always very elevated; and especially for his intelligent and earnest defence of classical studies, accompanied, though it is, by very free, and sometimes rather flippant strictures, on American Colleges and instructors. But it is easy to pass over the freedom, and even flippancy, of suggestions and strictures, if they are to any considerable extent just and true, and if they can be turned to good account; and such, we believe, to be the character and the tendency of some of those which occur in this work of Mr. Bristed. Doubtless, too, it would have been in better taste if, while rejoicing in his "foundation scholarship," and sundry other Cambridge titles, he had spoken a little more reverently of Yale College, his earlier Alma Mater, and in a little less supercilious tone of American Colleges generally in comparison with the English Universities; but as the virtues of reverence and modesty seem not to have been given him in large measure, we are disposed to give him credit, at least, for honest and excellent intentions, and to pardon much to the strong conviction he cherishes, that in certain branches of a liberal education, the English system is far superior to the American and that, therefore, the former system sends forth into life better scholars and more thoroughly-educated men. We have some doubts whether Mr. Bristed has taken pains to inform himself of the present character and condition of American Colleges; of the methods pursued in the study of the classics, and of what is really accomplished, and of the difficulties which stand in the way of their being more perfectly taught. It is just possible that he might find, on further inquiry, that the professors in our colleges are not entire strangers to many views, which he appears to consider somewhat new; and that they are already familiar with some of the plans which he proposes. For instance: the examinations by written papers, which he describes and recommends, were sometime since recommended by President Wayland to the corporation of Brown University, and established by that body, as a part of the laws of the University; and they are already in practical operation, in very nearly the same details which Mr. Bristed enumerates, both as semi-annual examinations on all the studies of the preceding semester, and as final examinations for degrees: for the Bachelor's degree, in three of the studies which the candidate has pursued; and for the Master's, "in the Ancient Languages, in Natural Philosophy, and in three other studies of the course, to be selected by the Faculty." The examination for the Master's degree, also includes one element which Mr. Bristed thinks wholly unknown in this country, namely, one book in Latin and one in Greek, which the candidate has never read in the regular course of instruction. But leaving, for a future occasion, a particular review of the various important matters on which Mr. Bristed has written, we have only to add, at present, that we gladly give in our adhesion to the justness of his observations on "The Advantages of Classical Studies, particularly in reference to the Youth of our Country;" and to the value and the practicability of some of his suggestions, on the methods by which they may be pursued more thoroughly and successfully.

Lectures on the History of France. By the Right Hon. SIR JAMES STEPHEN, K. C. B., LL. D., Professor of Modern History in the University of Cambridge. New-York: Harper & Brothers, 82 Cliff-street. 1852. 8vo. Pp. 710.

This volume of Lectures deserves and needs far more than a notice, for any proper consideration of its merits. The author, with whose eloquent papers in the Edinburgh Review all our readers are familiar, is the suc

cessor of William Smythe, Esq., in the chair of Professor of Modern History, in the University of Cambridge. On his appointment to the Professorship, he determined to devote his first attention to the History of France; and though he would gladly, from his own impulses and from the advice of literary friends, have devoted several years to preliminary research and study, yet, finding that recent academic arrangements at Cambridge admitted of no such delay, he entered at once upon the public duties of his office. In pursuing this course, (which the author describes in detail in his Preface,) he may have made some sacrifice of literary distinction, but we have no doubt that he best secured thereby the ends of his office, and best promoted the interests of his pupils. Lectures prepared for immediate delivery by one well versed in historical inquiries, and familiar with literary labor, are apt to gain far more by directness and point, by freshness of interest and effective power, than they can lose from the want of finish, or the absence of original views, or even the utmost accuracy of statement in matters of fact. The early publication of his Lectures Sir James ascribes to an exigency no less urgent than that which required their rapid composition. This was the necessity of furnishing his students with an introduction to French History, as there was no existing English book of that character, and a very large number of his auditors were unacquainted with the popular French works on the History of France, and a considerable portion of them did not know any modern language but their own. Besides, after one experiment, the lecturer renounced the hope of being able to repeat, year after year, the same discourses, and still more, had grave doubts as to the real value of oral teaching in the department of history.

These Lectures, thus prepared and published, and now reprinted in this volume, are twenty-four in number-twelve delivered in Easter term of 1850, and the remainder in Easter term of 1851. They comprise a narrative of the chief events, and a discussion of the principal subjects pertaining to the history of the French people during the entire period extending from the Roman dominion down to the Revolution of 1789. The author seems, in his preface, to consider himself a candidate for the honors of a lecturer and not of a historian; but we think that his work will entitle him to a high rank among the historical writers of the age. Exceptions may doubtless be taken to some of his explanations of leading phenomena in French history-and touching all the great movements of history, there is always wide room for difference of opinion; but none will fail to recognize in his pages the marks of laborious and faithful research, of originality in plan and method, of honest, independent thought, and of sound and healthful sentiment. The work will greatly enhance the author's literary fame; it abounds in passages which are marked by force, beauty, and eloquence of expression, and which ever remind one of those admirable papers in the Edinburgh Review on the Port Royalists, and Ignatius Loyola. No one can begin the volume without reading it with interest to the end, and all those parts especially which embody the story of great events, and the lives of distinguished men, are executed in the highest style of narrative, and at once delight and instruct the reader.

