CURRENT LITERATURE.
The Song of Hiawatha. By H. W. Longfellow. Illustrated by F. Remington. (Sampson Low.)—This edition of Hiawatha is admirably printed, and the pen-and-ink drawings at the side of the letterpress, illustrating Indian faces, clothes, weapons, and pottery, are exceedingly good. Some of the larger illustrations do not attract us. They are intended to give the reader accurate ideas of Red Indians and the scenes amid which they live, and their effect is to take some of the poetry out of Hiawatha by sug- gesting how much Longfellow must have read into his savages. He was relating a legend, not describing an occurrence, and so much actuality lowers the imagination by jarring with the im- pression created by the verses. One or two of the more weird designs are very striking ; but this savage is not the Hiawatha of our thought, and still less is Minnehaha, his bride. The edition, however, is a pleasing one to possess, and a perfect one to read.
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