Atlantic Monthly Vol. 6, No. 33, July, 1860
trouble with that daughter of his, so handsome, yet so peculiar, about whom there were so ma
ven then it was rather in the shape of wondering conjectures whether he would dare to make love to her, than in any pre
unlawful means, such as young girls have been known to employ in their straits, and to which the sex at all ages has a certain instinctive tendency, in preference to more palpable instruments for the righting of its wrongs. At any rate, this governess had been taken suddenly ill, and the Doctor had been sent for at midnight. Old Sophy had taken her master into a room apart, and said a few words to him which turned him as white as a sheet. As soon as he recovered himself, he sent Sophy out, called in the old Doctor, and gave him some few hints, on which he acted at once, and had the satisfaction of seeing his patient out of danger before he left in the morning. It is proper to say, that, during the follow
his explanations of possibilities, of probabilities, of dangers, of hopes. When he had g
re was nothing ever heard of like it; it could not be; she was ill,--she would outgrow all these singularities; he had had an aunt who was peculiar; he had heard that hysteric girls showed the strangest forms of moral obliquity for a time, but came right at last. She would change all at once, when her health got more firmly settled in the course of her growth. Are there not rough buds that open into sweet flowers? Are there not fruit
by two persons in presence of each other, which remain not only unworded, but unthoughted, if such a word may be coined for our special need. Such a mutually interpenetrative consciousness there was between the father and the old phy
of ours have her way, as far as it is safe. Send away this woman she hates, quietly. Get her a foreigner for a governess, if you can,--one that can dance and sing and will teach her. In the house old Sophy will watch her best. Out of it you must trust her, I am afraid,--for she will not be followed round, and she is in less danger than you think. If she wanders at n
received from her father and all about her. The old Doctor often came in, in the kindest, most natural sort of way, got into pleasant relations with Elsie by always treating her in the same easy manner as at the great party, enco
o some of the girls or of the teachers. Anything to interest her. Friendship, love, religion,--whatever will set her nature at
oks any too well, told her father to encourage his staying for a time. If she
. "Looks as if he had seen life. Has a scar that was made by a sword-cut, and a white spot on the si
He thought Elsie rather liked having him about the house for a while. She was very capricious,--acted as if she fancied him one day and disliked him the next. He did not k
a man-hater, and there was very little danger of any sudden passion springing up between two such young
most worth their weight in diamonds,--laces which had been snatched from altars in ancient Spanish cathedrals during the wars, and which it would not be safe to leave a duchess alone with for ten minutes. The old house was fat with the deposits of rich generations which had gone before. The famous "golden" fireset was a purchase of one of the family who had been in France during the Revolution, and must have come from a princely palace, if not from one of the royal residences. As for silver, the iron closet which had been made in the dining-room wall was running over with it: tea-kettles, coffee-pots, heavy-lidded tankards, chafing-dishes, punch-bowls, all that all the Dudleys had ever used, from the caudle-cup that used to be handed round the young mother's chamber, and the porringer from which children scooped their bread-and-milk with spoons as solid as ingots, to that ominou
andsome, game as a hawk, and hard to please, which made her worth trying for. But then there was something about Cousin Elsie,--(the small, white scars began stinging, as he said this to himself, and he pushed his sleeve up to look at them,)--there was something about Cousin Elsie he couldn't make out. What was the matter with her eyes, that they suck
There was much to be said on both sides. It was a balance to be struck after the two columns were add
other quarters. Sensible men, you know, care very little what a girl's present fancy is. The question is: Who manages her, and how can you get at that person or those persons? Her foolish little sentiments are all very well in their way; but business is business, and we can't stop for such trifles. The old political wire-pullers never go near the man they want to gain
games with his uncle, in which, singularly enough, he was beaten, though his antagonist had been out of play for years. He evinced a profound interest in the family history, insisted on having the details of its early alliances, and professed a great pride of race, which he had inherited from his father, who, though he had a
d sword-cut and a bullet-mark in two seconds from a scar got by falling against the fender, or a mark left by king's evil. He could not be expected to share our own prejudices; for he had heard nothing of the wild youth's adventures, or his scamper over the Pampas at short notice. So, th
