FOOTNOTES:

Were you ever in a charge—you who read this now by the winter fireside, long after the bones of the slain have turned to dust, when peace covers the land? If not, you have never known the fiercest pleasure of life. The chase is nothing to it; the most headlong hunt is tame in comparison. In the chase the game flees, and you shoot; here the game shoots back, and every leap of the charging steed is a peril escaped or dashed aside. The sense of power and audacity that possesses the cavalier, the unity with his steed, both are perfect. The horse is as wild as the man: with glowing eyeballs and red nostrils, he rushes frantically forward at the very top of his speed, with huge bounds as different from the rhythmic precision of the gallop as the sweep of the hurricane is from the rustle of the breeze. Horse and riderare drunk with excitement; feeling and seeing nothing but the cloud of dust, the scattered flying figures; conscious of only one mad desire, to reach them, to smite, smite, smite!

The author of this book is too much of an artist, too much of a poet, perhaps, to divest his battle descriptions of anything that is doubtful in fact, if only it is eulogistic of his hero or picturesque in its nature. He has an eye for color, and prefers to have his picture a showy and effective one even if some of the accessories are purely of the imagination. We cannot consider the letters of the "Times" special correspondent as a reliable history of the events immediately following the battle of Gettysburg, although they are undoubtedly glowing bulletins of the exploits of General Kilpatrick and his temporary subordinate, General Custer. Nor can we accept the statement of the Detroit "Evening News" for an entirely correct report of the grand review at Washington, in 1865, when he hands down to posterity that sober-sided old warrior, Provost Marshal General Patrick, as one who "had ridden down the broad avenue bearing his reins in his teeth, and his sabre in his only hand"; although the Mazeppa act in which Custer immediately followed is not overdrawn by the "News," because that would be "painting the lily." There are several other extracts from newspapers of a similar nature, but we have not space to refer to them. Captain Whittaker's book offers material for that "coming historian," but cannot be looked upon as an entirely safe historical authority. Colonel Chesney says, "Accept no one-sided statement from any national historian who rejects what is distasteful in his authorities, and uses only what suits his own theory.... Gather carefully from actual witnesses, high and low, such original material as they offer for the construction of the narrative. This once being safely proved, judge critically and calmly what was the conduct of the chief actor; how far his insight, calmness, personal control over others, and right use of his means were concerned in the result." The great fault of this otherwise attractive biography is the unwise partisanship which, as Captain Whittaker shows, was so injurious to his hero in life and which even in death does not forsake him. At page 282 Captain Whittaker says of alleged envy and jealousy of Custer in certain quarters:

A great deal of this was due to the boasting and sarcastic remarks of his injudicious friends, who could not be satisfied with praising their own chief without depreciating others.

Thus the author, after warning his readers of the pit into which so many others have fallen, proceeds in the most inconsistent manner to fall into it himself.

Had we space, we could here make many extracts entirely free from the foregoing objections. Many new descriptions of Indian life, never before in print, are here given; some excellent essays on the prominent phases of American military life; and many anecdotes and biographical sketches of the officers who fell with Custer on the "Little Big-horn," with portraits, are also given. The volume is a very large, handsome octavo, illustrated by two portraits of General Custer (one an excellent likeness on steel), and many full-page woodcuts, and seems especially seasonable as a holiday present. No biographical collection can be considered complete without it, and we should think it would have an especial charm to military readers. That Mrs. Custer is to receive a share of the receipts from its sale will not lessen its circulation.

Palestine is certainly an inexhaustible source of books, and Dr. Ridgaway[15]tells us the reason why. Travellers' descriptions of the grand mountain scenery, its strange deserts, its ancient customs, transmitted from the dawn of history, its trees a thousand years of age, and its mighty ruins, contribute to and intensify the interest which the Christian feels in that region alone of all the earth. Of late years this country has been the scene of systematic explorations and the theme of an important series of critical works. Dr. Ridgaway's volume deserves a place in this series, though he has little of novelty to present. But the author has produced just the book that was needed, the one which it might be supposed the firsttraveller there would have written. Leaving out nearly all the every-day incidents of travel, he aims to extract from each place he saw just what is of interest to the Bible student. He is to be congratulated on a rare ability to discriminate between the important and entertaining and what is matter-of-course. The plan of his journey, which was made in company with eleven others, mostly clergymen, was to follow the route of the Israelites from Egypt to Palestine, and then to visit every place made memorable by the life of Christ, besides many others of Biblical interest. He tried to be critical, and constantly discusses the pros and cons for admitting the received location of prominent points; but in this he is not very successful, and seems to decline at length into helpless acquiescence. He rejects the innovations and doubts of such men as Robinson and Baker, and acknowledges that the sacred sites have for the most part been identified. But there is a limit to even his credulity. He swallowed easily the "exact spot" where the cradle lay, but strained at the fragment of a column on which Mohammed is to sit when he judges the world, and says, "I was unable to resist the temptation to straddle it!" Perhaps the secret of Dr. Ridgaway's success is that he has omitted those rhapsodies which are natural enough amid such scenes, but which we get our fill of without going to Palestine. He is too full of the real situation to turn to fanciful imaginations, and as a consequence he gives us the best companion to the Bible which we know of. The critical results of his journey are small, but as a careful summary of what others have finally settled upon his work is authentic. A large number of engravings, of the best execution, bring the landscape and buildings vividly before us. Many of them are from Dr. Ridgaway's sketches, others from photographs, and the only fault we have to find is the omission of titles to them, an omission which is artistic, but inconvenient.

