764 BOOK REVIEWS. 



BOOK REVIEWS. 



Bryant's Popular History of the United States. Vol. I. pp. 638, large 



octavo. Scribner, Armstrong & Co., New York : 1877. 



This work has been called forth by the very evident want of a history 

 of the United States intermediate between those prepared for schools and 

 those which are too voluminous for general use; one which would combine 

 an attractive style with a complete and authentic record of events. Perhaps 

 no man in this country could have been selected who is better adapted to 

 this work than the veteran writer and scholar, William Cullen Bryant. 

 Having lived in and through the earlier days of our history, during the 

 administrations of Jefferson, Adams and Jackson, and while Webster and 

 Clay were leaders of American politics, and having published for a half cen- 

 tury one of the leading metropolitan newspapers, he has necessarily been 

 more or less intimately acquainted with most of the stirring events of the 

 times, past as well as present, and is thus enabled to write with a confidence, 

 freshness and accuracy unequalled by those historians who compile their 

 facts from extraneous sources. 



His coadjutor, Mr. Sidney Howard Gay, also an editor of long experi- 

 is noted for his knowledge of American history, elegant style and accuracy 

 in details. 



Between the two, it is not strange that an excellent and most readable 

 history has been produced, adapted equally to the wants of the scholar and 

 the tastes of the masses of readers. The volume now ready, is made up of 

 the period extending from the first discovery oi the Western Hemisphere to 

 the establishment of the several colonies along the Atlantic coast and the 

 beginning of their colonial career. 



The chapters on Pre-historic Man, the Mound Builders, the J^orthmen 

 in America, and the Pre-Columbian Voyages of Discovery, are extremely 

 interesting, as well as novel and out of the usual course in historical works 

 on the United States. 



The illustrations, numbering some 320, are first-class, from the beautifully 

 engraved portrait of Bryant himself, to that depicting the trial of Mrs. 

 Hutchinson in Massachusetts (1657) for preaching strange doctrines in public. 



The mechanical work is fully up to the standard of the well-known pub- 

 lishers, and will compare favorably with that of any other house in the 

 country. The complete work will comprise four volumes. It is sold only 

 by subscription, and Mr. A. Hart, the agent for this portion of the West, is 

 meeting with satisfactory encouragement. 



Words: Their Use and Abuse, br Professor William Matthews, L. L. B. 



Chicago : S. C. Griggs & Co. ; 1877. pp. 384. Sold by Matt Foster. $2.00. 



Professor Matthews is one of those rare writers, who can in all instances 

 combine the useful and the elegant in such proper proportions as to exactly 