A Wonder-Book for Girls and Boys. By NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. With Engravings by BAKER, from Designs by BILLINGS. Boston: Ticknor, Reed & Fields. 1852. 18mo. Pp. 256.

In condescending to the entertainment of girls and boys, Mr. Hawthorne has here struck into veins in the regions of fancy, which, old as they are, and long since abandoned, have yet proved, under the skilful labor of a

master-workman, as rich and exhaustless as ever. Going back to the realms of classic mythology, he has touched, as with a magic wand, and summoned to new life, and to the very midst of the now living world, some of those wondrous forms that were familiar to men's visions and hearts three thousand years ago. Six of these old classic myths he has reproduced with all the felicity of genius; while he has seized and kept those elements which fix their significance and identity, and stamp them immortal, he has clothed them in new robes of sentiment and manners, informed them with the life and tones of a better morality, and set them about with all the scenes and associations of the present day, so that they come home to us as living realities of our own age. That hoary and distant past of classic times seems near indeed and all young again, when those strange, immortal fables, which its genius first created for its instruction and delight, are now called back and made familiar to us, and even our own, by a gifted mind of the present. What a near and true fellowship there must be in all the kindred of genius! and how are all its creations, as Mr. Hawthorne says of the classic legends, "marvelously independent of all temporary modes and circumstances!" The myths which Mr. Hawthorne has here so happily handled, are The Gorgon's Head, Midas' Golden Touch, Pandora's Box, The Golden Apples, The Miraculous Pitcher, and The Chimæra. They are put together by a thread of modern story, which binds them all into a charming unity and integrity. Eustace Bright, a student of William's College, comes home in the vacations to a merry group of children, who rejoice in very fairy names, such as Primrose, Cowslip, and the like, and gets the little elves about him, sometimes in-doors and sometimes out-now in mid-winter, now in spring, and now in autumn, and tells them wonderful stories of the olden times. It seems that the student, who is very properly pale and slender, and learned withal, though only eighteen years of age, has won a great fame, and fairly too, as a story-teller, and moreover is vastly fond of exercising his gifts; the children, too, are always right glad to listen to his stories, and find them, as little Cowslip declares, good to hear at night, because they can dream about them asleep, and good in the morning too, because they can dream about them awake. We think that some of the purely modern parts of the book are full as good as the stories themselves; and if our limits would allow, we should be glad to make some extracts to illustrate our opinion. We heartily commend this work not only to boys and girls, but to men and women, and to all scholars and learned people who love to have now and then something more genial than big dictionaries of Mythology and Antiquities, and the musty old volumes they come from; and we are assured that they will all admire and enjoy these wonderful stories with a zest no less keen and genuine than that experienced by the merry children that listened to Eustace Bright.

A Popular Account of Discoveries at Nineveh. By AUSTEN HENRY LAYARD, Esq., D. C. L. With numerous woodcuts. New-York: Harper & Brothers. 1852. 12mo. Pp. 360.

This is an abridgment by Dr. Layard, himself, of his great work on "Nineveh and its Remains." The author was induced to write it by the fact that several inaccurate accounts of his researches had been written and published. The present volume contains the principal Biblical and historical illustrations embodied in the narrative, which is rendered at once complete and more attractive to general readers. The external decorations of the book are in good taste, and well illustrate its contents.

Women of Christianity, Exemplary for Acts of Piety and Charity. By JULIA KAVANAGH, author of "Nathalie," etc. New-York: D. Appleton & Company. 1852. 12mo. Pp. 384.

In this volume Miss Kavanagh has aimed to record the lives of those women who have best illustrated the self-denying, self-sacrificing spirit which the gospel inculcates and inspires, and of which the cross of Christ is the ever-enduring symbol and example. The authoress seems to have performed her task in a spirit of Christian charity, and with a praiseworthy zeal and faithfulness: she writes with clearness, ease, and earnestness, and apparently from a full mind and heart, and with a lively sensibility to real goodness whenever and wherever exhibited. The subject is perhaps too large for the limits assigned to it, and the names and characters too numerous, belonging, as they do, to the entire period of eighteen centuries, extending from the times of the first martyrs down to the present day. The difficulties incident to the management of so large a plan in such small compass have been, however, on the whole, surmounted with a commendable success. But it has occurred to us that, in this gallery of female portraits, some place was due to the women who have been foremost in the great work of modern Christian missions, who have certainly furnished in their lives some of the noblest illustrations of the charity, and the active, self-sacrificing piety of Christianity.