—Lieutenant Ruffner[16]does not give a very assuring picture of New Mexico, considered as a possible State in our Union. It has never prospered; its population and area of cultivated land being smaller now than three hundred years ago. As these changes are no doubt due to the operation of natural causes, about which scientific men do not agree, the immediate future of the country does not appear very flattering. Wide as the spread of westward migration has been, it has hardly affected New Mexico. Lieutenant Ruffner says: "The line once crossed, a foreign country is entered. Foreign faces and a foreign tongue are encountered." For twenty-six years the Territory has formed a part of our country, but in that time our civilization has hardly made an impression upon it. The author, without directly saying so, seems to regard the scheme for making it a State with disfavor, and his readers will agree with him. He has done his country a service by this painstaking and impartial description of a region which few but army officers know anything about.

—It is a very difficult thing nowadays to write a book of travels that can interest the general public. A hundred years ago a man who had circumnavigated the world was a remarkable object, and people would crowd to see him, and read his works with avidity. But what a change the last century has produced. Compare the difference of tone between 1776 and 1876, and then go back and compare 1676 with the former year. There is not anything like a parity of advance between the two centuries. The traveller and sailor was as much of a hero in 1776 as was the captain of the Vittoria, the last ship of Magellan's fleet when he sailed into Cadiz in 1522, having been round the earth and lost a day in the operation; just as Mr. Phileas Fogg, of later fame, gained one by going in the opposite direction. Men who have been to China and India, Australia and New Zealand, are too plentiful to-day to excite notice; and when it comes to writing books about their adventures, it is necessary to be cautious to avoid treading in old tracks and wearying the reader. The man who describes a voyage round the world to-day must be a character of interest in himself, or he will not interest his audience. The writer of the book now before us[17]possesses the qualifications for the task seldom possessed by theprofessional traveller, who is apt to bore one with long stories. He has the eye of a newspaper correspondent, the quick intuition as to what is or is not interestingper se, and has actually succeeded in making an interesting and readable book of three hundred pages out of a subject nearly worn out. Mr. Vincent started from New York in a clipper ship, went round the Horn to San Francisco, thence to Hawaii, where he remained some weeks, thence to New Zealand and Australia, finally to Calcutta, and thence home to New York, after a prolonged tour through India, Siam, and China. The incidents of the latter tour formed the basis of his first book, the "Land of the White Elephant," the success of which encouraged him to this, his second venture. The chief characteristic of Mr. Vincent's second work is its freshness and interest. He seems to be profoundly impressed with the truth of the saying of Thales of Miletus, that "the half is sometimes more than the whole." The taste and judgment of the author are shown by what he leaves out as much as by what he leaves in. There is hardly a dull page in the book, and in each place he only notes what is curious, leaving out of the question all that is commonplace. More could not be asked of him.

We have received the first number of the "Archives of the National Museum at Rio de Janeiro."[18]This is a scientific institution, and from the number of officers named it appears to be prepared for inaugurating thorough work in archæology, geology, botany, zoölogy, etc. Its aim, however, is not merely the study of pure science, but its application to the immediate welfare of man through agriculture and the industries. The director general is Dr. Netto, and the secretary Dr. Joao Joaquin Pizarro. Most of the officers are Brazilians, but our countryman, Prof. Hartt, is director of the "sciencias physicas," including geology, mineralogy, and palæontology. This first number of the "Archivos" contains papers in the Portuguese language on aboriginal remains, one by Prof. Wiener and Prof. Hartt, and one by Dr. Netto on a botanical subject.

Prof. Walker's work in both the Census Bureau and the Indian Department shows how original and critical his mind is. The first fruit of his activity as a professional teacher of political economy is an extended treatise on the question of wages.[19]He seems to have found himself unable to make the views of the systematic writers always harmonize with his own conceptions, and his work is to a considerable extent controversial. One of his prominent objects of attack is the wage-fund theory, which is that wages are paid out of capital, that a certain portion of the capital in every country is charged with this duty, and that the rate of wages could be accurately determined if the amount of this fund and the total number of laborers could be ascertained. This theory makes the savings of past labor to be the source from which wages are paid. Prof. Walker argues that "wages are, in a philosophical view of the subject, paid out of the product of present industry, and hence that production furnishes the true measure of wages." Labor is an article which the employer buys because it forms a necessary part of a certain product which he intends to sell. The price which he expects to obtain for the product controls the amount he can afford to pay for the labor. It is true that the money paid must necessarily come from past savings unless the laborers wait for their pay, as they formerly did in this country. But in making this payment capital merelyadvancesthe money, and its possessor receives interest for its use; the amount of this interest being another element that is controlled by the price which the manufacturer expects to obtain for the product. Prof. Walker thinks it not surprising that the erroneous wage-fund theory found acceptance in England, where the facts on which it is based were first observed. But he marvels that American thinkers can accept it, for the condition of some classes of laborers here was, so late as half a century ago, a decided disproof of it. Farm hands, for instance, were formerly often paid at the end of the year, for the reason that there was not capital enough in farmers' hands to make the advances necessary forweekly or monthly payments. Here was a case in which the employer clearly had to wait for the product before he could pay the wages. No past savings were available for the purpose. The author's arguments are always clearly put and forcible, but his position loses strength by the very character of his task. He has so completely separated the wages question from all others, that we miss the natural collocation of wages with the other items which make up the cost of a product. The capitalist has one and the same purpose in buying raw material and labor, and no discussion of the subject can seem complete that does not proceed from the likeness or unlikeness of these two components of value. Another theory which our author combats strongly is that the interest of the employer is sufficient to keep wages up to the highest profitable point. He holds that the laborer must be active in his own interests, or he will never obtain that rate of payment which is necessary to his proper maintenance. Bad food reduces the quantity and quality of the laborer's work, so that more men have to be hired for a given task, and the employer pays more in the end for his product, than when wages are good; but even this prospective loss is not sufficient to keep employers from experimenting to find just that point to which wages may be lowered without affecting food disastrously. This disposition of the employer can be combatted only by the resistance of the laborer. Prof. Walker thinks there is a "constantly imminent danger that bodies of laborers will not soon enough or amply enough resent industrial injuries which may be wrought by the concerted action of employers or by slow and gradual changes in production, or by catastrophes in business, such as commercial panics." Of course he does not advocate strikes, which "are the insurrections of labor," but even these are to be judged by their results. The results may or may not justify them. He considers that coöperation is a real panacea that can successfully take the place of violent measures. He denies the assertion that coöperation gets rid of the capitalist. It merely avoids the business man, who in the present order of things borrows the capital, hires the laborers, and directs the business. Practically he is a salaried man. Prof. Walker finds difficulty in giving this man a title suitable for use in treatises on political economy. He objects to "undertaker" and "adventurer," because they have other meanings, and suggests the Frenchentrepreneur. The objections are well taken, but the middleman is not only a reality; he also has a name by which he is known in business. If Prof. Walker wants to have a cellar dug or rock blasted, he can go to Pennsylvania and find a "venturer" to undertake the work; and there seems to be no good reason why a term that is already in common use and well understood should be rejected by the schoolmen. This is a valuable contribution to political economy, so valuable, in fact, that we can onlysaythat it should be read, not demonstrate the fact in a short notice.

