'I am glad you have enlisted, Mr. Armstrong, she said.

'Thank you,' I replied stiffly.

'I suppose you are very busy making preparations?'

'Very.'

'And you are going soon?'

'I hope so.'

Kate left the room. I wished she was back again a thousand times. How kind and shy she looked. If there was a gleam of hope—that tall fellow in uniform—no, she might stay away forever. And yet my heart gave a great leap as she appeared again.

'I want to show you a photograph, Mr. Armstrong,' she said, blushing and smiling. I took it. It was the officer in uniform, with the tremendous mustache and flashing eyes.

'It is my brother Frank. Does he look like me?'

I started as if I had been shot.

'Miss Kate, I want to take a walk now, and I should like some company. Will you go with me?'

'Hadn't we better have tea first?' she said, smiling. 'The bell has just rung.'

I do not know how that tea passed off, whether we had jumbles or muffins, whether I drank tea or cold water; but I knew that opposite me sat Kate, radiant in pink muslin, and when the interminable tea was over, we were going to take a walk together. I was thinking what I should say. I am generally a sociable and genial man, and it seems to me that on this particular evening I was assaulted with a storm of questions and remarks.

'Don't you think so, Mr. Armstrong?' asked the lady on my right, the lady on my left, and the gentleman in black at the end of the table. I aimed monosyllables at them promiscuously, and have at present no means of knowing whether they fitted the questions and remarks or not.

In the midst of a mental speech, I was vigorously assaulted by Mary, the table girl, and, looking about me in surprise, I caught a glimpse of the boardinghouse cat just disappearing through the door:

'And sure, Mr. Armstrong, yer must be blind. The blow was intended for the cat, and she had her paw in yer plate.'

Perhaps you do not know how pleasant it is to take a walk with a little gloved hand resting upon your arm, little feet keeping step with yours, and a soft voice chiming in with everything you say. I was happy on that particular night. We walked on the Common. The stars shone, and the long branches of the old elms swayed to and fro in the moonlight, as we passed under them. It was just the time and place that I liked.

'Miss Kate,' I began, 'in a few days I shall be far away from home and friends, amid danger and death, fighting the battles of my country. I have known you but a short time; but that time has been long enough to show me that I love you with my whole soul. I offer my hand and heart to you. May I not hope that you will sometimes think of the soldier—that I may carry your heart with me?'

'I think you may hope,' she replied, gently; 'but this is very sudden. I will give you a final answer to-morrow morning.'

When we got home, we went into the dining room, and I helped her to a glass of ice water, and hoped she would linger there a moment; but she was shy, and bade me a kind good night. I didn't know till the next morning what she was about the rest of the evening; when she met me on the stairs, placed a small parcel in my hands, saying:

'My answer, Mr. Armstrong,' and was off like a fawn.

I opened it, and saw the stockings, blue, and warm and soft. A note was stitched in the toe of one of them:

MY DEAR FRIEND: I said I was knitting the stockings for a soldier. I began them, with a patriotic impulse, for no one in particular. I finished them last night, and knit loving thoughts of you in with every stitch, I have always liked you, but I do not think I should have given you my hand if you had not enlisted. I love you, but I love my country more. I give you the stockings. When you wear them, I hope you will sometimes think of her who fashioned them, and who gives herself to you with them. Yours, KATE.

I reverently folded the tiny note, after having committed it to memory, and repeated its contents to myself all the way to my office, beginning with 'Mr. Armstrong,' and ending with 'Yours, Kate.' I was in a state of extreme beatification. Kate was mine, noble girl! She loved me, and yet was willing to give me up for her country's cause. And I began to repeat the note to myself again, when, on a crossing, I was accosted by a biped, commonly known as a small boy:

'Mister, yer stocking is sticking out of yer pocket.'

I turned calmly around, and addressed him:

'Boy, I glory in those stockings. I am willing that the universe should behold them. My destiny is interwoven with them. Every stitch is instinct with life and love.'

'Don't see it, mister! Glory, hallelujah!' and he ended his speech by making an exclamation point of himself, by standing on his head—a very bad practice for small boys. I advise all precocious youngsters, who may read this article, to avoid such positions.