to do but to watch Elsie; she had nothing to care for but this girl and her father. She had never liked Dick too well; for he used to make faces at her and tease her when h
o, have a perfect passion for gay-colored clothing; being condemned by Nature, as it were, to a perpetual mourning-suit, they love to enliven it with all sorts of variegated stuffs of sprightly patterns, aflame with red and yellow. The considerate young man had remembered this, too, and brought home for Sophy some handkerchie
ring eyes,--whether they were in the head of a woman or of a reptile he could not always tell, the images had so run together. But he could not help seeing that the eyes of the young girl had been often, very often, turned upon him when he had been looking away, and fell as his own glance met them. Helen Darley told him very plain
p together, and there would be no chance o
TION OF GALL
f their National Gallery. In 1790 but three national galleries existed in Europe,--those of Dresden, Florence, and Amsterdam. The Louvre was then first originated by a decree of the Constituent Assembly of France. England now spends with open hand on schools of design, the accumulation of treasures of art of every epoch and character, and whatever tends to ele
ctures, collected with taste and discrimination by a generous lover of art, because it did not wish to be put to the expense of finding wall-room for them. But
st of the most intense and refined enjoyment to every one capable of entering into its phases of thought and execution, analyzing its external and internal being, and tracing the mysterious transformations of spirit into form. It has been well said, that a complete gallery, on a broad foundation, in which all tastes, styles, and methods harmoniously mingle, is a court of final appeal of one phase of civilization against another, from an examination of which we can sum up their respective qualities and merits, drawing therefrom for our own edification as from a perpetua
sign which should enforce strict purity of taste and conformity to its motive. This gradual completion, as happened to the medi?val monuments of Europe, could be extended through many generations, which would thus be linked with one another in a common object of artistic and patriotic pride gradually growing up among them, as a national monument, with its foundations deeply laid in a unity of feeling and those desirable associations of love and veneration which in older civilizations so delightfully harmonize the past with the present. Each epoch of artists wo
the loss of the finest properties of each to the eye, and the destruction of that unity of motive and harmonious association so essential to the proper exhibition of art. For it is essential that every variety of artistic development should be associated solely with those objects or conditions most in keeping with its inspirations. In this way we quickest come to an understanding of its originating idea, and sympathize with its feeling, tracing its progress from infancy to maturity and decay, and comparing it as a whole with corresponding or rival varieties of artistic development. This systematized variety of one great unity is of the highest importance in placing the spectator in affinity with art as a whole and with its diversities of character, and in giving him sound stand- points of comparison and criticism. In this way, as in the Louvre, feeling and thought are readily transported from one epoch of civilization to another, grasping the motives and execution of each with pleasurable accuracy. We perceive that no conventional standard o
d eras. This would include every variety of ornamental art in which invention and skill are conspicuous, as well as those works more directly inspired by higher motives and intended as a joy forever. Architecture and objects no
scientific basis of accumulated knowledge and experience, providing models and other advantages not readily accessible to private resources, but leaving individual genius free to follow its own promptings upon a well-laid technical foundation. As soon as the young artist has acqu
evokes fraternity. The sentiment, that there is a common property in the productions of genius, making possession a trust for the public welfare, will increase among those by whose taste and wealth they have been accumulated. Masterpieces will cease to be regarded as the selfish acquisitions of covetous amateurs, but, like spoken truth, will become the inalienable birthright of the people,--finding their way freely a
ll that concerns art, a desire for its national development, an enlightened standard of criticism, and with it the most eloquent art-literature of any tongue, have all recently sprung into existence in our motherland. All honor to those generous spirits that have produced this,--and honor to the nation that so wisely expends its wealth! A noble example for America! England also throws open to the competition of the world plans for her public buildings and monuments. Mistakes and defects there have been, but an honest desire for amendment and to promote the intellectual growth of the nation now characterizes her pioneers in this cause. And what progress! Between 1823 and 1850, in the Museum alone, there have been expended $10,000,000. Within twelve years, $450,000 have been expended on the National Gallery for pictures, and yet its largest accession of treasures is by gifts and bequests. Lately, beside the P
