HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW.
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. A Sketch by Charles Eliot Norton. (A. Constable and Co. 3s. 6d. net.)—Dr. Norton gives a delightful sketch of New England as it was in the first half of the nineteenth century, "a good land," as he truly says, "in which to be born." And men were born in it who were worthy of its advantage. It is indeed a notable list : Emerson, 1803 ; Haw- thorne, 1804; Longfellow and Whittier, 1807; Holmes, 1809; Lowell, 1819. The six can hardly be put anywhere but in the very highest ranks of American men of letters. Dr. Norton's acquaintance with Longfellow began in his ninth year ; it grew into a friendship which was ended only by the poet's death. In this little volume he renders a not inadequate tribute of gratitude, Operrhpia, we may say, for intellectual and ethical nurture. Long- fellow had a singular gift of radiating influence, both mental and moral. There was no aloofness in his genius, and his character was all that is admirable. At his burial Emerson, who was to follow his friend in a few weeks, said: "I cannot recall the name of our friend"—his memory had for some time failed him—" but he was a good man." A selection of poems, autobiographical or peculiarly illustrative of the writer's intellectual development, has been added. This is a most pleasing little book, and worthy of its author,—an author whom we may fitly describe as one of the most cultivated men who speak and write the English language, whether on his or our own side of the Atlantic.
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