16 AUGUST 1884, Page 25

CURRENT LITERATURE.

Life at Puget Sound, 1865-1881. By Caroline C. Leighton. (Lee and Shepard, Boston, U.S.; Triibner and Co., London.)—We wish that Mrs. Leighton had bethought her of giving a map with her little book. The only atlas to which we happen to have access at the time of writing does not contain the name of " Puget's Sound ;" and we

are reduced to concluding that it lies between Columbia and Oregon River. But we are taken to more familiar localities,—Washington Territory, British Columbia, Oregon, and California. The author seems to have travelled over these places, chiefly, wo understand, over the sea-board, pretty frequently during her sixteen years of sojourn in the West. A very pleasant book she has made between the two,—her stationary life and her experiences of travel. The Chinese, we are glad to see, appear in a more favourable light than usual. As for the dealings of the State with the Indians, the author adds another voice to a testimony that is almost unanimous. An Indian chief resisted the measure. ment (which was, in fact, only another word for the confisca- tion) of the land of his tribe for the railway. " It is not mine to give," he said ; " the Great Spirit has measured it out to my people." This was the end. " The army destroyed the caches filled with dried berries, and the pressed cake which the Indians prepare from roots for their winter food, many lodges filled with grain, and thousands of horses; the officers mentioning in their report that it would give the Indians a winter of great suffering, and concluding in these words —` Seldom has an expedition been undertaken the recollection of which is invested with so much that is agreeable as that against the Northern Indians.' "