We broke camp, and started off in high spirits. I paraded through the streets with a bouquet of rosebuds on my bayonet. I found a note among them afterward, more fragrant than they.

When our regiment left Boston, it went from Battery Wharf. I went on board the Merrimac. Kate could not pass the lines, and stationed herself in a vessel opposite, where we could look at each other. I aimed a rosebud at her; it fell into the green water, and floated away. The second and third were more successful. She pressed one to her lips and threw it back again; the other she kept. Afterward, with the practical forethought which forms a part of her character, she bought out an apple woman, and stormed me with apples. The vessel left the wharf, and I looked back with eyes fast growing dim, and watched the figure on the dock, bravely waving her white handkerchief as long as I could see.

Well, it is hard for a man to leave home and friends, and all that he holds dear; but I do not regret it, though I have to rough it now. I am writing now beside a bivouac made of poles and cornstalks. My desk is a rude bench. I have just finished my dinner of salt junk and potatoes. On my feet is that pair of stockings. Profanity and almost every vice abounds; there are temptations all around me, but pure lips have promised to pray for me, and I feel that I shall be shielded and guarded, and kept uncontaminated, true to my 'north star,' which shines so brightly to me—true to my country and my God.



LITERARY NOTICES.

SORDELLO, STRAFFORD, CHRISTMAS EVE, AND EASTER DAY. By ROBERT BROWNING. Boston: Ticknor & Fields.

The contents of this volume, though now first presented to the American public, are not the latest of the author's writings. It completes, however, Messrs. Ticknor & Fields' reprint of his poetical works. His growing popularity calls for the present publication. We would fain number ourselves among the admirers of the husband of Elizabeth Barrett; the man loved by this truly great poetess, to whom she addressed the refined and imaginative tenderness of the 'Portuguese Sonnets?' of whom she writes:

'Or from Browning some 'Pomegranate,' which, if cut deep down the middle, shows a heart within blood-tinctured, of a veined humanity.'

Before the man so loved and honored, we repeat, we would fain bow in reverence. But it may not be; we cannot receive him as a true poet—as in any poetic quality the peer of his matchless wife. We hear much of his subtile psychology—we deem it psychological unintelligibility. His rhythm is rough and unmusical, his style harsh and inverted, his imagery cold, his invective bitter, and his verbiage immense. His illustrations are sometimes coarse, his comparisons diminish rather than increase the importance of the ideas to which they are applied. His pages are frequently as chaotic as those of Wagner's music; leaf after leaf may be turned over in the despairing search for a single crystallized idea. Fiery sparks, flying meteors, inchoate masses of nebulous matter are around us, but no glass in our possession can resolve them into ordered orbs of thought and beauty. If a man have anything to say, why not say it in clear, terse, vigorous English, or why use worlds of vigorous words to say nothing. Some years ago, one of Browning's books was sent for review to Douglas Jerrold, who was then just recovering from an attack of brain fever: after reading it for some time, and finding that he failed to arrive at any clear idea of the meaning of its lines, he began to fear that his brain was again becoming confused, and, handing it to his wife with a request that she would look over it in his absence, went out to drive. Returning in the evening, his first question was: 'Well, my dear, what do you think of Browning's poem?' 'Bother the gibberish,' was her indignant reply, 'I can't understand a word of it.' 'Thank God,' exclaimed Jerrold, clapping his hands to his head triumphantly, 'then I am not actually insane.'

DALETH; OR, THE HOMESTEAD OF THE NATIONS. Egypt Illustrated. By EDWARD L. CLARK. Boston: Ticknor & Fields.

