearance of a very large pumpkin, smashed very flat. Few persons, having undergone that ceremony, would know anything thenceforward. -Having read FANNY FERN's Ruth Hall; and considering what we suppose to be the fact, and to have been already discovered by most of its readers, that it is, in substance, a furious bombardment of her own family, we think, that very seldom bas so angry a book been published. It is full and overflowing with an unfemininely bitter wrath and spite. We are not called upon to discuss the verisimilitude of the characters in the book. Yet it cannot all be true. We do not believe, for instance, that any parents of the grade and culture of the Ellets and the Halls were ever the deliberate teasing devils whom Fanny Fern has drawn. The school examination is the most outrageous caricature; the scenes with publishers savor very strongly of romance. If the book has any purpose in its anger, its heedlessness and overstraining will defeat them. As a work of art, the book is extremely imperfect. This we say, on the charitable hypothesis that it is simply a novel, and nothing more nor less. It is better than the newspaper paragraphs, which have been the staple of Fanny's former books. Those were sketchy, scrappy, and unsubstantial to the very last degree of flimsiness, although certainly they contained many terse and striking sentences. But careful thought and faithful elimination must go to the making of a valuable book; and of thos, in Ruth Hall, there is none. If Fanny Fern should write ten times as much, and then selecting the tenth part of it, should construct it into a work of the size of Ruth Hall, she would do justice to herself and the public; which she has not yet done. -We lag far behind the bore or great Gangetic tidal wave of laudation which has lifted The Newsboy before the public. This circumstance gives us the advantage of consulting very many other specimens of opinion; which have been so uniformly favorable, that we must needs feel a diffidence in differing. But it is uncommon, in this world, unprecedented, indeed, until the days of Bob, the Newsboy, to find ragged street boys having a correct metaphysical intuition and a habit of ethical reasoning? who never do anything wrong, being upborne above all wickedness by their inbred goodness; who adopt and bring up destitute small girls, keeping house with them in deserted railroad cars, and do fifty other missionary deeds. Since, however, the author of the Newsboy has discovered one ragged angel of this description, let us hope that Ragged Schools and Newsboys' Lodging Rooms will be superseded by the voluntary enterprise of their students and occupants. Bob had hypertrophy of the heartat least, that viscus is never mentioned, we believe, except as his "great" heart. Seriously; besides the endless repetition of this single epithet, and the wonderful and almost heretical, at least, latitudinarian goodness of the hero. The .Newsboy, as a work of art, is almost beneath criticism. As a history of fact, it is, of course absurd as a romance, it is slatternly in plot, entirely unsatisfactory in catastrophe, flatulently sentimental, tawdry and forced in diction, ragged and careless in delineating character, without any moral or point of any kind, one of the very emptiest and leanest of the horde of lean and empty books which have been so impertinently shoved before the public for a year or two. A taking title; a suscepti bility of unbounded advertising; such, and the last not distinctive, are its most strik ing merits. -We have received three volumes of poems; first adventures, all. The task of appreciating such efforts is difficult, from the impossibility of judging what latent talent they may or may not indicate. The poetic faculty often acts like the Afreet coming out of the brazen vessel. It spreads out in vast indistinct thin clouds, with out specific gravity or coherence; and afterwards, if at all, it concentrates and defines itself, and takes a shape of significance and power. These three volumes are productions of this smoky period. There could be no possible reason for publishing them, were it not that a poet who publishes, must publish a first volume, and, usually, his first volume must be-not very good. The sooner, therefore, it may be argued, this first volume is out, the sooner will something valuable succeed it. We cannot, in conscience, praise these works, except faintly. Yet our suggestion of defects is made, because it is the proper commentary, and more in reference to future improvement, than present shortcomings. Mr. PAUL H. HAYNE'S Poems, Mr. WILLIAM WINTER'S Poems, and Pebbles from the Lake Shore, by CHARLES L. PORTER, are the books under consideration. They are all indistinct in thought; the efflux of mere emotions, or of conceptions not studied long enough to have any clearness. Mr. Hayne's are perhaps most deficient here. The names in the table of contents, even, afford an instance. "A FragmentLines Sunset - Lines-Stanzas-LinesThe Realm of Rest-Lines-Lines-Imagination and Memory-On poems are not written for a clear purpose; or with a distinct central thought. The Mr. Hayne's verses are also worst constructed. He often takes leave to accent the last syllable of a past passive participle to make out his metre ; as, " parchéd." Once, at least, the weak vocable "the," has to shoulder the arsis of a foot. Care and study will remedy these