length expires in agony before his eyes; torn, mutilated, bleeding forth its sacred ichor, discoloured, flaccid, dead!—Is such a monster, when he consumes LETTUCE in such a way as this, to defend himself behind an apparition of Taste? Then neither are these brushes of BEARDS, these pepper-and-salt, nor these Judas-Iscariot-red bristles, in any degree defensible upon the pretext of the Taste of the owners of them. There exists no right whatever to exhibit to the community on any such plea a disgusting object of this sort. Upon every principle of comity and social order they ought to be abolished, and this before the bright Bull 'receives the Sun,' or the Dog-Star shall make us long for coolness and for shade. I regret dear Publick I apologize to thee! -that seduced by the Demon of Parenthesis in the shape of a beautiful head of pure Summer Lettuce, I have wandered off from the consideration and anathema of the subject on which I intended to have expatiated. It was my plan when I sat down to have dwelt upon the Saucer and the Trencher beards. But the boundary of my space in this our favorite Magazine is already trenched upon, if not overpassed. Receive then my aspirations. Wait for my thoughts. Trim your Imperials. Subdue your Moustaches. Banish your Beards. And look after the half-concealed saucers that you cherish under your chins. JOHN WATERS. Vague realm of the past! how joyous a band J. M. LITERARY NOTICES. WHITE-JACKET; OR THE WORLD IN A MAN-OF-WAR. BY HERMAN Melville, Author of "Typee,' Omoo,'' Mardi,' and 'Redburn.' New-York: HARPER AND BROTHERS. WELL, we are glad to find the author of 'Typee' on the right ground at last. When we read his 'Mardi,' or rather tried to read it, for we never could get quite through it, we feared that the author had mistaken his bent, like a comic actor with a 'penshong' for tragedy, and that we were thenceforth to hear from him in a pseudophilosophical rifacciamento of CARLYLE and EMERSON. 'Redburn' reassured us; and now comes' White-Jacket,' to reïnstate the author in the best good-graces of the reading public. Not a page of this last work has escaped us; and so strong was the continuous interest which it excited, a quality not always encountered even in the most popular works of our time, that we accomplished its perusal in two 'sittings,' unavoidably protracted, we may remark, for we could not leave the work, while there was yet a page unread. Without the aid of much imagination, but with a daguer reotype-like naturalness of description of all which the writer saw and felt himself, and all which he saw others feel, Mr. MELVILLE has given us a volume which, in its evident truthfulness and accuracy of personal and individual delineation, reminds us continually of that admirable and justly popular work, the 'Two Years Before the Mast' of the younger DANA. A vein of sly humor percolates through the book; and a sort of unctuous toying with verbal double-meanings, is once in a while to be met with, which go far to indicate, that if the author had lived in the City of Brotherly Love,' (church-burners, firemen-fighters, assassins, and rowdies, excuse the implied exceptions!) he might, with a little proper instruction, have become as celebrated as a Philadelphia lawyer,' that preeminent model of a pun-hunter. We had intended to present several extracts from White-Jacket,' which we had pencilled for that purpose in the perusal; but the universal prevalence of the book itself, at this late period, would doubtless make them 'twice-told tales' to the great majority of our readers. We would call especial attention, as a matter of present public interest, to the chapters descriptive of an instance of almost indiscriminate flogging on board a man-of-war, and the consequences of such inconsistent punishment, in the case of each offender. The force of public opinion, and the example of certain humane officers in the highest rank of the American navy, would seem to indicate that the time is not distant when corporeal punishment, if not mainly abolished, will at least be hereafter frequently resorted to than formerly, and greatly lessened in its severity. The signs of the times' would seem to point unerringly to this result. POEMS BY H. W. PARKER. In one volume. 16mo. pp. 238. Auburn, New-York: JAMES M. ALDEN, Number 67 Genessee-street. THE pressure of new publications upon us, to several of which we are obliged to refer briefly in another department of the KNICKERBOCKER, prevents such a notice of the present volume as we should be well pleased to award it; for we encounter in its pages many gems of thought and felicities of expression which prove the writer to possess a poetical capacity of no ordinary character. We could instance, had we the requisite space, many favorable specimens of the writer's powers, but are compelled to content ourselves with the following, which fills but four out of the two hundred and thirty-eight pages contained in the volume which it graces. It is entitled 'The Loom of Life:' We shall watch Mr. PARKER's literary career with interest. We think we discern in him the evidence of true genius; and if his riper years fulfil the promise of his spring, we shall look to hear from him' hereafter. In the mean time we commend his first volume to the encouraging approbation of his readers and of ours; and to himself & careful study of the old 'masters of song,' to the end that, without imitation, he may avail himself of the best models of style. WOMAN IN AMERICA: HER WORK AND HER REWARD. By MARIA J. MCINTOSH, Author of 'Charms and Counter-Charms,' To Seem and to Be,' etc. New-York: D. APPLETON AND COM. PANY. We never take up a new work by the author of 'To Seem and to Be,' without being certain to find developed three important requisites: namely, purity and simplicity of style, the earnestness of thorough conviction, and the inculcation of lessons the most valuable to her readers. All these are preeminent characteristics of 'Woman in America;' and we wish it were in our power to secure a place for the work in the library of every true woman in our highly-favored land. He who undertakes,' says our author, in a brief and well-written introduction, 'to mark the movements of a multitude, who would decide whither their steps tend, and judge their deviations from the right path, must stand above them, that he may overlook their course; and some such elevation may seem to be claimed by