PUBLICATIONS RECEIVED.

Boom.

The last week of the year displays unwonted energy lathe publishing world. Mr. Bentley has sent forth a book from which much of interest and instruc- tion may fairly be expected—Ranke's History of France during one of the turning and governing periods of her career. Mr. Mulligan'a "Exposition of the English Language" is an attempt to explain English by natural gram- mar, with a view to great improvements in the art of teaching the arts of speaking and writing. The fifth volume of the Miscellany of the Spalding Club contains a copious selection of documents illustrative of Scottish man- ners and history at various periods. The chief wealth of the week, however, in point of numbers, is in novels ; two of which show how strongly religion, or theology, is agitating the world, and how much it is the fashion to throw everything into fiction. "Jesuit Executorship" is said, in a preliminary notice, to be the "autobiography of a young and gifted woman struggling in the midst of Roman Catholic society," &c. ; but this is probably an art- istical affirmation. "The Society of Friends" is an attack upon that body, by one who was of them: the facts and characters are said to be true, the story being used only to string the matter together. As private secretary to the late Daniel Webster, Mr. string must have had the opportunity which biographers do not always possess of marking in the "private life" of his patron those personal traits which only personal knowledge can impart—if he has a turn for portraiture. Mr. Spencer has passed from European Turkey to the more interesting if the more beaten field of France and Italy ; though the object of his "Tour of Inquiry "—the present state of those countries—may give his work freshness as well as interest Civil Wars and 3fonarchy in France, in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth

Centuries : a Watery of France principally during that period. By Leopold Ranke, Author of "A History of the Popes in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries." Translated by M. A. Garvey. In two volumes. Exposition of the Grammatical Structure of the English Language;

being an attempt to furnish an Improved Method of Teaching Gram- mar. For the use of Schools and Colleges. By John Mulligan, A.M. The Miscellany of the Spalding Club. Volume Fifth.

Jesuit Executorship, or Passages in the Life of a Seceder from Roman- ism : an Autobiography. In two volumes.

The Society of Friends : a Domestic Narrative, illustrating the Pecu- liar Doctrines held by the Disciples of George Fox. By Mrs. J. It. Greer, Author of "Quakerism, or the Story of my Life." In two volumes.

The lover's Stratagem, or the Two Suitors. By Emilie Flygare Carlen. In two volumes.

Tendring Cottage ; or the Rainbow at Night. By the Author of." Sin and Sorrow." In three volumes.

The _Private Life of Daniel Webster. By Charles Lanman, late his Private Secretary, and Author of "Letters from the Allegheny Mountains."

A Tour of Inquiry through France and Italy; illustrating their pre- sent Social, Political, and Religious Condition. By Edmund Spencer, Esq., Author of "Travels in European Turkey," Azc. In two volumes.

The Gulistan ; or Rose-Garden of Shekh Muslihu'd-din Se& of Shiraz. Translated for the first time into Prose and Verse, with an Intro- ductory Preface, and a Life of the Author, from the Atish Kedah. By Edward B. Eastwick, F.R.S., M.R.A.S., &c., and Professor of Oriental Languages and Librarian in the East India College, Haileybury.

Lady-Bird: a Tale. By Lady Georgiana Fullerton, Author of "Ellen Middleton," &c. In three volumes.

