Why Paul Ferroll Killed his Wife. By the Author of Paul Ferroll. New-York: Carleton, 413 Broadway. Boston: N. Williams & Co.
Those who remember Paul Ferroll, probably recall it as a novel of merit, which excited attention, partly from its peculiarity, and partly from the mystery in which its writer chose to conceal herself—a not unusual course with timid debutantes in literature, who hope either to intriguer the public with their masks, or quietly escape the disgrace of a fiasco should they fail. Mrs. Clive is, however, it would seem, satisfied that the public did not reject her, since she now reäppears to inform us, 'novelly,' why the extremely ill-married Paul made himself the chief of sinners, by committing wife-icide. The work is in fact a very readable novel—much less killing indeed than its title—but still deserving the great run which we are informed it is having, and which, unlike the run of shad, will not we presume—as it is a very summer book—fall off as the season advances.
The Channings. A Domestic Novel of Real Life. By Mrs. Henry Wood. Philadelphia: T. B. Peterson. Boston: Crosby and Nichols.
Notwithstanding the praise which has been so lavishly bestowed on this 'tale of domestic life,' the reader will, if any thing more than a mere reader of novels for the very sake of 'story,' probably agree with us, after dragging through to the end, that it would be a blessing if some manner of stop could be put to the manufacture of such books. A really original, earnest novel; vivid in its life-picturing, genial in its characters; the book of a man or woman who has thought something, and actually knows something, is at any time a world's blessing. But what has The Channings of all this in it? Every sentence in it rings like something read of old, all the incidents are of a kind which were worn out years ago—to be sure the third-rate story-reader may lose himself in it—just as we may for a fiftieth time endeavor to trace out the plan of the Hampton Labyrinth, and with about as much real profit or amusement.
It is a melancholy sign of the times to learn that such hackneyed English trash as The Channings has sold well! It has not deserved it. American novels which have appeared nearly cotemporaneously with it, and which have ten times its merit, have not met with the same success, for the simple and sole reason that almost any English circulating library stuff will at any time meet with better patronage than a home work. When our public becomes as much interested in itself as it is in the very common-place life of Cockney clergymen and clerks, we shall perhaps witness a truly generous encouragement of native literature.
The Pearl of Orr's Island. A Story of the Coast of Maine. By Mrs. Harriet Beecher Stowe. Boston: Ticknor and Fields.
In reading this quiet, natural, well-pictured narrative of Northern life, we are tempted to exclaim—fresh from the extraordinary contrast presented by Agnes of Sorrento—O si sic omnes! Why can not Mrs. Stowe always write like this? Why not limit her efforts to subjects which develop her really fine powers—to setting forth the social life of America at the present day, instead of harping away at the seven times worn out and knotted cord of Catholic and Italian romance? The Pearl of Orr's Island, though not a work which will sweep Uncle Tom-like in tempest fashion over all lands and through all languages, is still a very readable and very refreshing novel—full of reality as we find it among real people, 'inland or on sounding shore,' and by no means deficient in those moral and religious lessons to inculcate which it appears to have been written. Piety is indeed the predominant characteristic of the work—not obtrusive or sectarian, but earnest and actual; so that it will probably be classed, on the whole, as a religious novel, though we can hardly recall a romance in which the pious element interferes so little with the general interest of the plot, or is so little conducive to gloom. The hard, 'Angular Saxon' characteristics of the rural people who constitute the dramatis personæ, their methods of thought and tone of feeling, so singularly different from that of 'the world,' their marked peculiarities, are all set forth with an apparently unconscious ability deserving the highest praise.
The Golden Hour. By Monoure D. Conway, Author of the 'Rejected Stone,' 'Impera Parendo.' Boston: Ticknor and Fields.
The most remarkable work which the war has called out is beyond question the Rejected Stone. Wild, vigorous, earnest, even to suffering, honest as truth itself, quaint, humorous, pathetic, and startlingly eccentric. Those who read it at once decided that a new writer had arisen among us, and one destined to make no mean mark in the destinies of his country. The reader who will refer to our first number will find what we said of it in all sincerity, since the author was then to us unknown. He is—it is almost needless to inform the reader—a thorough-going abolitionist, yet one who, while looking more intently at the welfare of the black than we care to do in the present imbroglio, still appreciates and urges Emancipation, or freeing the black, in its relation to the welfare of the white man. Mr. Conway is not, however, a man who speaks ignorantly on this subject. A Virginian born and bred, brought up in the very heart of the institution, he studied it at home in all its relations, and found out its evils by experience. A thoroughly honest man, too clear-headed and far too intelligent to be rated as a fanatic; too familiar with his subject to be at all disregarded, he claims close attention in many ways, those of wit and eloquence not being by any means the least. In the work before us, he insists that there is a golden hour at hand, a title borrowed from the quaint advertisement, of 'Lost a golden hour set with sixty diamond minutes'—which if not grasped at by the strong, daring hand will see our great national opportunity lost forever. We are not such disbelievers in fate as to imagine that this golden hour ever can be inevitably lost. If the cause of freedom rolls slowly, it is because even in free soil there are too many Conservative pebbles. Still we agree with Conway as to his estimate of the great mass of cowardice, irresolution, and folly which react on our administration. If the word 'Emancipationist,'—meaning thereby one who looks to the welfare of the white man rather than the negro—be substituted for 'Abolitionist' in the following, our more intelligent readers will probably agree with Mr. Conway exactly:
'If this country is to be saved, the Abolitionists are to save it; and though they seem few in numbers, they are not by a thousandth so few as were the Christians when JESUS suffered, or Protestants when Luther spoke. There is need only that we should stand as one man, and unto the end, for an absolutely free Republic, swearing to promote eternal strife until it be attained—until in waters which Agitation, the angel of freedom, has troubled, the diseased nation shall bathe and be made every whit whole.