ar, thirty paintings, costing $200,000, one of which, the Murillo, cost $125,000. Russia is following in the same path. Italy, Greece, and Egypt, by stringent regulations, are making it yearly more d
THE ORIGIN
a new pair of breeches, ("The Atlantic" still affects the older type of nether garment,) is sure to have hard-fitting places; or even when no particular fault can be fo
ession, in spite of its plausible and winning ways. We were not wholly unprepared for it, as many of our contemporaries seem to have been. The scientific reading in which we indulge as a relaxation from severer studies had raised dim forebodings. Investigations about the succession of species in time, and their actual geographical distribution over the earth's surface, were leading up from all sides and in various ways to the question of their origin. Now and then we encountered a sentence, like Professor Owen's "axiom of the continuous operation of the ordained becoming of living t
"Struggle for Existence,"--a principle which we experimentally know to be true and cogent,--bringing the comfortable assurance, that man, even upon Leviathan Hobbes's theory of society, is no worse than the rest of creation, since all Nature is at war, one species with another, and the nearer kindred the more internecine,--bringing in thousand-fold confirmation and extension of the Malthusian doctrine, that population tends far to outrun means of subsistence throughout the animal and vegetable world, and has to be kept down by sharp preventive checks; so that not more than one of a hundred or a thousand of the individuals whose existence is so wonderfully and so sedulously provided for ever comes to anything, under ordinary circumstances; so the lucky and the strong must prevail, a
ically to be defined. Indeed, when we consider the endless disputes of naturalists and ethnologists over the human races, as to whether they belong to one species or to more, and if to more, whether to three, or five, or fifty, we can hardly help fancying that both may be right,--or rather, that the uni- humanitarians would have been right several thousand years ago, and the multi- humanitarians will be a few thousand years later; while at present the safe thing to say is, that, probably, there is some truth on both sides. "Natural selection," Darwin remarks, "leads to divergence of character; for more living brings can be supported on the same area the more they diverge in structure, habits, and constitution," (a principle which, by the way, is paralleled and illustrated by the diver
or relations" of the quadrumanous family than we like to acknowledge. Fortunately, however,--even if we must account for him scientifically,--man with his two feet stands upon a foundation of his own. Intermediate links between the Bimana and the Quadrumana are lacking altogether; so that, put the genealogy of the brutes upon what footing you will, the four-handed races will not serve for our forerunners;---at least, not until some monkey, live or fossil, is producible with great toes, instead of thumbs, upon his nether extremities; or until some lucky geologist turns up
troduction of man,) as that one form should be transmuted into another upon fitting occasion, as, for instance, in the succession of species which differ from each other only in some details. To compare small things with great in a homely illustration: man alters from time to time his instruments or machines, as new circumstances or conditions may require and his wit suggest. Minor alterations and improvements he adds to the machine he possesses: he adapts a new rig or a new rudder to an old boat: this answers to variation. If boats could engender, the variations would doubtless be propagated, like those of domestic cattle. In course of time the old ones would be worn out or wrecked; the best sorts would be chosen for each particular use, and further improved upon, and
London Athen?um, passim. It appears to be conceded that these "celts" or stone knives
ficient answer may be found in the activity of the human intellect, "the delirious yet divine desire to know," stimulated as it has been by its own success in unveiling the laws and processes of inorganic Nature,--in the fact that the principal triumphs of our age in physical science have consisted in tracing connections where none were known before, in reducing heterogeneous phenomena to a common cause or origin, in a manner quite analogous to that of the reduction of supposed independently originated species to a common ultimate origin,--thus, and in various other ways, largely and legitimately extending the domain of secondary causes. Surely the scientific mind of an age which contemplates the solar system as evolved from a common, revolving, fluid mass,-- which, throughers will say, is supernatural; their very question is, whether we have yet gone back to the origin, and can affirm that the present forms of plants and animals are the primordial, the miraculously created ones. And even if they admit that, they will still inquire into the order of the phenomena, into the form of the miracle. You might