A book produced without regard to expense, and of great beauty. Paper and print are excellent. Its illustrations are nearly one hundred in number. It has both woodcuts and chromo-lithographs exquisitely rendered, reproducing the modern scenery and antiquities of Egypt from photographs or authentic sources. Mr. Clark writes well, has travelled through the land of the Nile, and tries to bring before the minds of his readers vivid pictures of primeval times, for which Egypt presents such peculiar and valuable materials. Our writer is a scholar as well as a traveller, and has added to his personal experience considerable research into the authorities from whom many of his facts are derived. He is also an enthusiast, and somewhat of an artist, and gives us glowing pictures of the strange old land of the Pharaohs. He says: 'Daleth, the ancient Hebrew letter ([Hebrew: **-j]), signifies a door. From whatever country we look back along the pathway of the arts and sciences, in the dim distance tower the mighty gateways of Egypt—the homestead of the nations—beneath which the rites of religion and the blessings of civilization have passed out into the world; and with grateful respect we confess that on the banks of the Nile stands the true Daleth of the Nations.' This idea forms the clew to the whole book, and from hence is derived its title, Daleth. We heartily recommend it to our readers. It merits attention. We quote the last sentence of the short preface: 'That these fragments of the past may reflect for the reader the sunshine they have gathered in three thousand years, is the earnest wish of the author.'

THE LIFE AND ADVENTURES, SONGS, SERVICES, AND SPEECHES OF PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY (47th Regiment, New York Volunteers). "The Post of Honor is the Private's Station." With Illustrations by Mullen. From the authentic records of the New York Herald. New York: Carleton, publisher, 413 Broadway.

This book had established its reputation before it was issued in book form; and will be widely circulated. Our soldiers and sailors, our politicians of all parties will read it. It is evidently from the pen of one familiar with the varied phases of American life and the public service. Many of its songs are full of genuine humor. 'Sambo's Right to be Kilt' is excellent. 'The Review: A Picture of our Veterans,' is full of pathos. 'Miles' is familiar with Admiral DuPont and the monitors in front of Charleston, and is equally at home in Tammany Hall and Democratic Conventions. The publisher describes himself as unable to supply the rapid demand for the book. It is witty, satirical, and humorous; though we occasionally wish for somewhat more refinement.

ELIZA WOODSON; OR, THE EARLY DAYS OF ONE OF THE WORLD'S WORKERS. A Story of American Life. A. J. Davis & Co., 274 Canal street, New York.

We cannot tell our readers, with any degree of certainty, whether the tale before us is truth or fiction. It seems to be the simple history of an uneventful life, a record rather of the growth of character than an attempt to create the fictitious or tragical. If true it has the interest of fiction; if fictitious, it has the merit of concealing art and closely imitating nature. It contains the inner-life history of a deserted and much-abused little girl, from childhood to maturity. It is detailed, moral, conscientious, and interesting.

BABBLE BROOK SONGS. By J. H. MCNAUGHTON. Boston: Oliver Ditson & Co.

A volume of original songs and poems. That it comes from the University Press is sufficient guarantee of its superb typography. Of these lyrics we prefer 'Without the Children.'

RUBINA. New York: James G. Gregory, 46 Walker street.

A close and detailed picture of New England life and character. The poor young orphans have a dismal time of it among their hard and coarse relatives. The sterner forms of Puritanism are well depicted. The scene at the funeral of poor Demis, with its harrowing and denunciatory sermon over the corpse of the innocent girl, is powerful and true. The character of the 'help,' Debby, is drawn from life, and is admirably conceived and sustained. The book is, however, melancholy and monotonous. So many young and generous hearts beating themselves forever against the sharp stones of the baldest utilitarianism; so many bright minds drifting into despair in the surrounding chaos of obstinate, stolid, and perverse ignorance! It is a sadder book than 'The Mill on the Floss,' of which it reminds us. How the aspiring and imaginative must suffer in an atmosphere so cold and blighting!

COUNSEL AND COMFORT: Spoken from a City Pulpit. By the Author of 'The Recreations of a Country Parson.' Boston: Ticknor & Fields. 1864.

A book truly of good counsel and cheerful comfort. The strong personality of the writer sometimes interferes with the expansiveness of his views, as for instance in the discussion on pulpits; but it may perhaps be to that very strength of personality that we owe the force and directness of the lessons he so encouragingly inculcates.

A WOMAN'S RANSOM. by FREDERICK WILLIAM ROBINSON, Author of 'Grandmother's Money,' 'Under the Spell,' 'Wild Flower,' 'Slaves of the Ring,' 'The House of Life,' etc. Boston: Published by T. O. H. P. Burnham. New York: H. Dexter Hamilton & Co., Oliver S. Felt.