Four Days in Connemara. By Sir Digby Neave, Bart. [It seems the fashion to write a book on Ireland after a few days' observation of the country ; but it is obvious that all which the brightest genius can master under such circumstances is the external appearance of the land and the people. As this has been frequently done already, it is equally obvious that the only source of novelty is the contrast which the consequences of the famine and the Encumbered Estates Act have produced. Description, how- ever, forms but a small portion of Four Days in Connemara. The scene before the writer's eyes only constitutes a peg on which to hang quotation, discussion, and reflection, very often quite remote from Ireland and the Irish.] The Poet's ,Dream: a Tale of Christmas. With Illustrations by S. Mayson. [Avowedly suggested by Dickens's Christmas story of the Chimes, and as avowedly an imitation except that a poet is substituted for a ticket-porter. Rob Heatherden, a Scotch rustic with a local poetical reputation, comes up to London with his mother on the promise of a lord's patronage. The lord neglects him - he can neither sell his poems nor procure employment ; but, after a good deal of actual distress, and some seen in vision, including his own death, he awakes to find a discriminating publisher, poetical fame, and employment as a bookseller's clerk. The writing is not a bad imitation of Dickens.] Letters Left at the Pastrycook's : being the Clandestine Correspondence between Kitty Clover at School and her "dear, dear Friend" in Town. Edited by Horace Mayhew. Illustrated by Phis.

[These letters are supposed to have been written by a young lady at school, to a dear friend, who neglected to send for them ; so they fell into the edi- tor's hands. The framework is clumsy enough, but the letters are about the best of Mr. Mayhew's things that we have met. Life at a lady's school, among the scholars, teachers, and half-boarders, with the touching incidents that may naturally occur among so many, is well described, and, we think, better in the grave than in the jocose style.]

The Drawingroom Table-Book. By the Author of "Mary Powell." [Twenty steel engravings after modern French and English painters—which we recognize as republications from the Art Journal—form the pictorial feature of this gift-book. In point of engraving, they are almost uniformly good; in point of design, occasionally so—some being taken from the Vernon Csallery. A certain courtly tone is given to the book by dedication to Prince Albert, and by verse-descriptions of Mrs. Thornycroft's four statuettes of the Royal children, which appear among the prints. The literary portion, by the author (authoress ?) of "Mary Powell," consists of what may be termed fancy-pieces in prose and verse, partly imitative of the olden manner. They have neatness and ingenuity,. but are tainted with affectation.] Rainy Afternoons ; or Tales and Sketches by the Howard Family. By Randall Ballantyne, Authoress of "The Child's Ark," &c. The Seven Wonders of the World, and their Associations. With Illus- trations by W. Harvey.

[Both these little volumes have the character of gift-books of a rather ju- venile cast. "Rainy Afternoons" consists of a number of chapters con- taining information on various subjects—natural history, biography, tales— well connected by the framework of a family story. "The Seven 'Wonders of the World" is a well-digested compilation descriptive of those seven mi- racles of ancient art ; with some account of the present condition of some of them—as the Pyramids, and the Temple of Minerva at Athena ; or their ruins—as Babylon and Ephesus. Kindred topics are also introduced under some of the heads ; the Pharos of Alexandria leading to the subject of an- cient and modern lighthouses.]

Chambers's Repository of Instructive and Amusing Tracts. Volume L [Eight essays, tales, or expositions, for a shilling, binding included. The essays or expositions embrace subjects of current utility—as the Australian Gold-fields, the Cotton Metropolis; or interesting literature—as a critical sur- vey of Madame de Sevigne' and a condensed account of Paradise Lost, with some of its best passages. ‘The Pilgrim Fathers" forms an historical sketch ; "The Rhine" has both history and topography ; besides which there are two little novels.] A New System of French Pronunciation. By M. A. Thibaudin. Nos. L and IL The Conceited Pig. With six Illustrations by Harrison Weir.

Naw EDMONS.