her who seeks to awaken the attention of her country women to the mistakes by which, as she believes, their social progress is impeded, or misdirected. The only advantage over those whom she addresses, claimed by the author, is opportunity for more extended observation of the varied forms of social life in her own land than has been enjoyed by many of her sex. Bound to the South, the land of her birth, and the home of her childhood and youth, by ties which no time can sever, ties knit when feeling was strongest and association most vivid, her maturer and more reflective years have been passed in the Northern States; and here kind hearts have been opened to her, and friendly hands have been extended to draw her into the sanctuary of their homes, and permit her to become a pleased witness of the 'holy revealings' proceeding from those innermost shrines of life. Nor has her observation been confined to one class, in these her different abodes. She has been permitted to take her views of life, now from the position occupied by those who claim the 'privilege' of idleness, and now from that of those whom a friendly necessity has constrained to yield obedience to the benign law of labor.' Thus, her sympathies with all have been cultivated; and she speaks only that which she knows, and testifies that she has seen.' Again do we commend her volume to a wide and cordial acceptance. LAKE SUPERIOR: ITS PHYSICAL Character, VegETATION, AND ANIMALS, compared with those of Other and Similar Regions. By LOUIS AGASSIZ. With a Narrative of the Tour, by J. ELLIOT CABOT; and Contributions by other Scientific Gentlemen. Boston: GOULD, KENDALL AND LINCOLN. THE main object of the excursion, the results of which are given in the pages of this large, well-executed, and finely-illustrated volume, was a purely scientific one; namely, the study of the natural history of the northern shore of Lake Superior. The party was composed of the eminent naturalist, AGASSIZ, and fifteen other gentlemen, mainly 'seniors' from the higher 'schools' of Harvard University. Another end proposed by Professor Agassiz was to afford to those of the party who were unaccustomed to the practical investigation of natural phenomena an opportunity of exercising themselves under his direction. Interspersed throughout the narrative are literal and fresh reports, carefully made at the time, of the learned Professor's remarks on various points of Natural History, that seemed to him likely to interest a wider circle than those more particularly addressed in the second part of the book, which consists of papers on various points connected with the Natural History of the region, written, where not otherwise specified, by Professor AGASSIZ himself. This portion of the work, without presenting a mere detail of facts, shows the bearing of those facts upon general questions. We are enabled, from personal examination, to pronounce upon the accuracy of many of the descriptions of natural scenery and of men and things' contained in the volume before us. In reading it, we were once more on our way up the lonely Saint-Mary's river; once more at the 'Salt Steemaree,' as we heard a Yankee call it, on board our little steamer; the subdued roar of the rapids were in our ears; and wandering along the shore, we entered once again the Indian wigwams, and held council with the 'abrogynes.' The imning of the village is singularly faithful, both as regards its external and internal characteristics. We are sorry that Mr. CABOT, to whom we are indebted for the excellent landscape illustrations of the volume, did not give us one view on the St. Mary's which should have included the amphitheatric banks, measured off, as it were, with living land-marks, tall cane-like firs, rising above the verdant level of the surrounding forest. This was to us a most picturesque feature in the scenery of the river. We commend this volume before us not alone to the student of American Natural History, to whom of course it cannot fail to prove an acquisition of great value, but as a work well calculated to afford both entertainment and instruction to the general reader. THE SCARLET-LETTER: A ROMANCE. BY NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. Boston: TICK NOR, REED AND FIELDS. 6 If we are indebted for this delightful book to the fact that Mr. HAWTHORNE, after having been removed from the collectorship of the port of Salem, Massachusetts, had nothing else to do but write it, we take it upon ourselves to say, that the author need expect but slight sympathy from the reading public. What may have been his loss is to that public so abundant a gain that few tears will be shed for his individual 'taking off.' And speaking of 'taking off,' we should like to know of any Flemish painting, or any of WILKIE's wonderful 'transcripts from human nature,' that are more perfect than the pictures to the eye' afforded in the opening pages of the work under notice. We see the outward view from the windows of that custom-house, we scan the inmates with as clear a vision, as if we were personally on the spot; such is the magic of the author's word-painting. We feared a few unduly satirical and HOGARTHIAN touches in the portraits, as we read; and we now find, by the Salem journals, that the writer is accused of having been offensively and grossly personal in presenting what are pronounced to be 'carricatures' as veritable representations of living personages. Be this as it may, nothing apparently could be more strikingly artistic and coincidentedly natural, than these opening sketches. We find the following synopsis of the work in the main a correct representation of its incidents: The Scarlet Letter' is a psychological romance. It is a tale of remorse, a study of character, in which the human heart is anatomized, carefully, elaborately, and with striking poetic and dramatic power. Its incidents are simply these. A woman in the early days of Boston becomes the subject of the discipline of the court of those times, and is condemned to stand in the pillory, and wear henceforth, in token of her shame, the scarlet letter A attached to her bosom. She carries her child with her to the pillory. Its other parent is unknown. At this opening scene her husband, from whom she had been separated in Europe, preceding him by ship across the Atlantic, reäppears from the forest, whither he had been thrown by shipwreck on his arrival. He was a |