From James Munroe & Co., Boston and Cambridge:—
LUCY HERBERT; or, the Little Girl who would have an Education. By Estelle. With eight engravings. This is a very pretty and simply told story of successful effort and self-discipline. The heroine, left an orphan and dependent on her own exertions at a very early age, resolves to carry out her mother's strong desire that her little Lucy should be an educated woman, fitted as well to occupy an elevated station as the more humble one which seemed her lot. Her perseverance in pursuing this object, and the happy termination of her labors, are related in an easy and agreeable style.
FRIENDS IN COUNCIL: a Series of Readings and Discourses thereon. In two volumes. The first volume of this work has long been a familiar and favorite book with us. To read it is like holding familiar converse with a man of a large, generous, and kindly heart, and with an intellect at once deep, comprehensive, and penetrating into the very pith and marrow of the subject discussed. Vexed political questions, and those connected with our social life and happiness, are viewed with thoughtful consideration and an evident desire to look on both sides with impartiality; and, mingled with this, there is a genial undercurrent of humor and fancy, which makes the book an attractive one even to those who generally avoid the abstruser subjects. The clear and simple, yet elegant style in which the work is written shows that the author is a man of high cultivation as well as of earnest thought.
NOVELS, SERIALS, PAMPHLETS, &c.
From T. B. Peterson, 102 Chestnut Street, Philadelphia: "First Love. A Story of Woman's Heart." By Eugene Sue. This is said to be the author's best book. Powerful, pathetic, and witty, by turns, and of exciting interest, it undoubtedly is; but we can discover no other merit in a hasty examination of its pages. Far more to be read and admired, if not so intricate in plot or so lively in narration, are the two companion volumes, from the same publishers, respectively entitled, "The Iron Rule; or, Tyranny in the Household," and "The Lady at Home; or, Happiness in the Household." When we state that those interesting, naturally written, lifelike fictions are from the pen of T. S. Arthur, no one need be told of their excellence. Happy will it be if the lessons, so pleasingly and so touchingly inculcated by them, take root in the hearts of many and bear their proper fruit—charity, peace, humanity, and love.
From Harper & Brothers, New York, through Lindsay & Blakiston, Philadelphia: "Charles Auchester. A Memorial." By E. Berger. This purports to be the autobiography of a musical artist, portraying, in a somewhat sentimental, though not unattractive style, the early impulses and maturer struggles of one bountifully endowed with the tender and childlike feelings which the world is pleased to allot to the softer types of genius.
From A. Hart (late Carey & Hart), Philadelphia: "Old England and New England, in a Series of Views taken on the Spot." By Alfred Bunn, author of "The Stage Before and Behind the Curtain." Two volumes of the London edition complete in one. We have received, with the publisher's respects, a cheap American reprint of this volume of travels through the United States. As containing anecdotes and sketches of sixty or seventy of our notabilities, it will create some stir and attract many readers. With the usual amount of cant in regard to the "spitting" propensities of our population, we find much amusing matter, and no little philosophic consideration for manners and customs undoubtedly strange and singular to a thorough-bred Englishman. Mr. Bunn, while peregrinating the States, must have encountered an unusual number of our "fast men," who seem to have passed upon him for truth many of the broadly-humorous, if not profane stories, the relation of which is one of their peculiar amusements.
From Phillips, Sampson, & Co., Boston, through T. B. Peterson, Philadelphia: "Hearts and Faces; or, Home-Life Unveiled." By Paul Creyton, author of "Father Brighthopes," etc. This is a charming little collection of domestic tales and sketches, making no pretensions to literary merit, but really possessing it in a high degree.
From J. S. Redfield, Clinton Hall, New York, through W. B. Zieber, Philadelphia: "The Yemassee; a Romance of Carolina." By W. Gilmore Simms, Esq., author of "The Partisan," "Guy Rivers," "Martin Faber," "Richard Hurdis," "Border Beagles," etc. This is a new and revised edition of a standard romance, of whose acknowledged merits it is not necessary for us to speak.