e lineal (or unlineal) descendants of other and earlier sorts,--it now concerns us to ask, What are the grounds in Nature, the admitted facts, which suggest hypotheses of derivation, in some shape or other? Reasons there must be, and plausible ones, for the persistent recurrence of theories up
s, are apt to vary widely; and that by interbreeding, any variety may be fixed into a race, that is, into a variety which comes true from seed. Many such races, it is allowed, differ from each other in st
of systematic botanists and zoologists, and their increasing disagreement as to whether various forms shall be held to be original species or marked varieties. Moreover, the degree to which the descendan
hows itself in the clustering of the species around several types or central species, like satellites around their respective planets. Obviously suggestive this of the hypothesis that they were satellites, not thrown off by revolution, like the moons of Jupiter, Saturn, and our
le areas. So well does this rule hold, so general is the implication that kindred species are or were associated geographically, that most trustworthy naturalists, quite free from hypotheses of transmutation, are constantly inferring former geographical continuity between
a large part of them, comes in to rebut the objection, that there has not been time enough for any marked diversificatio
which are generally believed to have diverged from a common stock. Not that five or six thousand years was a short allowance for this; but because some of our familiar domesticated varieties of grain, of fowls, and of other animals, were pictured and mummified by the old E
century; but the full confirmation, the recognition of the age of the deposit in which the implements occur, their abundance, and the appreciation of their bearings upon most interesting questions, belong to the present time. To complete the connection of these primitive people with the fossil ages, the French geologists, we are told, have now "found these axes in Picardy associated with remains of Elephas primigenius, Rhinoceros tichorhinus, Equus fossilis, and an extinct species of Bos."1 In plain language, these workers in flint lived in the time of the mammoth, of a rhinoceros now extinct, and along with horses and cattle unlike any now existing,--specifically different, as naturalists slès, in American Journal of Sc
rican Journal of Science and Arts, for January, 1860,
was recreated at a later date. But why not say the same of the auroch, contemporary both of the old man and of the new? Still it is more natural, if not inevitable, to infer, that, if the aurochs of that olden time were the ancestors of the aurochs of the Lithuanian forests, so likewise were the men of that age--if men they were--the ancestors of the present human races. Then, whoever concludes that these primitive makers of rude flint axes and knives were the ancestors of the better workmen of the succeeding stone age, and these again of the succeeding artificers in brass and iron, will also be likely to suppose that the Equus and Bos of that time were the remote progenitors of our own horses and cattle. In all candor we must at least concede that such consid
n conceiving, which may yet see the light, although Darwin's came first to the birth. Different as the two theories will probably be in particulars, they cannot fail to exhibit that fundamental resemblance in this respect which betokens a community of origin, a common foundation on t
e. Some of the facts or accepted conclusions already referred to, and several others, of a more general character, which must be taken into the account, impel the theory onward with accumulated force. Vires (not to say virus) acquirit eundo. The theory hitches on wonderfully well to Lyell's uniformitarian theory in geology,--that the thing that has been is the thing that is and shall
m past, and ends with an analogical inference which "makes the whole world kin." As we said at the beginning, this upshot discomposes us. Several features of the theory
to fortify these by new and strong arguments, we are going now to read the principal reviews
and revised edition of Mr. Darwin's book, with numerous corrections, important additions, an
NI
ITY
F HERODIAS'S DA
me! Could'
is,--how gre
ed worlds o
shallowest h
hy vanities
in noble an
finds, beyo
of his you
t face, whose
sunbeams fl
sweet, yet ha
o barren ev
Vanity!
less aroun
hat red sca
meed,--the Pr
ITY
Fair! Bewa
Tale that s
r! he stripp
He knew th
incing foo
along the spi
avy sounds
ong the unco
I
ul! Thy mat
ike, at thy
aves the nigh
cry, "thy fe
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imb they re
D LITERAR
Planets, Satellites, and Comets. By O.M. MITCHELL, Director
lts of investigation in modern astronomy. He has explained with great fulness the laws of motion of the heavenly bodies, and has th
except on the supposition that some portions of the work were written in great haste. Passing over a few mere oversights, such as a s
ject to the same controlling law." Since Kepler's third law expresses a relationship between the motions of three bodies, two of which r
square of its distance, "was equivalent to proving, that, if a body in space, free to move, received a single impulse, and at the same moment was attracted to a fixed centre by a force which diminished as