"Elsie's Motherhood"[20]is a story in which piety of the Sunday-school kind is curiously contrasted with villany in the shape of Ku Klux outrages. Elsie's children are all sweetness, obedience, and kisses, and live in an atmosphere of goodness that is revolting because it is monstrous. There is a suspicion of political purpose associated with the appearance of the book just at this time which does not improve it.

—The author of "Near to Nature's Heart"[21]shows abundant powers of invention, but his imagination is not sufficiently well regulated for the production of a natural or even plausible story. The individual who is so intimate with nature is a young girl whose father has fled from England and hidden himself in the forests of the Hudson river on account of a quarrel with his brother, which he (erroneously) supposes to have been a fatal one. His seclusion is so complete that his daughter grows up almost without the sight of man or womankind except the three who are in her father's hut, and the consequence is a partial reversion to the wild state from which we are nowadays supposed to have been somewhat removed by the process of evolution. The author dresses the nymph ina style that ingeniously indicates the character he desires to paint. "Her attire was as simple as it was strange, consisting of an embroidered tunic of finely dressed fawn skin, reaching a little below the knee, and ending in a blue fringe. Some lighter fabric was worn under it, and encased the arms. The shapely neck and throat were bare, though almost hidden by a wealth of wavy golden tresses that flowed down her shoulders. Her hat appeared to have been constructed out of the skin of the snowy heron, with its beak and plumage preserved intact, and dressed into the jauntiest style. Leggings of strong buckskin, that formed a protection against the briers and roughness of the forest, were clasped around a slender ankle, and embroidered moccasins completed an attire that was not in the style of the girl of the period, even a century ago." This nymph was fishing, and for a float used the bud of a water lily! This is quite characteristic of the author's idea throughout. In losing civilization this girl put on all the supposed graces and none of the known brutishness of the wild state. The result is an incongruous character, but it is quite in harmony with the general notion that the natural state is one of greater perfection than that we really dwell in. As for the story, it relates to Revolutionary times, introduces Washington and the Continental army, with battles, dangers, and other lively and thrilling situations. In plot it is crude and rough. The author makes the artistic mistake of introducing religion as a principal element of his tale, though it does not relate to a time or to persons characteristically religious. The variety of incident, the presence of historical characters, including Washington and "Captain" Molly, and a certainquantumof real skill in the author, will no doubt make this book acceptable to the uncritical, but it does not deserve the attention of others. We notice that the publishers announce the "fourteenth thousand," which is the best indication of the book's popularity.

The ranks of the rhymers of the day are thronged with women, among the better of whom is the author of "Edelweiss,"[22]who has gathered her occasional verses into a pretty volume under the title of that graceful and tender little poem. Her title-page bears no publisher's name and her dedication to friends, whose loving kindness has welcomed them one by one, and at whose request they have been gathered together, seems to imply that they are privately printed. If this is because no publisher would undertake the production of the volume, we do not wonder; not because of the inferiority of the poems, for they are much better than many that do find publishers. They belong to a large class in which the world cannot be brought to take any great interest—verses expressive of various emotions, love, devotion, resignation, and so forth, which are all uttered with fervor or with tenderness, verses graceful in style, and in good rhythm, and which yet produce no great impression; while on the other hand they are much above that sentimental or that sententious twaddle which sometimes finds many admirers. It is sad to see so much of this sort of verse published; for it is the occasion and the sign of woful disappointment to persons of unusual intelligence and true poetic feeling, who, however, have not in any great measure the poetic faculty.