faults. Mr. Porter's and Mr. Winter's verses are more correct in structure, and a little more rigorous in thought and diction. In these, however, we notice a fault which Mr. Hayne has avoided, and which is very common in college poems, namely, too many varieties of metre and rhythm in one production. This may be meant to show the writer's command over the mechanism of poetry; but it looks as if the mechanism of poetry commanded him; as if he could not subdue the language under steady rules, but was forced, like a weak-handed driver, to let his Pegasus trot, walk, or canter at his own will. All three of our authors indulge in very much imagery and illustration, which seldom has any considerable newness or beauty either in itself, or in poetic relation to the matter in hand. For instance, the first stanza of Mr. Hayne's book : "Broad in the tempered rays of the red sun, The Egyptian desert glittered leagues away. Great clouds of floating dust, confused and dun, Hung heavy on the haggard brow of day, And veiled the fiery light of that fierce clime, As centuries veil the land's mysterious prime." Again; as a specimen of the sorrowful atmosphere which shrouds the verses, take these from Mr. Winter-who is perhaps the saddest of the three-and let it be remembered that the poet whose life is thus poisoned at the fountain-head is only eighteen "These but distress when thus they're thought on! The past can only live again In sighs, in bitter tears, in pain- Careful thought, intense study of English, of versification, of nature and of poetry, will enable these gentlemen to do well in the path which they have entered. But without those qualifications, they have no right to publish any more verses. -REV. E. H. CHAPIN's volume of discourses, entitled Humanity in the City, is marked by the proper care and fluent style of the well-known eloquent author. They continue a series already published; and deal in a somewhat cautious spirit with the abuses and miseries peculiar to city life, and the indications thence arising for Christian conduct in respect to them. -WHEWELL and BREWSTER, on the question of stellar inhabitation, are intrepidly followed-afar off-by an anonym, who puts forth his views in a volume with the somewhat awkward title, The Universe no Desert--the Earth no Monopoly. The argument is in favor of a plurality of inhabited worlds; but we doubt whether previous reasonings are much reinforced by it. The argument from the unity of design which is discovered in the constitution of this world and the kingdoms of it, is altogether too prolix, and partly irrelevant. Indeed, the book is crowded with bold assumptions, careless statement, disorderly arrangement, and inconsequent reasoning, all fortified by the dicta of Andrew Jackson Davis, and culminating after a rather truncated fashion, with a very brief ex cathedrȧ description of the inhabitants of certain planets and fixed stars, by that uncomfortable materialist, Emanuel Swedenborg. The half hidden sneering tone of many passages, and the peculiar style of the staring argumentative and linguistic de ex fects, as well as the tone and tendency of the whole work, remind us forcibly of A. J. Davis' Harmonia and Revelations. If it were not that he is quoted several times, we should incline to ascribe its authorship to him. Take a few miscellaneous tracts. Vol. I. The italics are ours :"It is clear that animal instincts are mathematically adapted to the countries they inhabit."-P. 61. "Ducks, geese, and petrels are of the web-footed tribe, and principalize the birds "-P. 55. P. 90, argument is based on Josephus' assertion, as endorsed by Berosus, that the grandsons of Adam studied astronomy, and recorded observations on it. P. 101, we find the muddy statement that "the march" (of scientific discovery) "has been systematic, according to one plan, as it has in the development of every physical phenomenon from the germination and growth of a seed or egg, to the formation of the globe. One mind seems to have superintended the whole train, in all its evolutions. All the various rays directly and unerringly converge towards the grand focus of Unity." These sentences are the climax of a chapter intended to prove an analogy of serial development in the two diverse departments of the Creation of the World on one hand, and human scientific discovery on the other. Chap. VII. almost begins with the following "The sphere, spheroid, ellipse, cone, cylinder, are aggregations of circles. Hence, to the planets, stars and comets, a circular motion seems to have been most natural." Non sequitur; for if a sphere moves naturally, as Mr. Hannibal Chollop would say, "in a circ'lar direction," it follows that a three-cornered thing would naturally move in a three cornered direction; also, that Baron Munchausen did shoot off half a bushel of snipe's legs, by firing at them round a haystack; both of which are absurd. Page 48. A series of fractions is stated indicating the arcs of circumference of the stems of certain plants, which separate the insertion of their successive leaf-stems, the plants being named in the following order-grass, grass (second species), rosebush and blackberry bush, willow, white pine, common pine cone. Then, page 85-6, another series of fractions, obtained by using the "orbital period" of Neptune (assumed at sixty thousand days) as common denominator, and taking for numerators the corresponding