s B, X
X
fore
der the circumstances might describe an hyperbola as welt as
toward the sun, and says that in this case the effect of the sun's attraction will be to diminish the inclination of the moon's orbit during the first half of the revolution, and thus cause the node to retrograde; and to increase it during the second half, and thus cause the nodes to retrograde. But
at the surface of the sun in consequence of the centrifugal force,--part of the data being, that a pound at the earth's surfac
t the earth's in the ratio of 111 2 to 1, or, more exactly, in the ratio of 12,342.27 to 1. But the sun rotates on its axis much slower than the earth, requiring more than 25 days for one revolution. This will reduce the above in the ratio of 1 to 252, or 1 to 625; so that we shall have the earth's equatorial centrifugal force (1/2
rd to diminish it 10 times; so that the final result is more than 300 times too great. If this result were correct, Leverrier would have no need of lo
f about twenty-four thousand years the eccentricity of the earth's orbit will be smaller than at any other time during the next two hundred thousand, at least; but it will begin to increase again long before the orbit becomes circular. Astronomers have lo
wn to mathematicians as "the law of the conservation of areas," which
ot become circular in the course of millions of years, or in what the principle of areas consists or does not consist. But if such facts or principles are to be stated at all, we have a right to see them stated correctly. Howeve
e Lamplighter" and "Mabel Vaughan
disappoint that "Expectation" which Fletcher tells us "sits i' the air," and which we all know is not to be balked with impunity, there can be no doubt, that, in shifting the scene, the authoress has enabled us to judge her essential talent with more accuracy. Possessing none of the elements which are thought essential to the production of a sensation, "The Lamplighter" forced itself into notice as a "sensation book." The writer was
in conversation discoursed of its peculiarities and wonders, she was led to an extensive and thorough study of the numerous eminent scholars and travellers who have recorded their experience and researches in Syria and Damascus. Gradually she obtained a vivid internal vision of the scenery, and a practical acquainta
ty; but the authoress has succeeded in transforming Havilah from an abstract proposition into an individual existence. Her Bedouin lover, the wild, fierce, passionate Arab boy, Abdoul, with his vehement wrath and no less vehement love, passing from a frustrated design to assassinate Meredith, whom he considered the accepted lover of Havilah, to an abject prostration of his whole being, corporeal and mental, at the feet of his mistress, saluting them with "a devouring storm of kisses," is by far the most intense and successful effort at characterization in the whole volume. The conclusion of the story, which results in the acceptance by Meredith of the conditions enforced by the celestial purity of the heroine, will be far less satisfactory to the majority of readers than if Havilah had been represented as possessed of sufficient spiritual power to convert her passionate Arab lover into a being fit to be a Christian husband. By all the
sippi Partisan. By J.F.H. CLAIBORNE. Illustrate
the Mississippi. We regret that Dale's own words were thus lost; for the stories of the hardy partisan are not improved by his biographer's well-meant efforts to tell them in more graceful langua
his task. A noticeable and very comic feature is presented in the praises which he has interpolated, when ever any acquaintance of his is referred to. We readily acquiesce, when we are told that Mr. A is a model citizen, and that Mr. B is alike unsurpassed in public and private life; but the latter statement becomes less intensely gratifying when we learn the fact that Mr. C also has no superior, and that there are no better or abler men than D,
oems. By JOHN G. SAXE. Bos
on, what he may not learn by an appearance in print, the real judgment of the miscellaneous public on his performance. He may doubt the justice of the praise or the censure of the professional critic; but it is hard for him to resist the fact of failure, when it comes to him palpably in the satire that scowls in an ominous stare and the irony that lurks in an audible yawn,--hard for him to question the reality of triumph, when teeth flash at every gleam of his wit and eyes moisten at every touch of his sentim
of spirit and pure love of fun, excel the longer poems to which we have just referred. We have found the great majority of them exceedingly exhilarating reading, and, if our
d," and the Author of "Dollars and Cents." In T
atchless knowledge of the human heart and wonderful powers of delineation place them far above Dickens or Thackeray," they are all, from Sylvanus Cobb, Junior, down to Ned Buntline and Gilmore Simms, beneath serious notice, and may be left to the easy verdict of the readers of the cheap magazines and illustrated newspapers, in whose columns they have gained a world- wide obscurity. Miss Warner's b