—"Frithiof's Saga" has been often translated into English, and we have here the result of one more effort to give us the great Swedish poem in our own language.[23]The principal difference between this translation and its predecessors is that this preserves the changing metres of the original. It was undertaken chiefly because it seems the Swedes have not been satisfied with the previous translations because they did not follow the metre of the original. The reason is not a good one, and the result of the attempt to conform to it is not very happy. There is no question of pleasing the Swedes with a translation into English. It is English ears that are to be consulted by what is written in English, whether original or not. The Swedes have the original; that is for them; the English version is for us. The effect of the manyand great changes in the rhythm and in the form of the verse is not pleasant to our taste; and indeed we are inclined to think that the best translation of this or of any other "Saga" would be into rhythmic prose, which embodied the spirit, but did not simulate the form of the original.

—It is very unfortunate for what is often called American literature, that almost all attempts to treat any part of our history poetically or dramatically are miserable failures. Among the verse books before us two are of this kind; one by Mr. George L. Raymond,[24]who has written in what he supposes is the ballad form some things which are not at all ballad-like, and which are dreary stuff under whatever name; and the other a thing which Mr. Martin F. Tupper[25]seems to suppose is a drama in blank verse upon the events of our war of independence. A more stupid and ridiculous performance we have rarely seen. That it should be read through by any one seems to us quite insupposable. And yet, although he has written this and "Proverbial Philosophy," Mr. Tupper is a D. C. L. of Oxford and an F. R. S.

—Something of a far higher quality than this is Mr. Bayard Taylor's "National Ode" written for the Centennial celebration. It is to be regretted, we think, that Mr. Taylor was not able to give himself up entirely to poetical composition. He has the poetic faculty, and his verse is nervous and manly, far better, we think, than his prose. Had he been a poet only, he might have taken a still higher place in contemporary literature. This poem, well known to the public, is one of his finest and most spirited efforts. The present edition[26]is very handsomely illustrated and printed.

—Charles Sprague is an "American" poet of the last generation, who is almost forgotten, and indeed quite unknown to readers of the present day. He has something of Campbell in his style—Campbell in his calm and serious moods. It may have been desirable to reprint his poems and essays in an attractive volume,[27]with his portrait; but we fear that he belongs to the class of middling writers of prose and verse who were much talked of by our fathers chiefly because they were "American."

—One of the best of the many volumes of verse upon our table is the collection of poems by Mrs. S. M. B. Piatt.[28]Mrs. Piatt's muse is often thoughtful, but in all that she has given us, of which much is attractive in form and suggestive in substance, these lines that follow are the most valuable. They refer to the altar which Paul found at Athens "To the Unknown God":

Because my life was hollow with a painAs old as death: because my eyes were dryAs the fierce tropics after months of rain,Because my restless voice said, "Why?" and "Why?"Wounded and worn, I knelt within the nightAs blind as darkness—Praying? And to Whom?—When yond'cold crescent cut my folded sight,And showed a phantom Altar in my room.It was the Altar Paul at Athens saw.The Greek bowed there, but not the Greek alone!The ghosts of nations gathered, wan with awe,And laid their offerings on that shadowy stone.The Egyptian worshipped there the crocodile;There they of Nineveh the bull with wings;The Persian there with swart, sun-lifted smileFelt in his soul the writhing fire's bright stings.There the weird Druid held his mistletoe;There, for the scorched son of the sand, coiled bright,The torrid snake was hissing sharp and low;And there the Western savage paid his rite."Allah," the Moslem darkly muttered there;"Brahma," the jewelled Indies of the EastSighed through their spices with a languid prayer;"Christ?" faintly questioned many a paler priest.And still the Athenian Altar's glimmering DoubtOn all religions—evermore the same.What tears shall wash its sad inscription out?What hand shall write thereon His other name?

Because my life was hollow with a painAs old as death: because my eyes were dryAs the fierce tropics after months of rain,Because my restless voice said, "Why?" and "Why?"

Wounded and worn, I knelt within the nightAs blind as darkness—Praying? And to Whom?—When yond'cold crescent cut my folded sight,And showed a phantom Altar in my room.

It was the Altar Paul at Athens saw.The Greek bowed there, but not the Greek alone!The ghosts of nations gathered, wan with awe,And laid their offerings on that shadowy stone.

The Egyptian worshipped there the crocodile;There they of Nineveh the bull with wings;The Persian there with swart, sun-lifted smileFelt in his soul the writhing fire's bright stings.

There the weird Druid held his mistletoe;There, for the scorched son of the sand, coiled bright,The torrid snake was hissing sharp and low;And there the Western savage paid his rite.

"Allah," the Moslem darkly muttered there;"Brahma," the jewelled Indies of the EastSighed through their spices with a languid prayer;"Christ?" faintly questioned many a paler priest.

And still the Athenian Altar's glimmering DoubtOn all religions—evermore the same.What tears shall wash its sad inscription out?What hand shall write thereon His other name?

The last five lines of Mrs. Piatt's poem express finely the feeling as to God and religion which now fills countless numbers of the truest hearts and brightest minds.

—"As You Like It" has just been published in the "Clarendon Press Series of Shakespeare's Select Plays." Mr. GrantWhite, in his article "On Reading Shakespeare," in the present number of "The Galaxy," has said so much in regard to this series and its present editor,[29]William Aldis Wright, that it is only necessary for us to record here the appearance of this edition of Shakespeare's most charming comedy, and to say that Shakespeare's lovers and students will find in it some new views which are interesting, and appear to be sound, and a copious and careful body of annotation.