This work is published from advance sheets purchased from the English publisher. It is an excellent novel, full of incident and interest. The plot is artistic, and fascinates the reader to the end. The element of mystery is skilfully managed, increasing until the final denoument, which is original and unexpected. We commend it to the attention of the lovers of fascinating fiction.

INDUSTRIAL BIOGRAPHY: IRON WORKERS AND TOOL MAKERS. By SAMUEL SMILES, Author of 'Self-Help,' 'Brief Biographies,' and 'Life of George Stephenson.' 'The true Epic of our time, is not Arms but, Tools and Man—an infinitely wider kind of Epic.' Boston: Ticknor & Fields.

This book may be considered as a continuation of the Series of Memoirs of Industrial Men introduced in Mr. Smiles's 'Lives of Engineers.' The author says that 'while commemorating the names of those who have striven—to elevate man above the material and mechanical, the labors of the important industrial class, to whom society owes so much of its comfort and well-being, are also entitled to consideration. Without derogating from the biographic claims of those who minister to intellect and taste, those who minister to utility need not be overlooked.'

Surely the object of this book is a good one. The mechanic should receive his meed of appreciation. Our constructive heroes should not be forgotten, for the heroism of inventive labor has its own romance, and its results aid greatly the cause of human advancement. Most of the information embodied in this volume has heretofore existed only in the memories of the eminent mechanical engineers from whom it has been collected. Facts are here placed on record which would, in the ordinary course of things, have passed into oblivion. All honor to the brave, patient, ingenious, and inventive mechanic!

THE WIFE'S SECRET. By MRS. ANN S. STEPHENS, Author of 'The Rejected Wife,' 'Fashion and Famine,' 'Tho Old Homestead,' 'Mary Derwent,' etc., etc. Philadelphia: T. B. Peterson & Brothers, 306 Chestnut street.

MRS. STEPHENS has considerable ability in the construction of her plots and their gradual development. Her stories are always interesting. The wife's secret is well kept, and the denoument admirably managed. The fatal want of moral courage, the suffering caused by mental weakness, the strength of love, the sustaining power of intellect, are portrayed with ability in the book before us. The moral is unexceptionable throughout.

THE VEIL PARTLY LIFTED, AND JESUS BECOMING VISIBLE. By W. H. FURNESS, Author of 'Remarks on the Four Gospels,' 'Jesus and His Biographers,' 'A History of Jesus,' and 'Thoughts on the Life and Character of Jesus of Nazareth.' Boston: Ticknor & Fields. For sale by D. Appleton & Co., New York.

Investigations into the life and character of Christ Jesus are everywhere multiplying around us. Attempts to account for the marvels of His glorious Being on a simply natural plane are made in apparent good faith, and with considerable ability. Mr. Furness approaches his subject with reverence: he has studied the man, Jesus, with his heart. The human phases of His marvellous character are elaborated with skill and patience. He regards Christianity as a 'natural product, a product realized, not against, or aside from, but in the established order of things; that were we competent to pronounce upon the purposes of the Infinite Mind, which we are not, we might say that, so far from His being out of the course of nature, nature culminated in Christ, and that, of all that exists, He is the one being profoundly human, preeminently natural.' In the dove which descended at His baptism, Mr. Furness 'discovers the presence of a common dove divested of its ordinary appearance, and transfigured by a rapt imagination into a sign and messenger from heaven.' He says 'there is no intrinsic impossibility in supposing that Jesus was naturally possessed of an unprecedented power of will, by which the extraordinary effects attributed to him were produced.' 'The bloody sweat is an evident fiction—how could blood have been distinguished in the dark?' He pronounces the story of 'the wise men from the east an evident fable.' Mr. Furness puts no faith in the miraculous conception, but believes in the resurrection. He says: 'Bound by irresistible evidence to believe that Jesus was again alive on that memorable morning, I believe it will hereafter appear that He came to life through the extraordinary force of will with which He was endowed, and by which He healed the sick and raised the dead; or, in other words, that consciousness returned to Him by an action of the mind, in itself no more inscrutable in this case than it is in our daily waking from sleep.'

