I. B. Wright," illustrating Coleridge's poem, “Love," and two outlines from Flaxman's well-known illustrations of Dante. The third number contained another of Flaxman's outlines, and an etching by D. C. Johnston, illustrating a passage in Dickens's "American Notes; there was also a coarse woodcut of Flaxman placed at the head of an article on Flaxman, by W. W. Story. This completes the list of the illustrations in the three numbers, all of which, except the Flaxman outlines, are here reproduced. The table of contents of the first number was as follows:

Longing: A Poem. By W. W. Story.
The Tell-tale Heart. By Edgar A. Poe.
The Poet and Apollo: A Poem. H. P.

The Plays of Thomas Middleton. By J. R.
Lowell.

The Rose. By J. R. Lowell.

LITERARY NOTICES: Hawthorne's Historical Tales for Youth; La Fontaine's Fables; Nature, a Parable; The Salem Belle; The Career of Puffer Hopkins; American Notes for General Circulation; The Rights of Conscience and of Property; Sparkes's Life of Washington; American Criminal Triais; Confessions of St. Augustine; Life in Mexico.

FOREIGN LITERARY INTELLIGENCE,

Lowell's Own contributions to the second number were a charming essay on "Song Writing," which subject he promised to "resume at some future day," and the sonnet "To M. O. S.," besides three or four book notices. The third number contained from his hand only the sonnet entitled "The Street."

Nathaniel Hawthorne appeared as a contributor to the second number of the Pioneer, his "Hall of Fantasy" being the opening piece in the number; and to the third number he contributed "The Birth-mark." Poe contributed something to each of the three numbers,

and so did Parsons. Whittier's "Lines written in the Book of a Friend" were printed in the second number; and in the last number there was a poem by Elizabeth Barrett, "The Maiden's Death."

On the inside cover pages of the second number, the publishers printed a number of notices of the first number, which had appeared in "the most respectable journals of the country," felicitating themselves that "the verdict of the press had been unanimous in favor of the Pioneer." These notices are almost as varied as those which Lowell himself prefixed to the "Biglow Papers," and we should like to quote many of them, as showing the impression which the Pioneer made upon the newspaper fraternity of 1843. The Boston Daily Advertiser, the Boston Bay State Democrat, the Boston Daily Mail, the Boston Transcript, the New York Union, the New York Tribune, the Philadelphia Saturday Museum, and N. P. Willis's Brother Jonathan are the papers heard from. The Bay State Democrat, whose notice is the only one which we can give,

wrote:

There is something refreshing and invigorating in the work, and we have to thank the editors for a delightful evening's entertainment in perusing its contents. The introduction, by one of the editors, probably Mr. Lowell, is bold and manly; and if the strong, clear, and somewhat original ideas there expressed are lived up to in the future conduct of the work, we predict for it a wide and honorable popularity in the literary world. Among the best articles, we notice a graphic sketch of Aaron Burr, done in Neal's best style; but there is contained in this article some uncalled for and disgraceful allusions to the patriot Jefferson, that any American, at this day, ought to be ashamed to pen. Neal can command public attention by his talents, without dabbling in such filthy puddles as the partisan slang against that great and good man. For the poetry of the number not much can be said. It is about as good as the usual run of magazine poetry, and serves as an agreeable relief to the eye, after a close application to the solid columns of the prose matter. From this, however, we must except "The Rose," which is a very pretty affair, and the novel style of pictorial illustrations that accompany the piece will, we think, commend itself to general approval. The critique on the last last Athenæum Exhibition of Paintings is racy and spirited. It is by I. B. Wright. His fondness for the art is evidently deep, and chastened by a correct taste; and his playful satire is admirable. The "Armenian's Daughter" is a

highly interesting and well told tale; author not stated. J. S. Dwight's paper on Beethoven's Symphonies, as performed by the Boston Academy of Music, is well written, and calculated to excite an increased interest in the performances of that society. We like Mr. Dwight's style much; with a soul full of his subject, he seems to sit down and discourse of it to the reader in a rich and flowing strain of unaffected eloquence. The "Tell-Tale Heart," by Edgar A. Poe, is an article of thrilling interest. It is the tale of an unconscious madman. We must try to copy it for our readers soon. The critique on the Plays of Middleton, by the senior editor, is a paper of great power, well calculated to set one a thinking for himself, and this is the greatest merit of critical notices. But this is more; it is a profound investigation into the spirit of poetry, and an able defence of its influence over the mind. If Mr. Lowell, or any other man, could come up to the ideas advanced in the article, in his poetical productions, he would be the poet of the day, and age.