—Of poetry, or rather of verse, as we before remarked, our table is full this month, and with it we have a dictionary to teach us to rhyme withal.[30]"Walker's Rhyming Dictionary" has had complete possession of this field for three quarters of a century, and we are not sure that it will be supplanted by Mr. Barnum's. His new plan is very systematic. He classifies his words in groups—single rhymes, double rhymes, triple, quadruple, and even quintuple rhymes; and then he divides and subdivides and parcels off his words under separate headings. He does not give definitions. The book will be valuable to the student of the English language, more so, we are inclined to think, than to the mere rhyme-hunter, who will prefer to run his finger and his eye down a column of words arranged merely according to their final letters.

—Mr. Tennyson's new dramatic poem is before us in the elegant Boston typography of Ticknor & Field's worthy successors.[31]The poet laureate added little to his fame by his previous dramatic work, "Queen Mary"; he will gain less by this. It is good of course to a certain degree, but it is only "fair to middling" Tennysonian work. We find in it not a passage that stirs us, not one that charms. It puts the story of the Norman Conquest of England into a dramatic form and into good blank verse, with sound and sensible treatment of the subject, and that is all. Its author's good taste, and above all his experience, his dexterity, acquired by such long practice, are manifest on every page; but there is little more. He dedicates it to the present Lord Lytton, in evident desire to wipe out the memory of the old feud between him and Bulwer Lytton; but that was too black and too bitter to be sponged away with a little sugar and water.

—Mr. Latham Cornell Strong is modest in his preface about his collection of verse,[32]although he is rather too elaborately metaphorical in his way of blushing properly. He says, as to the flaws in his poems, that he "has a reasonable confidence that they will not all be discovered by any one reader." This may be true from the probable fact that no one reader will read them all; we think that we have met with enough of them to show that Mr. Strong might well have refrained himself from publication. For example, we think that a true poet could hardly have written many such passages as these, and there are many such in the volume:

The night is rising from the trees,Herhands, uplifted,trailwith starsThe moon hath flungits bannerson the swardOld Rupert named,alone of all the restShe most esteemed, for he had brought her flowers,To wreathe her tresses and make manifestHis sympathy for her,in many ways expressed

The night is rising from the trees,Herhands, uplifted,trailwith stars

The moon hath flungits bannerson the sward

Old Rupert named,alone of all the restShe most esteemed, for he had brought her flowers,To wreathe her tresses and make manifestHis sympathy for her,in many ways expressed

The last four lines unite incorrectness, tameness, and inelegance with remarkable and fatal facility.

FOOTNOTES:[12]"The Theistic Conception of the World.An Essay in Opposition to Certain Tendencies of Modern Thought." ByB. F. Cocker, D.D., LL.D.New York: Harper & Brothers.[13]"Religion and the State; or, The Bible and the Public Schools." BySamuel T. Spear, D.D.12mo, pp. 393. New York: Dodd, Mead & Co.[14]"A Complete Life of General George A. Custer," etc. ByF. Whittaker, Brevet Captain Sixth N. Y. V. Cavalry. New York: Sheldon & Co.[15]"The Lord's Land: A Narrative of Travels in Sinai, Arabia, Petræa, and Palestine, from the Red Sea to the Entering in of Hamath." ByHenry B. Ridgaway, D.D.New York: Nelson & Phillips.[16]"New Mexico and the New Mexicans: A Political Problem." By an Officer of the Army.[17]"Through and Through the Tropics." ByFrank Vincent, Jr. New York: Harper & Brothers. 1876.[18]"Archivos do Musen Nacional do Rio de Janeiro." Imprensa Industrial.[19]"The Wages Question.A Treatise on Wages and the Wages Class." ByFrancis A. Walker. New York: Henry Holt & Co. $3.50.[20]"Elsie's Motherhood." A Sequel to "Elsie's Womanhood." ByMartha Finley (Farquharson). New York: Dodd, Mead & Co.[21]"Near to Nature's Heart." By Rev.E. P. Roe. New York: Dodd, Mead & Co.[22]"Edelweiss: An Alpine Rhyme." ByMary Lowe Dickinson.New York, 1876.[23]"Frithiof's Saga.A Norse Romance." ByEsais Fegner, Bishop of Wexio. Translated from the Swedish by Thomas A. Holcombe and Martha and Lyon Holcombe. 16mo, pp. 213. Chicago: S. C. Griggs & Co.[24]"Colony Ballads, etc., etc., etc., etc." ByGeorge L. Raymond. 16mo, pp. 95. New York: Hurd & Houghton.[25]"Washington: A Drama in Five Acts." ByMartin F. Tupper. 16mo, pp. 67. New York: James Miller.[26]"The National Ode.The Memorial Freedom Poem." ByBayard Taylor. Illustrated. 8vo, pp. 74. Boston: William E. Gill & Co.[27]"The Poetical and Prose Writings of Charles Sprague." 16mo, pp. 207. Boston: A. Williams & Co.[28]"That New World, and Other Poems." By Mrs.S. M. B. Piatt. 16mo, pp. 130. Boston: James R. Osgood & Co.[29]"Shakespeare." Select Plays. "As You Like It." Edited byWilliam Aldis Wright, M.A., Bursar of Trinity College, Cambridge. 16mo, pp. 168. Oxford: at the Clarendon Press.[30]"A Vocabulary of English Rhymes." Arranged on a new plan. By the Rev.Samuel W. Barnum. 18mo, pp. 767. New York: D. Appleton & Co.[31]"Harold: A Drama." ByAlfred Tennyson. 16mo, pp. 170. Boston: James B. Osgood & Co.[32]"Castle Windows." ByLatham Cornell Strong. 16mo, pp. 229. Troy: H. B. Nims & Co.

