VIII.

The Ascent of Mount Ararat,

(ACHIEVED FOR THE FIRST TIME).

BY DR. FRIEDRICH PARROT.

TRANSLATED BY W. D. COOLEY.

12mo, Map and Wood-cuts, Muslin, extra gilt, 50 cents. This is a most interesting book, both in its description of the country and inhabitants of Central Asia, and in its connection with the remarkable event of our world-the Flood. Mount Ararat, which was ascended by M. Parrot, must ever possess to the Biblical reader most intense interest, as the resting place of the ark after the universal deluge.-Pittsburgh Chronicle.

A work destined, from the intrinsic interest of the subject, and the fullness of detail which is spread before the reader, to a very wide circulation. The idea of ascending Mount Ararat seems to have risen with the traveler to a passion; previous travelers had never accomplished it; the natives of the region looked upon it as impossible; their superstition regarded the inaccessible summit as the mysterious resting place of the ark to this day. How Dr. Parrot approached the region, what adventures he met with by the way, what manners and customs he witnessed, how he twice essayed to reach the sacred peak and turned back, and how on a third attempt he accomplished the feat through difficulties the recital of which has led scientific men still to doubt if the ascent were really performed-may all be read in this compact volume, illustrated by maps and engravings, with every aid to the reader's comprehension.-News.

Hardly a subject could have been selected more stirring in its character than "A Journey to Ararat." Held in equal veneration by Jew, Christian, and Mohammedan, and regarded with superstitious feelings even by the pagan, that mountain has always enjoyed a degree of celebrity denied to any other. Sinai, and Horeb, and Tabor may have excited holier musings; but Ararat "the mysterious"-Ararat, which human foot had not trod after the restorer of our race, and which, in the popular opinion, no human foot would be permitted to tread till the consummation of all things-Ararat the holy, which winged cherubim protected against the sacrilegious approach of mortals, and which patriarchs only were permitted to revisit, appeared in many respects an object of curiosity as unique as it was exciting.-London Athe

næum.

It is a highly entertaining work, embodying much historical, geographical, and scientific information, and conveying a knowledge of the character, habits, and manners of the people among whom the author traveled. The ascent of Mount Ararat is so very difficult that many persons have doubted whether the feat was accomplished by Dr. Parrot, but his acknowledged integrity ought to place his claims in this respect above suspicion. The lovers of bold adventure will find in this volume much to gratify their peculiar taste, and the general reader can hardly fail to be pleased with it.New York Tribune.

This volume has claims upon the public, as a scientific and truly valuable work, which have been possessed by few others. It is, in fact, the condensed narrative of an exploring expedition sent out by the Russian government into the region about Mount Ararat, a region which possesses more interest for scientific men, perhaps, than any other in the world which has been so little explored.-New York Courier.

It reads more like the travels of Von Humboldt than any book we have lately read. The writer is a man of science and observation, and the book we recommend to the public.- Lowell Courier.

IX.

Remarkable Criminal Trials.

TRANSLATED FROM THE GERMAN OF FEUERBACH, BY LADY DUFF GORDON.

12mo, Muslin, extra gilt, 50 cents.

A book of thrilling interest; one that can not fail to be read with avidity. New York Courier.

This work abounds with singular cases of criminal jurisprudence in Bavaria, of the most astounding and thrilling interest, the details of which are of remarkable character, and differ essentially from those hitherto familiar to the public in England or this country. They are fully equal, in their absorbing interest, to any thing in the famous "Causes Celebres" of France; and, perhaps, for their unique and striking features, are unexcelled by any delineations of crime elsewhere on record.-True Sun.

Public attention was first drawn to this work by an able and interesting article in the Edinburgh Review. They are all narratives of marvelous interest-more strange and wonderful, many of them, than any work of fiction, and giving to the reader a clear view of the nature and peculiarities of the criminal jurisprudence of Germany.-N. Y. Commercial Advertiser. Its illustration of the many curious customs of German criminal jurisprudence will be sufficiently startling to the English reader; but, apart from this, the extraordinary subtle discrimination thrown into the narrative of each particular crime gives to the volume, as a mere story book, the intellectual interest, the passion, and all the rich and various coloring of a philosophical romance. The translation is excellent, and a judicious compression of the original has added much to the effect.-London Examiner.

The narratives abound with thrilling interest, setting forth the constant recurrence of crime, detection, and punishinent, in which the attention of the reader is roused by the novelty of the scene, and rewarded by the light thrown upon the darkest portion of human nature.-New Bedford Mercury.

This work has been so highly extolled by the Edinburgh Foreign Quarterly and other reviews, that not much need be said of its character and claims to public notice. It presents some of the most remarkable stories of horrible crimes and their exposure we have ever met, and gives a very clear and vivid conception of the peculiarities of German criminal jurisprudence. It is a book which will be universally read, as one of the most thrilling and absorbing interest. The translator has given in the preface a very good account of the criminal law of Germany, and has selected only those portions of the original work which will have the greatest value and interest. -Mirror.

This book is of an entirely different character from works of a similar title that have hitherto appeared. It contains an account of fourteen trials for murder in Germany, and the object of it is to show the peculiar mode of trial instituted by the Bavarian code.-Evening Gazette.

