This, in a qualified sense, is a readable and valuable guide to the Eternal City. It contains a great deal of information about the historic sites of old Rome, a good deal about the galleries in which the intelligent Protestant visitor is supposed to be interested, and something also about the restaurants, livery stables, etc., to which it would be rash to assume that he is indifferent. It likewise contains a good deal about the churches and holy places, giving some interesting facts, together with various remarks and stories characterized by the usual dense ignorance and stupidity as to the dogmas and practices of the Catholic Church which may be said to be the special glory of the “reformed” Anglo-Saxon. The principal value of such commonplace productions is that they suggest the necessity of having a good manual on a somewhat similar plan for the use of people who really want to see and understand Rome when they visit it.
Travels in Arabia. Compiled and arranged by Bayard Taylor. New York: Scribner, Armstrong & Co. 1872.
This is another volume of the Illustrated Library of Travel and Exploration series, and is nearly all taken up with Palgrave’s narrative of his travels in Arabia. It is well illustrated.
Little Jakey. By Mrs. S. H. De Kroyft. New York: Hurd & Houghton.
A simple story and a sad one of the short yet not uneventful life of a little German, an inmate of the New York Institution for the Blind. It is written in a pleasing and unaffected style.
Aunt Fanny’s Present; or, The Book of Fairy Tales.
Woodland Cottage, and Other Tales. Philadelphia: Peter F. Cunningham.