We deem that there is more difficulty in admitting that Christ rose from the dead by extraordinary force of will, than in admitting the truth of the record that He was the only Son of the Father, with full power over life and death. We thank Mr. Furness for the skilful manner in which he has brought to light the infinite tenderness and divine self-forgetfulness of the Redeemer, but we cannot think he has succeeded in lifting the veil of mystery which surrounds the birth, miracles, crucifixion, resurrection, and atonement of the Redeemer. Meantime let Christians who accept revelation in its integrity, throw no stumbling blocks in the way of earnest and candid inquirers, such as Mr. Furness. Is it not true that, dazzled by the Divine, we have been too little touched by the exquisite, compassionate, faithful, and child-like human character of our Master? Truth seeks the light, and it cannot fall too fully on the perfect; every ray serving but to reveal some new perfection. Let those of fuller faith rejoice in the beauties forever developing in the character of the Holy Victim. Let them patiently pray that those who love Him as an elder brother, may gaze upon His majesty until they see in Him the risen God.

We have found this book interesting and suggestive. It is disgraced by none of the flippant and irreverent sentimentalism which characterizes M. Renan.

Contents: 'Wherein the Teaching of Jesus was New;' 'How the Truth of the History is made to appear;' 'His Knowledge of Human Nature;' 'His Wonder-working Power;' 'His Child-likeness;' 'The Naturalness of His Teaching;' 'The Naturalness of certain Fables found in His History;' 'The Genesis of the Gospels.'

THE CAMPANER THAL, and Other Writings. From the German of JEAN PAUL FRIEDRICH RICHTER. Boston: Ticknor & Fields. For sale by D. Appleton & Co., New York.

The "other writings" in the work before us are: Life of Quintus Fixlein, Schmelzle's Journey to Flaetz, Analects from Richter, and Miscellaneous Pieces. The Life of Quintus Fixlein and Schmelzle's Journey to Flaetz are both translated by that ardent admirer of Richter's genius, Thomas Carlyle; a sufficient guarantee that the spirit and beauty of the original are fully rendered. The Analects are translated by the brilliant writer, Thomas de Quincey.

Richter died while engaged, under recent and almost total blindness, in enlarging and remodelling the Campaner Thal, or Discourses on the Immortality of the Soul. 'The unfinished manuscript was borne upon his coffin to the burial vault; and Klopstock's hymn, Auferstehen wirst du! 'Thou shalt arise, my soul!' can seldom have been sung with more appropriate application than over the grave of Jean Paul.'

The works of Jean Paul require no praise from the hands of the reviewer; his name is a true 'open sesame' to all hearts. Not to know him argues one's self unknown. Some of his finest passages are to be found in the Campaner Thal. It was written from his heart, and embodies his conviction of immortality. How tender its imagery, how rich its consoling suggestions, how all-embracing its arabesques, how original its structure! That its author should grow in favor with our people, would be a convincing proof of their own progress. So many different powers unite in him, that he has been well styled by his own people 'The only.' The vigor and rough strength of the man, with the delicacy and tenderness of the woman; glowing imagination with wondrous stores of erudition; fancy with exactness; the most loving heart with the keenest insight into the foibles of his fellows; the wit of a Swift with the romance of a Rousseau—but why attempt to describe the indescribable, to give portraits of the Proteus who changes as we gaze upon him?

Meanwhile, we heartily commend Jean Paul to the notice of our readers, and thank the publishers who are placing his great works within the reach of those who cannot read him in the original.

THE WIND HARP, and Other Poems. By ELLEN CLEMENTINE HOWARTH. Philadelphia: Willis P. Hazard.

If we have been correctly informed, the author of this book is an Irish woman living in Trenton, N. Y., whose husband is a laboring man, and, like herself, in humble circumstances. She has quite a large family, lives in a small tenement, and is obliged to labor daily for a subsistence for herself and family. When she came to this country from Ireland, she could scarcely write a grammatical sentence; and all the information of history and the classics which she has, she has derived from such books as have accidentally fallen in her hands. She is extremely modest and retiring, and does not seem to be at all conscious of the genius with which she is endowed. Mrs. Howarth possesses the poetical talent of the Irish race. Her rhythm is musical, flowing, and pure; her thoughts gentle and womanly; her diction refined; her form good; her powers of imitation great. What she wants now is more self-reliance, that she may write from the inner life of her own experience. Her poems lack originality. Let her not fear to dip her pen in her own heart, and sing to us the joys and sorrows of the poor. Burns were a better study for her than Moore; the Corn Law rhymer than Poe. With her talents and the cultivation she has acquired, her familiarity with the hopes, fears, and realities of a life of labor will give her great advantages as the poetess of the faithful, suffering poor.