periods of the following planets, in this order :-Uranus, Saturn, Jupiter, Planetoids (averaged) Mars, Venus, Mercury. And the following triumphant conclusion is deduced: "They" (the two series) "are identical, not only in substance and value, but in the process of formation. If all this does not tend to prove a comparative uniformity of great things with smail, and to indicate one connected network of plan and system, what does?" We don't see it. We are inclined to believe that no human mind but Barnum's can comprehend the herculean grasp which dragged such a mermaid conclusion from such fish-and-monkey premises. Page 107. "Nutrition needs digestion, digestion needs circulation, circulation needs respiration, respiration needs air, air needs water." Vol. II., p. 104, it is argued, first, that a convex lens has to be removed (to a certain extent) from an object, in order to adjust the focus upon such object; second, that the atmosphere has the properties of a convex lens; and third, therefore (in the margin), "remove the sun (why not the lens?) "further off, and a corresponding" (increased is meant) "intensity of heat will follow. Our atmosphere is dense enough for a little further removal to cause a conflagration of .. the earth itself. Solar fire" (i. e. the sun's rays when removed) "would burn a hole through its equator." An equator with a hole burnt through it! Hence, if we wish to be warm, we should go away from the fire. We refrain from gamboling further in the rich fields which our nameless author opens for animadversion. The book is so loose a bundle of rags that it is too much like child's play to tatter it further. -Mr. SEBA SMITH, accompanying himself with his famous straw auxiliary, or rather doppelganger, Jack Downing, has collected into one volume a number of short sketches, under the name of 'Way Down East. Most or all of them we have seen in periodicals heretofore; several of them are funny and spirited; especially "Polly Gray and the Doctors," "Jerry Guttridge " and Seth Woodsum's wife." The remainder are respectable; some of them, however, having the peculiarity of tapering off in a disappointing manner, without any perceptible catrastrophe. The book, to those who have not read it before, will on the whole prove entertaining. -The History and Poetry of Finger Rings, by CHARLES EDWARDS, Esq., is an odd and heterogeneous collection of curious scraps of information, from legend, song and history, tracing the history and significances of the ornament discussed, from the patriarchal times downward. Various collateral matters of interest are likewise pleasantly considered. That very rare and graceful little poem, reported to be Shakespeare's, to his mistress, Anne Hathaway, is given—of which, however, the disjunct morsel, "Anne Hathaway, she hath a way," is floating up and down the sea of literature. And there are interesting and justifiable digressions upon amulets and charms, even to the "mad stones" lately stated to exist in Virginia, which extract animal poisons from wounds. A very slight formality of style is here and there perceptible; but it is a quality not inappropriate to the quaint researches of an antiquarian or virtuoso. -Brushwood Picked up on the Continent, by ORVILLE HORWITZ, is a journal of occurrences in an ordinary European tour. It contains not much that is new, something that is sprightly, and a sort of justification or apology for licensed gambling and prostitution wholly inexpedient, latitudinarian and immoral, to say the least. -Too many technical words are usually thought necessary in medical books, for the profit of the generality of persons. Dr. JACOB BIGELOw's work, Nature in Disease, is perhaps as free from those encumbrances as could be expected. It is a collection of discourses on various medical topics, some more and some less adapted to the purpose of the general reader; but all distinguished by the clear arrangement and lucid statement, which seem almost ex-officio, the privilege of skilful physicians. The most interesting of all, is the paper on the Burial of the Dead; which contains several curious accounts of the opening of ancient tombs. -Mr. CHARLES GAYARRE'S History of Louisiana under the Spanish domination, is a well written sequel to his former volume on a preceding period. It contains a considerable mass of matter extracted from original documents; which renders it rather heavy. The volume would be much more valuable and readable, if it furnished fuller accounts of the domestic life of the people their manners and customs at their homes and places of business. The history of the dispute between the Jesuits and Capuchins is an instance-almost the only one of the material to which we refer ; and it is the pleasantest part of the volume-not for its scandal, but for its information of significant details. -GRACE GREENWOOD'S Merrie England is a collection of old English legends, in a graceful and spirited style, and so told as to be entertaining to the little people, to whose pleasure and profit Grace seems to have devoted herself. -Day-Dreams by a Butterfly, is a work which we prefer to let speak for itself. We may just introduce it, however, as a dactylic metaphysical poem, of about one hundred and thirty pages. The great question of existence is thus investigated: "Or live we in thee And move? Life's great sea, A wave of thy being, roll on? The scintils of thought from its throne?" ¡ The eternity of matter is affirmed in rhyme, as follows: "As we firmly hold To the dogma bold, That matter, if such has aye been, So, that it will be To eternity, By th' optics of reason is seen." Sundry other deep questions are treated in the same style. We apprehend that these two extracts will, however, enable our readers to judge whether the poem will assist their investigations in mental and moral philosophy. Such studies are pills for which a good gilding of rhyme and rhythm may be a pleasant vehicle to somebody. REPRINTS.