r Carleton,) and would by no means hint at any reluctance to meet him again; but a new novel, by its very announcement, implies a new hero,--and if we come upon a plain family-party, when fondly hoping for an introduction to some distinguished stranger, we may be excused for thinking ourselves hardly treated. Is it so infallible a sign of superiority, moreover, to speak constantly in riddles? This Sphinx-like style is eminently characteristic of Mr. Linden. Then again, our authors have been too ambitious. They laboriously assert Mr. Linden to be a marvel of learning,--a man of vast and curious literary attainments: but all that their hero d
d my Camp
for kis
tonished the company by such a t
world's
e men and
tations we find to be contagious,) have recounted the wildly erratic histor
the little
rming his awe-struck hearers that the latter poem was written by Doctor Watts! The fact is, any attemp
by her blind admiration of her lover when he is peculiarly absurd, but whose dumb rejection of Doctor Harrison, though a tri
gentlemanly, good-humored Doctor is not to be considered a villain in the ordinary acceptation of the word; he is only a technical villain,--
of everybody, which seems to have no recommendation except that it leaves him free to do this very work of robbing the mails, and which, by his failure to do it, is left utterly unexplained and profoundly mysterious. All this is very bad. The Doctor's meanness is utterly inconsistent; and the bare thought of a sober and uncommonly awkward Yankee, like Squire Deacon, deliberately making two separate attempts at assassination, is unspeakably ludicrous. Moreover, we are hopelessl
id expect a magnanimous pardon to be extended to him by Mr. Linden; and although that gentleman was altogether too magnanimous before, we should have acquiesced mildly. And what becomes of Mrs. Derrick? There we are in earnest; for Mrs. Derrick is an especial favorite with us. It seems as if our authors had become bewildered,
on of certain detached passages. We have never seen the drollery of a genuine Yankee
known only as the new teacher, nobody knows and nobody dares ask his
Derrick, 'what on
hould I know? I
me all about him. And of course he thinks I know,--and I don't,--no more
and ask him, or wai
nd we'll send Cindy. He won't care about his name till he gets his
ould, after having no
o right away, and find out what his name is,--tell
ame back, and hand
"No." Then I said, says I, "Mis' Derrick do' know, and she'd like ter." "Miss Derrick!" says he, and he took out his pencil and writ that. But I
ions" are an importan
is sister hold a brief Yankee dial
bothering yourself a
e Squire, beginning his sentence with an untransl
to anything,' said his sister. 'Come, Sam,--d
crusty,' said the Squire. 'Shows
what has
re, 'what has he done? That's
t to find out for
'. Is that the sort o' man to t
ct to do by all this fuss you're ma
ning a man at that rate? When I
cy and painfully ridiculous when exposed to the curious light. Many of us readers find all this mawkish and silly, and others of us are pained that to such scrutiny should be exposed the dearest secrets of affection, and are not anxious to have them exposed to our own gaze.
Heart Triumphant. By A.S. RO
alling the heroes in number, we are happy to assure the tenderhearted reader) are not in the least interesting, except for sheer goodness of heart. This unaided moral excellence, however, fairly redeems the book, and so far softens even our critical asperity that we venture only to suggest,--first, that the utterly unprecedented patois of Mrs. Kelly is not Irish, for which a careful examination
ff-Bill. Was
which has a direct interest not only for all scholars, but for that large and constantly increasing class whose thirst for what may be called voluminous knowledge prompts them to buy all those shelf-ornamenting works without which no gentleman's library can be considered complete. Though in the matter of book-buying the characters of gentleman and scholar, so seldom united, are distinguis
l language which forms the staple of debate, we should make no remonstrance. We recognize the severe justice of an ideal avoirdupois in literary criticism. We remember the unconscious sarcasm of the Atlantic Telegraph, as it sank heart-broken under the strain of conveying the answer of the Heavy Father of our political stage to the graceful "good-morning" of Victoria. The enthusiastic member of the Academy of Lagado, who had spent eight years in a vain attempt to extract sunbeams from cucumbers, might have found profitable employment in smelting the lead even from light literature, not to speak of richer deposits. Under an act thus dubiously worded, and in a country which makes Bancroft a coas in no wise differing from cotton and tobacco, and rate them accordingly by a merely material standard. It has been the dealers in books, and not the makers of them, who have hitherto contrived to direct public opinion in this matter. We look upon Public Opinio
ess of our public libraries compels every student to depend more or less upon his own private collection of books; and it is a fact of some significance, that, with the single exception of Hildreth, all our