The beauties of Middleton, as illustrated by the editor, are highly attractive. The literary notices by the editors are just and discriminating, and betray sound judgment and refined taste. The embellishment of the work, besides the wood illustrations of "The Rose," are two splendid steel engravings by J. Andrews.

The Transcript was "glad to perceive a sensible omission in the usual fashion plate of popular periodicals." All of the literary magazines of that time had published fashion plates. The Boston Miscellany had done so. The Pioneer abandoned the custom with some vehemence, remarking to its readers, with reference to the Flaxman outlines which accompanied its second number, that "in real value they exceed a host of tawdry fashion plates."

The Tribune, referring to Mr. Lowell's word about creeds, in his Introduction, said:

"This may be all well enough, but we cannot understand what definite meaning the writer attaches to a creed which consists in freedom from all creeds. If he intends precisely what he says, he seems to us to use words without meaning; but if he means a creed not framed upon others, carrying its worth in its truth, not in its having been believed before, he ought to have said so.

the Higginbottomopolis Snapping-turtle and the Salt-river Pilot.

"J. R. Lowell, a man of original and decided genius," said the reviewer, "has started a monthly magazine in Boston. The first number lies before us, and it justifies our expectation, viz., that a man of genius, who is merely a man of genius, is a very unfit editor for a periodical."

He then proceeds with his bill of particulars against the new magazine, and much of his criticism is, to our thinking, quite valid; but his generality reads rather queerly now, as we remember the notable editorial capacity displayed by Lowell in connection with the Atlantic and the North American.

To many Boston people, turning the pages of the Pioneer, the article on the Exhibition of Paintings at the Athenæum, by I. B. Wright, and that on the Academy of Music Concerts, by John S. Dwight, will have a peculiar interest. Mr. I. B. Wright was evidently a man of singular versatility. He was the designer of the picture of "Genevieve" in the second number of the magazine, already spoken of, and he was the author of a remarkable production, entitled "Dream Love," of which instalments appeared in the second and third numbers, and which was still "to be continued" when the magazine died—a production which was a kind of cross between "an eloquent article," as which the editors described it, and the "namby-pamby love tales and sketches," of which they announced that none were to be admitted to the pages of the Pioneer. His article upon the Athenæum Exhibition, which seems to have been a pretty large one, including a considerable number of works by the old masters, as well as works of the contemporary Boston artists, is an interesting revelation of the conditions of the art life of fifty years ago. There is much "fine writing" in it, and some whole

some

"Are there no faces and forms, are there no lives and deaths, burials and marriages, within our own land, and next our own doors? Shines not the sun upon America, gilding and coloring its landscape with as various hues as when the masters breathed the atmosphere of this earth? Is nature used up? Is character gone? Is virtue extinct? Is vice rooted out? Where were

the old masters that taught the old masters? Where was their Italy but in their eyes and soul?"

Mr. Dwight's articles upon the Academy of Music and Beethoven's Symphonies show the same fine culture and true feeling in the field of music that have been shown in everything in his whole career as a musical critic, which, beginning before the Pioneer was born, and continued in uninterrupted vigor to the present day, constitutes him in many respects the most remarkable figure in the musical life of Boston. The opening of the first article, in which the writer felicitates himself and Boston upon the manifestly better patronage of the best things in music, will be entertaining reading for those who attend the present symphony concerts.

Robert Carter, who was Mr. Lowell's

associate in his magazine enterprise, had come to Boston from Albany only two years before, but at once formed a strong friendship with Lowell, which lasted until his death in 1879. He was of just the same age as Lowell, and full of the same He was pioneering, reforming spirit. afterwards, for a time, private secretary to Prescott, the historian; he was a helper of Kossuth; he became the editor of the Commonwealth, and a leader in the organization of the free-soil party, and he did much newspaper work of a high quality. It is stated that he left a volume of memoirs which remains unpublished. If any part of the volume relates to Lowell and these old days of the Pioneer, it certainly ought to see the light. To the Pioneer itself he contributed a serial story, entitled "The Armenian's Daughter."