[12]"The Theistic Conception of the World.An Essay in Opposition to Certain Tendencies of Modern Thought." ByB. F. Cocker, D.D., LL.D.New York: Harper & Brothers.

[13]"Religion and the State; or, The Bible and the Public Schools." BySamuel T. Spear, D.D.12mo, pp. 393. New York: Dodd, Mead & Co.

[14]"A Complete Life of General George A. Custer," etc. ByF. Whittaker, Brevet Captain Sixth N. Y. V. Cavalry. New York: Sheldon & Co.

[15]"The Lord's Land: A Narrative of Travels in Sinai, Arabia, Petræa, and Palestine, from the Red Sea to the Entering in of Hamath." ByHenry B. Ridgaway, D.D.New York: Nelson & Phillips.

[16]"New Mexico and the New Mexicans: A Political Problem." By an Officer of the Army.

[17]"Through and Through the Tropics." ByFrank Vincent, Jr. New York: Harper & Brothers. 1876.

[18]"Archivos do Musen Nacional do Rio de Janeiro." Imprensa Industrial.

[19]"The Wages Question.A Treatise on Wages and the Wages Class." ByFrancis A. Walker. New York: Henry Holt & Co. $3.50.

[20]"Elsie's Motherhood." A Sequel to "Elsie's Womanhood." ByMartha Finley (Farquharson). New York: Dodd, Mead & Co.

[21]"Near to Nature's Heart." By Rev.E. P. Roe. New York: Dodd, Mead & Co.

[22]"Edelweiss: An Alpine Rhyme." ByMary Lowe Dickinson.New York, 1876.

[23]"Frithiof's Saga.A Norse Romance." ByEsais Fegner, Bishop of Wexio. Translated from the Swedish by Thomas A. Holcombe and Martha and Lyon Holcombe. 16mo, pp. 213. Chicago: S. C. Griggs & Co.

[24]"Colony Ballads, etc., etc., etc., etc." ByGeorge L. Raymond. 16mo, pp. 95. New York: Hurd & Houghton.

[25]"Washington: A Drama in Five Acts." ByMartin F. Tupper. 16mo, pp. 67. New York: James Miller.

[26]"The National Ode.The Memorial Freedom Poem." ByBayard Taylor. Illustrated. 8vo, pp. 74. Boston: William E. Gill & Co.

[27]"The Poetical and Prose Writings of Charles Sprague." 16mo, pp. 207. Boston: A. Williams & Co.

[28]"That New World, and Other Poems." By Mrs.S. M. B. Piatt. 16mo, pp. 130. Boston: James R. Osgood & Co.

[29]"Shakespeare." Select Plays. "As You Like It." Edited byWilliam Aldis Wright, M.A., Bursar of Trinity College, Cambridge. 16mo, pp. 168. Oxford: at the Clarendon Press.

[30]"A Vocabulary of English Rhymes." Arranged on a new plan. By the Rev.Samuel W. Barnum. 18mo, pp. 767. New York: D. Appleton & Co.

[31]"Harold: A Drama." ByAlfred Tennyson. 16mo, pp. 170. Boston: James B. Osgood & Co.

[32]"Castle Windows." ByLatham Cornell Strong. 16mo, pp. 229. Troy: H. B. Nims & Co.

—The evolutionists manifestly feel that they are put upon their defence in the matter of religion. As far as they themselves are concerned, they are at peace with their own consciences; but nevertheless they do not sit easily under the charge of atheism which is very generally brought against them by that part of the world to which science does not stand in place of religion. They are now making desperate efforts to show that they have a religion, and Mr. M. J. Savage has written a very clever book upon the subject, entitled "The Religion of Evolution." Mr. Savage is a very pronounced evolutionist; he sticks at nothing in the most extravagant form of the new theory, and the attitude which he would take toward religion is clearly shown in the title of his previous volume on a kindred subject, "Christianity the Science of Manhood." It is safe to say that although Mr. Savage and others like him may call themselves Christians and believe themselves to be so, and may live lives worthy of the name, no man who twenty-five years ago was a professed believer in the Christian religion, and comparatively very few of those who are so now, would accept the termscienceas applicable to Christianity or to religion at all. For science means knowledge, knowledge of facts, and cautious logical deductions from those facts; whereas the very essence of religion is a faith which holds itself above knowledge and reason, a faith which is not only the substance of things hoped for, but the evidence of things not seen. And this great definition, one of the greatest ever given, applies not particularly to the faith of the Christian religion, but to all faiths—Judaism, Mohammedanism, Buddhism, and the rest. The true religionist will sooner accept one of these as a religion than a religion of evolution, or than he will consent to accept Christianity as a science of anything—of manhood, or even of God-hood.