A second edition of "Esmond," .within a few weeks of the issue of the first, speaks significantly for Mr. Thackeray's growing popularity. That so thoughtful and serious a book should have won its way at once to an exten- sive audience, must be attributed to the effect of the writer's previous works, and to its own solid merit; for of meretricious ornament it is absolutely bare : it does not even aim at its author's accustomed piquancy ; the cynic mask is worn but lightly, and the kindly philosopher and tender critic of human weakness shines through. Mr. Thackeray has little to thank most of his cri- tics for ; they have generally contented themselves with reiterating the old story that human nature is more lovely and less odious than he chooses to depict it, and they fail to recognize the aim or the spirit in which the blots and scars are painted. A self-complacent age, an age pampered with the flatteries of its professed teachers, shrinks from seeing itself on the canvass of a stern realist, and rushes to its R. A.s to persuade itself of its own beauty. Willingly these gentlemen discharge their pleasing and profitable function,

but posterity will perhaps judge that the age which produces and is a justi- fication of a Louis Napoleon, and a host of minor incarnations of hypocritie selfishness and hollow pretence, may have been none the worse for the somewhat grim truth a Thackeray has the power of telling it—and what is more, of making it feel, and wince as it feels, in spite of its protestations that there is no likeness at all.

Mackay's " Salamandrine," the most ambitious, and on the whole the best of the author's poems, reappears in a shape of beauty, forming a hand. some quarto volume, profusely illustrated, elegantly got up, and altogether adapted to the drawingroom. The new edition of the "Vale of Lanherne " contains some additional miscellaneous poems, and appears in a plainer style than " The,Salamandrine," while the illustrations are not taken from fancy but reality—pictures of the scenery the poet describes. The condensed edi- tion of Mr. reality—pictures valuable account of the American Expedition to the Lake of Tiberias, the Jordan, and the Dead Sea, is published in a small volume, with, no doubt, a corresponding reduction of price. Miss Martineau's Letters on Ireland, which attracted attention on their appearance in the Daily News, have been collected into a neat volume under the auspices of Mr. Chapman. Webster's Royal Red-Book see= to possess no additional feature, unless it be a fuller display of honours and official persons. The ninth volume of the Library Edition of the Waverley Novels contains one of the most striking if not the best of Scott's historical romances. The others tell their own story.

Esmond : a Story of Queen Anne's Reign. By W. M. Thackeray, Author of "'Vanity Fair," "Pendenms," Bro. In three volumes. Second edition.

2'he Salamandrine. By Charles Mackay, Author of " Egeria," &a. With Illustrations, drawn by John Gilbert ; engraved by the Brothers Dalziel. .

The Vale of Lanherne, and other Poems. By H. Sewell Stokes. A new edition, with Additions ; and Illustrations drawn on Stone, by C. Haghe, from Designs by .T. G. Philp.

Narrative of the United States Expedition to the River Jordan and the Dead Sea. By W. F. Lynch, U.S.N., Commander of the Expedition. With a Map from accurate Surveys. A new and condensed edition. Letters from Ireland. By Harriet Martineau. Reprinted from the Daily News.

Webster's Royal Red Book, or Court and Fashionable Register, for January 1853.

TVaverky Novels. Volume IX. Ivanhoe.

A Whim and its Consequences. By G. P. R. James, Esq. (Parlour Library.) The Common law Procedure Act, (15 and 16 Vict. cap. 76) ; with Practical Notes, &c. By Robert Malcolm Kerr, Barrister-at-law. Second edition.

AL/dew:sem.

The Banking .Almanack, Directory, Year-book, and Diary, for 1853. Art-Union of London Almanack, for 1853.

Pastemarrs.

Three Lectures delivered before the University of Oxford. By George K. Rickards, M.A., late Michel Fellow of Queen's College, Professor of Political Economy.

Our Lord's _Prayer practically Explained. By a Norfolk Curate. Art-Education at Home and Abroad, &O. • By G. W. Yapp.

Second Report of the Commissioners /or the Exhibition of 1851, to the Right Honourable Spencer Horatio Walpole, &a., one of her Majes- ty's Principal Secretaries of State.

A Reply to the Strictures of Lord Mahon and others on the Mode of Editing the Writings of Washington. By Jared Sparks. Also a Review of Lord Mahon's History of the American Revolution. From the North American Review.

Two Speeches by Colonel James Charles Claatterton, &c. Practical Hints to Sunday School Teachers, &c. By Richard Yeld.