BOOKS RECEIVED TOO LATE FOR REVIEW.

LYRICS OF A DAY; OR, NEWSPAPER POETRY. By a Volunteer of the U. S. Service. New York: Carleton, publisher, 413 Broadway.

RED-TAPE AND PIGEON-HOLE GENERALS: as Seen from the Ranks during a Campaign in the Army of the Potomac. By a Citizen Soldier.

'We must be brief when traitors brave the field.'

New York: Carleton, publisher, 413 Broadway.



EDITOR'S TABLE.

ADELAIDE A. PROCTER AND JEAN INGELOW.

Extremes ever meet, and our age, which is preeminently occupied with physical science and material comfort and aggrandizement, is also eminently productive in good poetry. There should be no antithesis between the words physical science and poetry. The secrets of the Universe, the ways of God's working, are surely the highest poetry; but the greater number of scientists have willed a divorce between the material and the spiritual, and decry that very imaginative faculty which, in the case of Kepler, bore such wonderful fruits for science. Facts are very well, and induction is also well, but science requires the aid of the creative and divining imagination to order the details and draw thence the broader and higher generalizations. Let us hope that the good common sense of the in-coming half-century will annul the divorce, and again unite on a solid basis spheres that should never have been so far sundered.

Meantime, we cannot but remark the number of good poems meeting us on every hand, not only from writers known to fame, but also from the living tombs of obscure country newspapers. We know it is the fashion to deride such productions, and sneer at the 'would-be poets.' Let critics speak the truth fearlessly, but let them never prefer the glitter of a self-glorifying search for faults to the more amiable but less piquant occupation of discovering solid thought, earnest feeling, and poetic fancy. It is well to discourage insipidity, impudent pretension, and every species of affectation; but critics are, like authors, fallible, and not unfrequently present glaring examples of the very faults they condemn. In any case where the knife is needed, let it be used firmly but gently, that, while the patient bleeds, he may feel the wound has been inflicted by no unloving, cynical hand, but was really intended for his ultimate good. Let the instrument be finely tempered, and neither coarse nor rough. We can all recall a few cases where a rude treatment has effected a cure, but only by draining the life blood of the victim, or by turning every better human feeling into bitterness and corroding gall. Words of blame intended to fall upon the hearts of the young, or of the old, should always be spoken kindly, for we can never know how deeply they may penetrate, what tender schemes for widowed mother, aspiring brother, portionless sister, or starving wife and children they may shatter. The public is a pretty keen judge, and will in most cases drop works devoid of the immortal elements of genius. The critic may point the way, but he need add no unnecessary stab to a downfall sure and bitter.

This digression, however, has no bearing upon the honored names heading this table, as both now have become 'household words' in our midst. Both are acknowledged as real poets, but how different are they in style, and mode of thought! Jean Ingelow, as the more brilliant, is the more general favorite, Adelaide Procter having as yet scarcely received her due meed of praise. Miss Ingelow exhibits an exuberant fancy, a luxurious wealth of diction, and a generally fine poetic sense of form; her thoughts are sound, and their dress new and glittering; but the volume we have read is one to please the fancy and gratify the intellect rather than touch the heart. The style is occasionally obscure and the thought difficult to follow. Of course one can always find a meaning, but one is not always sure of interpreting according to the author's intentions. This quality, found largely in the school of Robert Browning, is one to be guarded against. Mrs. Browning sometimes deals in such involutions, but her style is so evidently an essential part of herself, that we rarely think of affectation in connection with it. It is pleasanter to dream our own dreams, than to follow any author into a tangled maze, whence we, and not he, must furnish the clew for egress.

