to
draw him into separate detachments, in successive skirmishes to profit
of their superior aim and activity, and of their better knowledge of the
country, and to keep up its confidence by a system of short and gradual
retreats from fastness to fastness,--from river beyond river." p.
l29.--These sentences, taken at hap-hazard from two consecutive leaves,
are not unfair specimens of the literary merits of this intrepid attempt
to convert the history of the nation, at its most critical period, into
a collection of _Memoires pour servir_ to the biography of General
Hamilton.

We are very sure that Mr. Hamilton has undertaken a task for which he
has neither the necessary talent nor materials, and which can only end,
as it has begun, in a ridiculous failure. If we could hope that our
words would reach or influence him, we would entreat him to be content
with the proud heritage of fame which his father left to his children,
without seeking to increase it by encroachments on that left behind
them by his great contemporaries. The fame of Hamilton, indeed, is no
peculiar and personal property of his descendants. It belongs to us all,
and neither the malice of his enemies nor the foolish fondness of his
son can separate it from us. Notwithstanding the amusement we could not
help deriving from the perusal of this volume, and sure as we are that
the book must grow more and more diverting, in its way, as it goes on,
we cannot but feel that the entertainment will be dearly purchased
at the cost of even the shadow of just ridicule resting, even for a
moment, on so illustrious and venerable a name as that of ALEXANDER
HAMILTON.

_Parthenia: or the Last Days of Paganism_. By ELIZA BUCKMINSTER LEE,
Author of "Naomi," "Life of Jean Paul," "Lives of the Buckminsters,"
etc., etc. Boston: Ticknor & Fields. 1858. 12mo. pp. 420.

The true gauge of any civilization, whether of a race, a nation, or a
district, is to be found in the character and position of its women.
Slaves, toys, idols, companions, they rise with every ascending grade of
culture until they have won the natural place so long denied them. The
feminine string rings a true octave with the masculine, and makes a
perfect concord, when left to vibrate in its entire length. But the
lower forms of social humanity are constantly shortening it, and so
producing occasional harmonies at the expense of frequent discords.

We hold such a book as "Parthenia" to have a wide significance