-LADY SCOTT'S novel, The Pride of Life, is ingeniously so contrived, that it is hard to say whether the authoress wrote in sympathy with the sorrows she describes, or in irony at the toady souls that could feel such sorrow. We hope that very few Americans will understand the book. We read it as a boat drives knocking against a short heavy head seathumped and thumped by shocks of sur prise at the inadequacy of all the motives which all the way were stirring up mortal grief and anger, breaking up families and killing men and women. Observe:-Mordaunt Eveleyn, a young man of "noble blood," but not very wealthy-being allowed only four thousand dollars a year-marries a young woman of surpassing beauty, and lovely character, great artistic talent and intellectual culture, superior indeed, in every way, to himself. And thereupon, the fool of a mother, whose life is devoted to sell her daughters to lords and her son to a lady, in the name of wife and husband, and the foolish father whose weak will has been bert into the same channel; and the flippant, stylish sisters, who are sold or to be sold, are hurried away into passions, whirlwinds, paralyses of quenchless grief and mortification. In order to cover their shame, they plot; they lie; they take joyful refuge under the pretence that the young lady is a nobleman's bastard! "unacknowledged daughter" is the delicate fashionable equivalent. She herself is brutally sequestered from intercourse with her father, mother and brother; tortured and compressed into the proper -"repose That marks the caste of Vere de Vere," and introduced to the titled relatives of her husband, as a sneering-stock to spit their fashionable venomous envy on; they had made other arrangements for the young man. Are there such people-animals-in England, and so many of them, that this is to be considered a portraiture of actual manners there? We had hardly supposed it. We repeat that it seems to us, that the story must seem as unnatural and uninteresting to us this side of the Atlantic, as if all the agony and anger and sickness and death, had been deduced from Mordaunt Eveleyn's marriage with a lady outside of the pale of fashionable society, on account of having red hair, and always preferring gunpowder tea to young hyson. -The central idea of Heartsease (by the author of The Heir of Redclyffe) is the same with that of The Pride of Life; namely the experience of a wife, married for her loveliness, into a sphere "above" her own. Perhaps novels of this species are a sign and outgrowth of the gradual equalization which seems to be slowly supervening upon the stratified texture of English society. But the book is of a much higher order, morally and artistically, than Lady Scott's. The characters are exceedingly well drawn and distinguished. Violet is a true and lovely woman, operating upon her unstable husband, and her outrageously proud sister-in-law, Theodora, by forces beautiful and womanly, unconscious and still, but powerful and sure. Her own trials and changes, and those of her relatives, are very skillfully developed. The book, although not of the intense kind, bears evidence of very keen observation, and very true and careful thought; and as a work of art, must rank very high. There is one noticeable defect, in the management of the moral. This, which was apparently intended to permeate the whole texture of the narrative, is stuck in in unassimilated, uncomfortable lumps. We come upon them as upon an unexpected jolt; with a start and an "oh !" -PHILLIPS, SAMPSON, & Co. publish a neat volume containing the poems of COLLINS, GRAY, and GOLDSMITH, under the editorship of EPES SARGENT, Esq. The handsome paper and open type render this a very pleasant library volume. --LITTLE, BROWN & Co.'s Aldine series of the English Poets, edited by Professor Child, is continued with WORDSWORTH'S Poetical Works, in seven volumes. This set of books is of a very convenient size for reading, and the typographical execution is admirable. NEW EDITION.-We have received a second edition of Rev. C. KINGSLEY'S POWerful and suggestive novel, Hypatia. TRANSLATIONS.-Can the Saxon mind properly value the Gaulish? We doubt it. We are willing to grant that French authors possess excellences which we cannot see-that it is our blindness which has something to do with the failure-and that it is only because ours is the Anglo-Saxon mind, that we prefer the productions of Anglo-Saxon writers. Whatever may be the reason, such at any rate is the fact. We remember, clearly enough the unsatisfactory result of our studies in Berquin's writings for children. And Madame GuiZor's Popular Tales impress us similarly now. Not that they are not well and gracefully told; not that they lack adventure, or probability. But they are not agreeable, in our judgment. For this we see two causes, other than the inborn prejudices above |