A Buckeye Abroad; or Wanderings in Europe and the Orient._ By SAMUEL S. Cox. New-York: George P. Putnam. 1852. 12mo. Pp. 444.

The title of this volume, which strikes us as capitally hit, is a good index of its character. It is a book of impressions and reflections, gathered in a tour by no means new, which are striking and original, and conveyed in a manner that is natural and unpretending, but arrests and keeps the attention by the rapid flow of the narrative, and by a vigorous and racy style of expression. Mr. Cox has evidently observed with his own eyes, and thrown himself into the scenes that were about him with an ever fresh and active nature, which does no sight-seeing listlessly, nor from a mere sense of traveling obligation. The chapters of his book have all the ease and directness of letters written upon the spot, but the style of execution, and the finish of particular parts, give evidence of faithful revision. Altogether it is a most interesting book of travels, and stands out prominently from the mass of books of this class, in these days of traveling and of authorship. Mr. Cox, though a native and resident of Ohio, was educated in New-England; and we observe with interest his allusion to his Alma Mater in the last paragraph of his book-when "the Buckeye" was nearing home, and when, as the vessel was passing the coast, the cry that Rhode Island is in sight" came to him "like a homesound," and reminded him of the "University in which so many months had been passed conning over scenes which the last summer had now realized."

The History of Palestine, from the Patriarchal Age to the Present Time, with Introductory Chapters on the Geography and Natural History of the Country; and on the Customs and Institutions of the Hebrews. By JOHN KITTO, D.D., Editor of "The Pictorial Bible," &c. With upwards of 200 Illustrations. Boston: Gould & Lincoln. 1852. 12mo. Pp. 426. Messrs. Gould & Lincoln are doing a good service by the publication of Dr. Kitto's Biblical works. The present volume contains a well-digested

History of Palestine, in eight Books, and traces the changing fortunes of the Hebrew people, through the successive centuries in which they were an independent nation, and the subsequent periods down to the present time, during which they have been under foreign rule, and different forms of government. Prefixed to the History are five introductory chapters on the geography of the country, and the life and manners of the people, devoted respectively to historical and physical geography, agriculture and pasturage, habits of life, literature, science and art, and institutions. The History is not an abridgment of the author's Pictorial History of Palestine, "but has been written expressly," as he tells us in the preface, "for its present use." In preparing the chapters upon the manners and customs of the Jews, Dr. Kitto has drawn somewhat from the wellknown work of Jahn on Biblical Archæology; but his descriptions have been enriched and made more life-like by illustrations of oriental usages, gained from the author's former residence in the East. The work is valuable for all students of the Bible; for families, and especially for Sunday Schools and Bible Classes. We only miss in it a good map of Palestine, and a Plan of Jerusalem.

A Hand-Book of the English Language, for the Use of Students of the Universities, and the Higher Classes of Schools. By R. G. LATHAM, M. D., F. R. S., late Professor of the English Language and Literature, University College, London. New-York: D. Appleton & Co. 1852. 12mo. Pp. 398.

The grammatical works of Dr. Latham are legitimate and most valuable results of the fruitful researches, made in recent times, in the kindred sciences of Ethnology and Comparative Philology. The labors of German scholars, in these modern sciences, Dr. Latham has turned to vast account, in unfolding and illustrating the history and progress, and the whole structure of the English language. His investigations and discoveries entitle him to the first rank among living writers on English grammar, and to a place not inferior in honor and usefulness to that of any English grammarian of former times. The present volume is a compendious treatise, prepared from the third edition of the author's large work on "the English Language ;" and renders accessible to students and general readers the substantial results of Dr. Latham's grammatical studies, presented in brief compass, and unaccompanied by those reasonings and details of illustration which are fitted only for those who are familiar with Comparative Philology. The work is divided into seven parts, devoted respectively to the General Ethnological Relations of the English Language, the History and Analysis of the English Language, Sounds, Letters, Pronunciation and Spelling, Etymology, Syntax, Prosody, and Dialects of the English Language. The book is, of course, not intended for a practical grammar, but it is a most valuable contribution to English grammar: and its acute and most useful observations, especially on different parts of Etymology and of Syntax, deserve the special attention of advanced pupils and of teachers, and will undoubtedly prepare the way for a higher criticism of our language in our colleges and schools.

Selections from the Metamorphoses and Heroides of Ovid. With Notes, Grammatical References, and Exercises in Scanning. Second Edition, Revised and Corrected. By E. A. ANDREWS, LL.D. Boston: Crocker & Brewster. 1851.

This is a new edition of a book first published in 1844. The text, which in the first edition was Burman's, is in the present chiefly that of Loers,