—It is with this view of religion, this feeling about it, that the evolutionists have to deal when they endeavor to free themselves from the charge of irreligion. This is a state of the case which some of them do not seem to appreciate at its full importance. They shirk it, or at least they slight it; but Mr. Savage, it must be admitted, meets it fairly and boldly. He takes the position that such a view of religion is unworthy of a reasonable creature, and he brushes it aside with little ceremony and with some dexterity. But his chief difficulty is with the conception which lies at the foundation of all religions—the idea of god. Granted a god, or gods, and religion follows as a matter of course; and conversely, no god, no religion. Therefore the evolutionists, those of them who feel, or who see the necessity of a religion, of whom Mr. Savage may be taken as a fair representative, go about to provide themselves and the rest of the universe with a god, and they do it in this fashion. It is shown to the satisfaction of the evolutionists, and also of very many who have no respect for their theory, that the Mosaic cosmogony—that is, the account in Genesis of the creation of the earth and its inhabitants, and all the visible universe—has never been proved, and is incapable of proof, and that it holds its place in popular belief solely because of its supposed connection with Christianity; that it is merely a tradition (from however high and venerable a source), and that it rests upon no knowledge or study of the facts which it professes to explain; that it is in no way connected with Christianity, which would stand on its own merits equally whether the world were six thousand or six million years old, and whether it and its inhabitants were made in six days or six æons; that it—the Mosaic account of the origin of the world—explains nothing, but simply tells dogmatically that God made all and that God did so and so; that no intelligent person would think of resting satisfied with the Mosaic account, had it not come to be regarded as a requirement of religion to do so, but that this has become so fixed that the whole orthodoxsystem is the natural and logical outgrowth of the Mosaic account of the beginning of things: "the prevailing belief about God, the nature and the fall of man, total depravity, the need and the schemes for supernatural redemption, the whole structure, creed, and ritual of the Church, the common belief about the nature and efficacy of prayer meetings, the whole system of popular revivals, limited salvation, and everlasting punishment"—all and each being built on the foundation of the Mosaic cosmogony. Therefore for the vast number of intelligent thoughtful people to whom the Mosaic account of the creation is no longer authoritative, although it may be mythically instructive, the foundation of their religion is gone. It is then assumed that religion must rest upon a veneration for the creative power or agent to which the presentcosmosowes its existence, and that as the traditional God or Creator of Genesis has been eliminated from cognition by science, his place in religion must be taken by the power by which he is supplanted. Hence we have the god of evolution and the religion of evolution.

—But what is this god of evolution? In a very remarkable series of papers which have appeared for some months past in "Macmillan's Magazine," upon Natural Religion, remarkable equally for the subtlety and closeness of their thought and their clearness of style, something called Nature is set up as God; Mr. Savage's god, as nearly as we can make out, is the law of evolution—the formative power by which the universe passed from a mass of fluid fire, revolving in space, into suns, and suns and planets, and their inhabitants. In either case it amounts to about the same thing. What is nature? We may be sure the word is not used in the sense which it has when we say that a man admires nature, loves nature, or observes nature, nor in that which it has when we speak of the nature of things or the nature in a work of the imagination, or the nature of man, or "the nature of the beast." What is it then? We are very sure that the "Macmillan" writer, with all his delicacy of thought and command of expression, could not say exactly what he means when he speaks of this Nature which is so worthy of reverence and of love. For this reason, and for no other, we may be sure, he has left the word undefined. This is important; for, as Mr. Savage says in his eleventh chapter, when he proposes the question whether evolution and Christianity are antagonistic, so that one necessarily excludes the other—"that depends upon definitions."

—The truth is that this whole question is one greatly of definitions. What do you mean by God? what by Nature? what by religion? We are inclined to think that if the two parties on one side and the other of the great question of the day were to have a preliminary settlement of definitions, it would become plain that there could be no discussion, certainly no profitable discussion, between them—no more than there could be a fight between a deep-sea fish and a chamois. They would find that there was no ground on which they could meet, no point on which they could come in contact! To one God is, and must be, a person, an individual, who, however spiritual, eternal, omniscient, and omnipresent, is yet as much a person as a man having a will, with purposes, affections, feelings, sentiments, as indeed every spiritual being must have—a being who can be feared, revered, admired, loved. Religion to these men is worship of this person, obedience to his will because it is his, faith in him, love of him. The god of the evolutionists, on the other hand, is, if Nature, a mere manifestation or result; if a law, a mere mode or rule of action. As to the religion of evolution, we cannot, with all Mr. Savage's help, and that of the "Macmillan" writer (who, we are sure, must be a man of mark, or at least one who will become so), discover what it is, except a conformity to what may be called the law of nature; but that is something of which a healthy beast or a drop of water is quite as capable as a man is; and such conformity implies feeling quite as much in one of these cases as in the other. It implies feeling in no case; and religion without feeling, sentiment, and faith is no religion at all in the sense which the word has had from the beginning of its use to this day. The religious man finds inhisGod a being whom he can love and lean upon, who has a right to his obedience, to whom he can be loyal, whom he canaddress, calling him Father, as we are told that Christ did. But you cannot love a law. True, David says, "O how I love thy law"; but the law that he loved was the will of the Supreme Being, and he loved it because it was His. It was not a mode of action or of evolution that he loved. Nor can you obey such a law, although you may conform to it; nor can you be loyal to it, for you cannot be loyal to an abstraction. As to fatherhood, this law-god of evolution is the father of nothing except as two and two are the father and mother of four. Therefore, while we regard such books as Mr. Savage's as interesting expositions of the condition as to super-scientific subjects into which modern science has brought many of its votaries, we cannot see that they do anything toward refuting the charge brought against science (as it is among the evolutionists), that it is at war with religion, and takes away all the grounds of religious faith. For that which the evolutionists set up as a god religious people regard as the mere creature of the true God; and what they set up as religion the others regard utterly lacking in all the essentials of religion. It would be much better for the evolutionists to face this whole question boldly, as Mr. Savage does in part, and to say that the result of their investigations is the belief that there is no God, and consequently that there need not be, and in fact cannot be, any religion in the sense in which that word has for centuries been used. Moreover, we cannot see the grounds of one pretence which is made by the evolutionists, and which is implied if not in terms set up in all their writings that are not purely scientific and have what may be called a moral character, such as the book before us. This is that their theory accounts for everything, and is more consistent with reason than that of those who accept with faith the book of Genesis. The evolution theory is, in the words of Mr. Savage, "that the whole universe, suns, planets, moons, our earth, and every form of life upon it, vegetable and animal, up to man, together with all our civilization, has developed from a primitive fire-mist or nebula that once filled all the space now occupied by the worlds; and that this development has been according to laws and methods and forces still active and working about us to-day." But if it be granted, or even proved, that this is true, we cannot see how it satisfies the reason when we come to the question of creation and a creator. For what a stupendous, unutterably stupendous, and almost inconceivable thing was that fire-mist that filled all space and had in it not only the germs and possibilities of suns and moons and planets and our earth, but of man andall his civilization; and those laws and methods and forces according to which the universe and man and his civilization have been evolved from a fire-mist—what inconceivable things they are! Now who made the fire-mist and the law of evolution? We cannot see that reason is satisfied by the substitution of a fire-mist and a law of evolution for the will of a creator and a specific creation of the suns and stars and planets, including the earth, and man, and his possibilities of civilization. The thing is as broad one way as it is long the other. As far as the fact of creation goes, in either case the belief must be a matter of faith, not of reason. With regard to the anthropomorphism of the Hebrew story, that is shared, and must be shared, by all religions—that is, all religious which rest upon the notion of a personal God. The limitations of man's nature, the limitations of language, make anthropomorphic metaphor necessary when a man speaks of a god. Even the evolutionists cannot get rid of the necessity of faith.