than under the privateering policy. But without some definite establishment of legal rights and remedies, the publisher is at the mercy of a dishonorable, sometimes of a vindictive competition, and must run the risk of having the market flooded within a week with a cheaper and inferior edition, reprinted from the sheets of his own which had been honorably paid for. We do not pretend to argue the question of literary property, the principle of it being admitted in the fact that we have any copyright-laws at all. Our wish is to show, that, in the present absence of settled law, the honest publisher is subjected to risks from the resultant evils of which the whole reading community suffers. The
r the treatment of European history as to overbalance in some instances the disadvantages arising from want of access to original documents; yet an American author whose work was yet in manuscript could not possibly compete with an English rival, even of far inferior ability, who had already published. If, within the last few years, a tolerably popular history of France had been published in England, and cheaply reprinted here, (as it surely would have been,) we doubt whether Mr. Godwin would have undertaken his laborious and elaborate work,--or, if he had, whether he would have rea
onor is liable to constant infringement for the gratification of personal enmity, or in the hope of immediate profit. The rewards of uprightness and honorable dealing are slow in coming, while those of unscrupulous greed are immediate, even though dirty. Under existing circumstances, free-trade and fair-play exist only in appearance: for the extraordinary claim has been set up, that an American booksell
rom the fact that the editions of American books republished in England are already numbered by thousands. With the growth of the English Colonies the value to an American author of an English copyright is daily
ones among them now are, there would be no need of legislative regulation; but, in the present condition of things, he who undertakes to reprint an English book which he has honestly paid for is at the mercy of whoever can get credit for poor paper and worse printing. There is no reason why a distinction should be made between copy-right and patent-right; but, if our legislators refuse to admit any abstract right in the matter, the
ERICAN PU
EDITORS OF THE A
arly Fathers, with Special Reference to the Doctrine of the Trinity; illustrating its Late Orig
ler, Graves Professor of Greek in Amherst College
be, M.D. New York. Mason Br
F.G.S., F.R.A.S., Michel Fellow of Queen's College, Oxford; late One of the Select Preachers to the Univers
e Pastor of the First Parish in Portland, Maine. Boston.
phet, Ancestor and Type of Jesus; in a Series of Letters addressed by an Assyrian Ambassador, Resident at the Court of Saul and David, to his Lord and King on the Throne of Nineveh; wherein the Glory of Assyria, as well as th
ds, Mathematical Instrument- Maker. Boston.
he Writings of Alexander Hamilton and of his Contemporaries. By John C.
en Appendices. Designed for the Use of Academies, Colleges, and Private Learners. By Frederick T. Winkelmann, A.M., Ph.D., Professor
Henry Ward Beecher. By B.F. Barrett. New Y
ames Redpath. Boston. Thayer &
uis Literary and Philosophical Association. Southern and W
ighter" and "Mabel Vaughan." Boston. Tic
ver before published in this Country. By Charles Dickens.
of "My Lady." New York. Harper
e. From 1827 to 1858. With Extracts from Varnhagen's D
ition, by Friedrich Kapp. New York.
d Original Sources. By John Savage. Philadelphi
itman. Boston. Thayer & Eld
liam Irving, James Kirke Paulding, and Washington Irving. Printed from the Original Edition,
ne of the Science, with an Abstract of its History. By J.T. Champlin, D.D., Preside
or of "Step by Step" and "Here and Hereafter."
ily Readers. By Marcius Willson, Author of "American History," "Outlines o
ly Series. By Marcius Willson. New York.
ly Series. By Marcius Willson. New York.
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, Taste, Wealth, and Religion. By P.A. Chadbourne, Prof
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Edward Bulwer Lytton, Bart. Library Edition. In Three Volumes.
Bart. Library Edition. In Two Volumes. Philadel
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vel in the Old World. By J.H. Siddons. New Y
Singing, and adapted to Choirs and Social Worship. By B.F. Baker
more Cooper. Illustrated from Drawings by F.O.C. Darl
y Trollope, Author of "Doctor Thorne," etc. New
ence of that Doctrine, reprinted from Various Sources; together with Sermons by Rev. Thos.
Irving. National Edition. Vol. I. New Y
Hiller, Author of "The Pleasures of Religion, and O
Holme Lee, Author of "Against Wind and Tide," etc.
Notes, a Memoir of his Life. Edited by his Surviving Correspondent, John Hall,
ed before the New York Historical Society, at the Academy of Music in New Yo
tion; including the Mechanism of Speech, and its Bearing upon Etymology. By S.S. Haldeman, A
ore the South Congregational Society, Boston, in January, February, and March, 1860
gious Persecution. By Sallie Rochester Ford, Author of "G
host. A Course of Lectures, by Frederick A. Farley, D.D., Pastor of the Chu
technic Societies of the State Military School, at Charleston. By
ge, Gambier, Ohio. Pittsbur
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