The 'Songs of Seven' and 'The High Tide on the Coast of Lincolnshire' are truly fine poems, to us the most complete and sustained in the entire collection. In 'Requiescat in Pace,' we are carried so far away from the actualities of life that we scarcely care whether the lover be dead or living. As in a fairy tale, we read for the sake of curiosity, admiring sundry touches here and there, but feeling nothing. Miss Ingelow's rhythm is good, and her language musical.

The style of Adelaide Procter is singularly lucid and direct; she has but little command of poetic ornament, and we rarely think of her choice of words. Pathos, and a close, keen representation of human experience, are her distinguishing characteristics. She is a poet to read when the soul is wrung, and longs for the solace of communion with a noble, tender, sympathetic human heart. The very absence of ornament brings the thoughts and feelings nearer to our needs. Her poems are evidently pictures of real human souls, and not poetic imaginings of what human beings might feel under such and such circumstances. There are many of Miss Procter's tales and shorter poems which bring tears to the eyes of all who have really lived and sorrowed, and the more we read them, the more do they come home to us. We feel as if we could take their author into our heart of hearts, and make all the world love her as do we. With her, brilliancy of imagery and description are replaced by a sententiousness and concentration of expression that suddenly strike home some truth perhaps well known, but little dwelt on. For instance, in 'A Legend of Provence,' we find:

'Kind hearts are here; yet would the tenderest one Have limits to its mercy: God has none. And man's forgiveness may be true and sweet, But yet he stoops to give it. More complete Is Love that lays forgiveness at thy feet, And pleads with thee to raise it. Only Heaven Means crowned, not vanquished, when it says, 'Forgiven!''

Again, in 'The Present:'

'Noble things the great Past promised, Holy dreams, both strange and new; But the Present shall fulfil them, What he promised she shall do.

* * * * *

'She is wise with all his wisdom, Living on his grave she stands, On her brow she bears his laurels, And his harvest in her hands.'

'Links with Heaven' is a continued series of tender, original thoughts, expressed in the same terse and striking, but simple manner. 'Homeless,' 'Treasures,' 'Incompleteness,' 'Light and Shade,' are, among the smaller poems, fine specimens of her distinguishing merits; while of the longer, 'Three Evenings in a Life,' 'Philip and Mildred,' and 'Homeward Bound' cannot fall to charm all who love to read a real page from the experience of humanity.

Both Jean Ingelow and Adelaide Procter are thoroughly penetrated by profound religious convictions, the faith and charity of the latter being especially vivid and pervading. The one has a preponderance of the beautiful gift of a rich fancy, while to the other was given in greater degree the power of the penetrative and sympathetic imagination. The one, as we read, recalls to us a glittering heap of precious, shining jewels; the other, the first cluster of spring violets, wreaths of virginal lilies and midsummer roses, growths of cypress sound to the core, rosemary, sage, and all healing herbs, branches of scarlet maple leaves, and lovely wayside gentians, adorned by the hand of the Great Artist, and blue as heaven itself.

But a little while ago, the Angel, Death, 'who comes in love and pity, and, to save our treasures, claims them all,' bore away her pure soul along the 'misty pathway' to everlasting peace and joy.

L.D.P.

* * * * *

Loyal Women of America, this will greet you in the midst of the great Metropolitan Fair, and we congratulate you upon the success of the heavy work you have undertaken and accomplished! When God was manifest to men, he came to work for others, and you are treading in the highest path when you follow in the footsteps of the Master. Claim and perform your natural duties, show yourselves capable of self-abnegation, evince your determination to support the cause of justice, to be loyal to the humane principles of our Constitution—and all the rights which you may postulate, will be conceded you. This war in which you have suffered so much, made so many sacrifices, has developed your energies, shown your capabilities, revealed your noble hearts, and convinced the world that woman is the strong and vigorous helpmate, and not the weak, if beautiful, toy of man. The Government looks to you as its best aid, for moral sanction is its living soul; it looks to you for higher life, for, unless the heart of love is the throbbing life-pulse of Government, it sinks into a dull, lethargic mechanism. Far above the din of faction, the red tape of cabinets, the rivalry of generals, the strife of politicians, shines the resolve, and pulses the determination of woman, that mankind shall be free. For this, the dusky nation bless her as she moves; the frighted mother torn from her child, the maiden sold to shame, call upon her to deliver them from infamy and the devouring hunger of a robbed mother's heart. The wronged children of Ham arise and call her 'Blessed.'

