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his view. This book professes to describe one hundred and eleven different experiments, with every variety of materials taken from the earth and the heavens-meteoric stones-and from the waters under the earth. Besides the detail of these experiments, it professes to explain many other kindred phenomena. It also gives a sort of analysis and rationale of the psychometric process, by Mrs. Elizabeth M. F. Denton, who was the subject of many of these experiments. Mrs. D. attempts to make the process intelligible to all who have not experienced it, by anticipating all possible objections and questions, and answering them as satisfactorily as she

can.

This is a brief account of the contents of this volume, which is quite a curiosity in its way. We do not feel qualified to pronounce upon the experiments that are narrated in it, for the best of all reasons, that we have not had the opportunity of cross-examining the witnesses.

LETTERS TO THE JONESES.*-In these letters Dr. Holland has followed the same vein which in 1858 he began to work in his "Letters to Young People," only opening here and there, as the miners say, "a new lead." In other words, he has addressed a great variety of people, both old and young, in respect to their follies and errors, in a strain of good natured but very plain-spoken advice. These letters have the great merit of plainness of speech, without the slightest tinge of bad temper. Their good humor is irresisti. ble, and is not a little enhanced by the exaggeration approaching to caricature in which the portraitures are drawn, and the sort of mock solemnity in which the castigations are administered. Both these features are eminently fitted to render the book immensely popular in the universal Yankee Nation. The faults and foibles of this class of humanity are admirably understood by the ingenious author, and he certainly knows how to catch their car and please their tastes, while he administers wholesome advice.

The volume will do more good to multitudes than scores of sermons. Indeed it will reach many who never listen to sermons at all, or who will be prepared to hear sermons from the pulpit for the first time, by having previously read the less formal and more familiar discourses of that eminent lay-preacher, Timothy Titcomb,

* Letters to the Joneses. By TIMOTHY TITCOMB, author of "Letters to Young People," &c., &c. New York: Charles Scribner, 1863. 12mo. pp. 347. [New Haven: Judd & Clark. Price $1.50.]

Esq. We trust the venerable personage will long live to prosecute the duties of his vocation.

MY FARM OF EDGEWOOD.*-We opened this volume to while away a leisure hour by turning over its pages, and by resting the eye here and there upon a choice passage, such as we were certain we should find, from our knowledge of the other works of the author. We did not close the book till we had stolen a long evening from pressing occupations, as well as from the claims of sleep. Instead of reading here and there a page or a paragraph, we followed the book through, leaving nothing unread. It might be, in part, because we know the farm of Edgewood, and are not unfamiliar with the level, carpet-like plat that stretches out toward the east, and the billowing hill that rises so abruptly toward the west, and the hollow into which it dips so suddenly. We have watched the changes in this hollow, as it has been transformed from the coarse, bog-grown marsh into the inviting meadow, skirted so beautifully by the groups of shrubbery and flowers planted afront the ledges and boulders that obtrude themselves from the foot of the hill-side. It may be, also, that our own love of farming life has qualified us, in part, to read the narrative of the author with an enthusiasm somewhat akin to that which inspired it, and that we know how to sympathize with Wordsworth's "Farmer of Tilsbury Vale," who, though doomed to live in London, never loses his love for the farm which he had left, but

"Up the Haymarket hill oft whistles his way,

Thrusts his hands in a wagon, and smells at the hay."

But laying aside these prepossessions, and looking at the work with all the coolness which becomes the critic, we cannot but pronounce it a rare volume, to which good sense, practical wisdom, and an exquisite sense of beauty have contributed their choicest and best. If that man is a benefactor to his race who treats of important practical truth concerning subjects that occupy the thoughts, the hearts, and the hands of a very large portion of our worthiest citizens, in a manner which is fitted to instruct, to interest, and refine them, then has the author of this volume shown himself to be an eminent well-doer to his fellow-men. The man

*My Farm of Edgewood; A Country Book. By the author of "Reveries of a Bachelor." New York: Charles Scribner. 1863. 12mo. pp. 319. [New Haven: Judd & Clark. Price $1.50.]