Lowell's own poetical contributions to the Pioneer were all adopted afterwards into his published collections - as, we think, were all the poems contributed to the Boston Miscellany. His prose contributions do not appear in his collected works. Not the least interesting of these

"AMERICAN NOTES, for General Circulation." By Charles Dickens. This book has been too widely read to need any elaborate criticism on our part. There are one or two points in it, however, on which we wish to say a word. The book has been loudly complained of as superficial, and as vilifying our country and its institutions. We do not think that it can fairly be called superficial (in a derogatory sense), because it was not intended to be deep. Mr. Dickens's philosophy has always been rather of the eyes and heart, than of that higher and more comprehensive kind, with which the inner eye and the soul have to do. Such a traveller as De Tocqueville is properly expected to give a philosophical analysis of our government and its operations, and philosophical conjecture as to its ultimate tendencies and results. But we could not rightly expect from Mr. Dickens anything more than the necessarily cursory observations of one who has shown himself to be the keenest and shrewdest observer of his time.

To judge from the tone of a large share of the criticisms on this lively jeu d'esprit (for such it may be rightly called), it would seem that our people imagined that, because they had admired Mr. Dickens's other works, he had no right to do anything but admire everything of theirs in turn. The Americans are the only nation who appear to think that they can say what they please of others, and that others have no right to say what they please of them. Mr. Dickens's remarks on slavery seem to have raised the greatest storm of indignation, and yet the greatest part of his chapter on this system, which (call it crime or misfortune) is surely the darkest plot on our national character, consisted only of quotations from our own newspapers. If the eyes and mouths of our own countrymen are to be forever sealed on the question which more nearly concerns their interest and honor than any other, they should thank God for what little light they are permitted to gain from an intelligent foreigner, whose vivid exposure of the abuses of his own system of government give him the better right to strike at those of our own. A man of genius, like Dickens, is a citizen of the world, and belongs as much to America as to England. If our narrowness and cowardice in this matter are not outgrown, we might as well publish expurgated editions of Shakespeare and all others who satirize and revolt at tyranny (as all great minds must), - nay, of the Declaration of Independence itself.

The greatest and deepest fault we have to find with the book is the too frequent eulogy of brandy and water, and the ill-concealed satire of the temperance reform -a reform which has been and is doing incalculable good throughout the land; which is spreading peace and innocence where only degradation skulked before, and which is insuring stability to our free

dom, by teaching men to set free and respect themselves, without which they can have no true reverence for anything.

The notice of Longfellow's "Poems on Slavery" is the most interesting of the notices, chiefly on account of the strong words on the anti-slavery reform, into which Lowell was already throwing himself.

His

"POEMS ON SLAVERY." By Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. Cambridge: John Owen. This is a little volume which we think likely to do a great deal of good. Professor Longfellow is perhaps more widely and popularly known and admired in this country than any other writer, certainly than any other poet; while many of his poems have been translated into German by Freiligrath, and Bentley has now and then the good taste to steal them for his Miscellany. In this instance we think the popularity. interdum vulgus rectum videt a proof of merit in the author. style has just enough peculiarity to render it attractive, and, at the same time that it is strongly tinged with romanticism, the structure of the verse, the rhythm of the melody, and the development of the sentiment are so gracefully simple as to be even at once with minds of the highest and lowest range of education. Such a man as this, so well known as a polished scholar of general literature, so always welcome to every fireside as a poet whose muse has never in any way spotted the virgin white of her purity, will find a ready hearing, when he comes as a pleader on either side of a vexed question, with many who to all others would be resolutely deaf.

We do not join in the torrent of eulogy upon the fearlessness and nobleness of spirit evinced by the author in publishing this little pamphlet, because we think that it is yielding quite too much to the exacting spirit of evil to say that a man does any more than his simple duty to his instincts when he espouses the cause of right. It is always an argument of greater courage in a man (so far as that goes) to deny and refuse the divine message that is sent to him, as it always is sooner or later, for in so doing he causes his guardian angel to hide her face from him in sorrow, and defies the Spirit of God in his own soul, who is thenceforth his most implacable foe and one that always vanquishes at last. The sentiment of anti-slavery, too, is spreading so fast and so far over the whole land, that its opponents are rapidly dwindling into a minority. Moreover, such praise, if any there be, should be given to the early disciples and apostles of this gospel, men and women who have endured for their faith such spiritualized martyrdom as the refined nineteenth century is still tenacious of inflicting. There, for instance, is William Lloyd Garrison, the half-inspired Luther of this reform, a man too remarkable to be appreciated in his generation, but whom the future will recognize as a great and wonderful spirit. There, too, is Whittier, the fiery Koerner of this spiritual warfare, who, Scævola-like, has sacrificed on the altar of duty that right hand which might have made him acknowledged as the most passionate lyrist of his time. There is the tenderly-loving Maria Child, the au