—Dr. Richardson's papers published in "Nature," and designed to prove the advantage, and in fact the real necessity of experimenting on animals in order to be ready to save human life, contain many interesting facts and deserve to be widely read in view of the current discussion as to the propriety of permitting the practice of vivisection. The following case affords conclusive proof of the learned and humane physiologist's argument. He says: "Dr. Weir Mitchell of Philadelphia, in the year 1869, made the original and remarkable observation that if a part of the body of a frog be immersed in simple syrup, there soon occurs in the crystalline lens of the eyeball an opaque appearance resembling the disease called cataract. He extended his observations to the effects of grapesugar, and obtained the same results. He found that he could induce the cataractic condition invariably by this experiment, or by injecting a solution of sugar with a fine needle, subcutaneously, into the dorsal sac of the frog. The discovery was one of singular importance in the history of medical science, and explained immediately a number of obscure phenomena. The co-existence of the two diseases, diabetes and cataract, in man had been observed by France, Cohen, Hasner, Mackenzie, Duncan, Von Graafe, and others, and Von Graafe had stated that after examining a large number of diabetic patients in different hospitals, he had found one-fourth affected with cataract. Before Mitchell's observation there was not a suspicion as to the reason of this connection, and a flood of light, therefore, broke on the subject the moment he proclaimed the new physiological fact. Still more, Mitchell showed that the cataract he was able to induce by experiment was curable also by experiment, a truth which will one day lead to the cure of cataract without operation. Then, but not till then, the splendid character of this original investigation, and the debt that is due to one of the most original, honest, laborious workers that ever in any age cultivated the science and art of medicine, will be duly recognized." Upon receiving intelligence of this discovery, Dr. Richardson undertook experiments to discover the cause of this dependence of cataract upon diabetes. He found that whenever the specific gravity of the blood was raised to ten degrees above the normal standard, and remained so for a short time, cataract followed. He also found that the disease so produced could be cured by removing the salts which had been introduced into the blood. This certainly points to a cure for cataract which shall be really radical, and adds another to the results which justify, even upon humanitarian grounds, physiological experiments, at the expense of the animal creation, within prescribed limits.

—Mr. Sorby has lately made some calculations of the probable size of the invisible atoms which compose material substances. Dr. Royston Pigott determined that the smallest visual angle which we can well appreciate is that covering a hole of 11.4 inches diameter at a distance of 1,100 yards. This corresponds to about six seconds of an arc. In a microscope magnifying 1,000 diameters this would make visible a particle one-three-millionth part of an inch thick. But Mr. Sorby is inclined to think that a size between 1/80,000 and 1/100,000 of an inch is about the limit of the visibility of minute objects, even with the best microscopes. Now, taking the mean of the calculations made by Stoney, Thomson, and Clerk-Maxwell, we have 21,770 as the number of atoms of any permanent gas required to cover one-thousandth of an inch, when lying end to end. By a series of calculations which produce numbers entirely beyond human conception, (10,317,000,000,000 atoms in 1/100,000,000 of a cubic inch, for instance) he reached the conclusion that there are in the length of 1/80,000 of an inch (the smallest visible object) about 2,000 molecules of water, or 520 of albumen, and therefore, in order to see the ultimate constitution of organic bodies, it would be necessary to use a magnifying power from 500 to 2,000 times greater than those we now possess. With this result settled, he was able to make one of those radical predictions which are so rarely possible to the careful scientist; namely, that the atom will never be seen by man. It is not that instruments cannot be made powerful enough (though that is no doubt true), but that the waves of light are too coarse to distinguish the limits of such an extremely small distance. To see atoms we should need light waves only one-two-thousandth of their actual length. At present we are as far from that attainment as we are from reading a newspaper, with the naked eye, at the distance of one-third of a mile.

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