that not only teaches his brother farmers to grow two blades of grass or grain where only one grew before, but also teaches them how they may find dignity in an employment which too often makes them only drudges, and how to transform a life which is too often encrusted with sordid meanness, into a discipline of beauty, gracefulness, and contentment, performs, indeed, a service that is worthy the gift of genius. The volume will fall into the hands of many readers. No commendation of ours is needed to give it currency and circulation. We can only express our satisfaction that this should be. Among the amateur farmers, whose name is legion, it will find its way, notwithstanding the hard hits which it deals so good naturedly at their lavish expenditure and their lamentable disappointments. But its proper destination and its appropriate sphere is in the houses of the working farmers. Here it will meet the heartiest welcome, and here it will be read with the most intelligent appreciation. There are many sunwarmed parlors in the country that will this winter be the brighter and the more contented for the sunlight which this book will bring with itself. Many an evening, bright with the glow of the fireside, will be the more cheerful for the delight with which the home circle will peruse its pages. The instruction which it embodies will be none the less valued because of the desultory method which the author has followed, or the many digressions into which he has been beguiled. By the great mass of readers, these very features will be considered as an additional charm. The light and easy movement of the author's style, the graceful and delicate transitions which he makes, the quiet humor in which he so naturally indulges, the sly but good natured satire which seems to drop so naturally from his pen, and the unaffected yet chastened pathos into which he rises for a moment, are all exquisitely wrought into a varied and beautiful tissue which is fitted to give perpetual delight to the cultivated reader, and to be itself an instrument of culture to the unrefined.

"REVERIES OF A BACHELOR,"* AND DREAM LIFE."-Mr. Scribner has just brought out, in very elegant style, new editions

* Reveries of a Bachelor: or a Book of the Heart. By IK MARVEL. A new edition. New York: C. Scribner. 1863. 16mo. pp. 271. Price $1.25.

Dream Life: a Fable of the Seasons. By IK MARVEL. A new edition. New York: C. Scribner. 1863. 16mo. pp. 271. Price $1.25.

of these two very popular books by Mr. Mitchell. The new prefaces with which both volumes are provided, penned in the true Ik Marvel style, add to them a fresh charm. The Dedication, we cannot refrain from reprinting for the benefit of our readers. "To one at home, in whom are met so many of the graces and the virtues, of which as a bachelor I dreamed, this new edition of my book is dedicated."

MILL'S PRINCIPLES OF POLITICAL ECONOMY.*-Messrs. Appleton & Co. have published a new American edition of this well known and valuable work, which must now rank as the standard edition. It contains all the latest revisions of the author as found in the fifth and last London edition. As a specimen of the most finished and elegant typography, nothing that has appeared from the American press has surpassed it, and it is fully equal to the best English work.

MR. CHARLES SCRIBNER'S NEW PUBLICATIONS.-We have received, too late for any notice, several valuable new publications from Mr. CHARLES SCRIBNER. We have only space to say that they are all books which will be received by the public with marked interest. Among them are an American reprint of Prof. G. L. Craik's "History of the English Language and Literature, from the Norman Conquest,"-the most extended, learned, and critical work of the kind in the language;-the first volume, of a truly princely edition of a reprint of "The Fœderalist," edited by Mr. Henry B. Dawson of Morrisania-and Prof. Shedd's " History of Christian Doctrine," the title of which we have already given in another place. These are works which every reader of this Quarterly will know how to value, but we must defer all notice of them to the next number. In excellence of typography, and beauty of appearance, they are fully equal to the best printed English books. But those who would know what effect such successful rivalry has upon prices, must examine Mr. Scribner's advertisement on page 8th of our advertising sheet. We have also received from him a beautiful book of "Selections of Poetry, bearing the title of "The School Girl's Garland," edited by a very well known and popular writer, Mrs. C. M. Kirkland.

Principles of Political Economy: with some of their Applications to Social Philosophy. By JOHN STUART MILL. In two volumes. From the fifth London edition. New York: D. Appleton & Co. 1864. Royal 8vo. pp. 616, 603. [New Haven: Peck, White, & Peck. Price $6.00].

NEW

THE

ENGLANDER.

No. LXXXVII.

APRIL, 1864.

ARTICLE I.-THE CONFLICT WITH SKEPTICISM AND UNBELIEF. SECOND ARTICLE:-THE MYTHICAL THEORY OF STRAUSS.

Das Leben Jesu, kritisch bearbeitet, von Dr. David Friedrich Strauss. 4 A. Tübingen: 1840. Streitschriften zur Vertheidigung, &c., von Dr. David Friedrich Strauss. Tübingen: 1841.

THE peculiar form of unbelief which, in our time, has been brought forward to invalidate the testimony to the miracles of the Gospel, is the Mythical Theory; and the leading expounder and advocate of that theory is David Frederic Strauss. The Life of Christ, by Strauss, is an extensive and elaborate work. The author, if not a man of the profoundest learning, is, nevertheless, a trained and well read theologian. Adopting a theory which, at least in the breadth of its application,

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