But it is with the men of her own race, that woman is weaving the golden web of priceless sympathies. Woven of her tenderness, it sparkles with man's deathless gratitude. The soldier feels her gracious being in every throb of his true heart. Her love and care are forever around him. In his lonely night watches, his long marches, his wearisome details of duty, his absence from home, his countless deprivations, he thinks of the women of his country, and is proud that he may be their defender. This thought stimulates him on the field of battle, and nerves his arm to deeds of glory. And when he falls, he falls into the arms which spread everywhere around him. The Sanitary Commission is her representative. She sends it to him to breathe of her in his hour of pain. Through it she watches o'er him as he lies low and bleeding on the dreadful field, surrounded by the dead and dying; she sends her ambulances there to bear him to shelter and comfort; her surgeons stanch the noble blood, remove the shattered limbs, quench the stifling thirst, working with a tenderness sucked in with the mother's milk. In the hospital, in her own gentle person, she soothes his restless hours, watches o'er his sleepless couch, dresses his mangled limbs, bears him up with her own faith, giving her strength to aid his weakness, she leads him back to life, or, if death must come, up to God. American Women, live up to the holy duties now demanded of you, and your rights will all be conceded, higher, holier, deeper, broader, more vital than any for which you have yet asked or hoped. The esteem and veneration of the very men who have scorned you for your love of luxury, laughed at you for your ridiculous aping of foreign aristocracy, jeered at you for your love of glitter, your thirst for wealth, your frivolity and folly, and despised you for your arrogance and heartlessness—are already yours. Contempt for you has passed away forever. Let the dead past bury its dead. American women solve the riddle of woman's destiny. Vast is her field and heritage: all who suffer belong to her. Her heart is the strength of love and charity; her mind, justice and the rights of all who bear the human form; her soul, God's temple among men, in which dwell the angels of Purity, Sacrifice, and Devotion. Love to God and man is her creed, self-abnegation her crown, faith her oriflamme, strength her gift, life her guerdon, and immortality her portion.

American Women, we place a soldier's song before you:

A SOLDIER'S PSALM OF WOMAN.

BY LIEUT. RICHARD REALF.

Down all the shining lapse of days That grow and grow forever In truer love and better praise Of the Almighty Giver— Whatever God-like impulses Have blossomed in the human, The most divine and fair of these Sprang from the soul of woman.

Her heart it is preserves the flower Of sacrificial duty, Which, blown across the blackest hour, Transfigures it to beauty; Her hands that streak these solemn years With vivifying graces, And crown the foreheads of our fears With light from higher places.

O wives and mothers, sanctified By holy consecrations, Turning our weariness aside With blessed ministrations! O maidens, in whose dewy eyes Perennial comforts glitter, Untangling War's dark mysteries And making sweet the bitter;—

In desolate paths, on dangerous posts, By places which, to-morrow, Shall be unto these bannered hosts Aceldemas of sorrow, We hear the sound of helping feet, We feel your soft caressings; And all our life starts up to greet Your lovingness with blessings!

On cots of pain, on beds of woe, Where stricken heroes languish, Wan faces smile and sick hearts grow Triumphant over anguish; While souls that starve in lonely gloom Flush green with odorous praises, And all the lowly pallets bloom With Gratitude's white daisies.

O lips that from our wounds have sucked The fever and the burning! O tender fingers that have plucked The madness from our mourning! O hearts that beat so loyal-true For soothing and for saving— God send your own hopes back to you, Crowned with immortal having!

Thank God!—O Love! whereby we know Beyond our little seeing, And feel serene compassions flow Around the ache of being;— Lo! clear o'er all the pain and dread Of our most sore affliction, The shining wings of Peace are spread In brooding benediction!

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We have been requested by the author of 'Hannah Thurston,' an article in our April number, to correct a typographical error (the omission of the word all) in said article. The mutilated sentence originally read: "I cannot think that marriage is essential to, or even best for, the happiness of all women."

ED. CON

THE END