The records of crime are not usually a profitable kind of reading. The contagion of the example is generally greater than the warning of the fate of the criminal; and many a villain has been made by the very means taken to keep him from crime. But as much depends on the manner of the narrative, and as it is possible to extract some of the gravest lessons of virtue and wisdom from the misdeeds of others, it gives us pleasure to state that the present work is unexceptionable in this respect, while the cases possess extraordinary interest, and are replete with instruction. They afford much insight of human motives, and teach impressive lessons of the retributive justice of Providence, and the misery and evil of sin.-Biblical Repositor

X., XI.

Journal of Researches

INTO THE NATURAL HISTORY AND GEOLOGY OF THE COUNTRIES VISITED DURING THE VOYAGE OF H. M. S. BEAGLE ROUND THE WORLD.

BY CHARLES DARWIN, M.A., F.R.S.

2 vols. 12mo, Muslin, extra gilt, $1 00.

This is another most valuable contribution to the cause of popular education, issued in Harper's New Miscellany; a series that bids fair to surpass even their Family Library in the sterling excellence and popularity of the works which it renders accessible to all classes of the community. The work contains, in a condensed and popularized form, the results of the British Exploring Expedition, which Mr. Darwin accompanied at the special instance of the lords of the Admiralty. The voyage consumed several years, and was performed at a very heavy expense on the part of the British government. Yet here we have its most important results, divested of all scientific technicalities, and presented in a form at once attractive and accurate. The work is entitled to secure a very wide circulation. It contains an immense amount of information concerning the natural history of the whole world, and is superior, in point of interest and value, to any simi lar work ever published.-New York True Sun.

A work very neatly issued, and has the interest of a leading subject well developed, the unfailing secret of producing a book of character. In the present state of the world, when new countries are opening every day to the great conqueror, Commerce, such publications are of unusual importance. Perhaps no information, just now, can be of more consequence to us than that which puts us in possession of the movements of English discovery.-News.

This is a most valuable and a most interesting work; one which combines true scientific worth with the graces of style suited to render it popular, better than almost any similar work which has recently come under our notice. The voyage of the Beagle was, in truth, a scientific exploring expedition; and Mr. Darwin accompanied it at the special request of the lords of the Admiralty. Its results have been published in several very elaborate, extensive, and costly volumes in England; but as these were entirely beyond the reach of the great mass of the reading public, Mr. Darwin prepared these volumes, in which all the important results of the expedition are fully, clearly, and distinctly presented, interwoven with a most entertaining narrative of personal incident and adventure.-N. Y. Courier. This is a work of remarkable interest and value. The author, in circumnavigating the world, under commission of the British government, for scientific and exploring purposes, visited nearly every country on the globe, and preserved in this brief, simple, but beautiful narrative all the singular facts of a scientific, social, or geographical nature which are of general interest. The amount of information condensed in these volumes is incredible; and the skill with which the useful and interesting is selected from that which is unimportant or well known is admirable. We admire the style, the straightforward sincerity of the writer, the apparent candor, and the erudite research which he uniformly exhibits. Without one quarter of the bulk or pretension of our famous exploring expedition, the present work is hardly inferior to it in value and interest. This series is gaining a fine character, of which we hope the publishers will be jealous.-New York Evangelist.

XII.

Life in Prairie Land.

BY ELIZA W. FARNHAM.

12mo, Muslin, extra gilt, 50 cents.

This is a delightful book, and will afford most agreeable reading. The authoress has a quick eye and graphic pen, and describes the statistics of a large city or the peculiar mode of a sun-bonnet with the same facility and pleasantness.-North American.

It is made up of a series of charming and life-like pictures of a personal residence in the Far West-perfect Daguerreotypes of a settler's daily habits, customs, methods of husbandry, &c., together with graphic sketches of travel in various sections of that far-spreading and fertile country. The work is enlivened by a rich vein of irresistible humor, interwoven with passages of great power and eloquent beauty, eminently impressive and suggestive.-Democratic Review.

This is the title of a most lively, and in every way most admirable book of western sketches, which the Harpers have just published as No. 12 of their New Miscellany. We have read it with the greatest interest and delight. It is, in our judgment, the best book upon the West that has ever been written, and sets forth much better than any other the actual character of the country and of life upon its broad prairies. It abounds in interesting sketches of scenery, narratives of the most thrilling incidents, pictures of character, &c., and is written with very great vigor, and the most hearty sympathy with every branch of the subject. The work can not fail to be very widely read and universally enjoyed.-Courier.

No book has passed through our hands for some time which has given us more pleasure than this. The authoress possesses a heart full of the love of nature, and her descriptions of life in the West are glowing and truthful. Her style is one which we admire, so free from an attempt of bewildering the imagination by overwrought descriptions, yet eloquent with words and thoughts, which spring from a well-educated and cultivated mind. -Boston Gazette.

We can not help entering into the enthusiasm of the writer, and feeling somewhat of the same enchantment that warms her; her descriptions "steal upon the heart like the very witchery of nature."-Sat. Evening Post.

As pleasant and agreeable book it is as we have met with for some time -one which can and will be read with infinite entertainment and instruction. All the shrewdness, vivacity, far-seeing penetration into human nature of woman, and all the elegance which her accomplished pen can boast, are displayed to advantage in this portraiture of Life in the West. She writes what she has seen and heard; she was no listless, dull traveler through the scenes she portrays, but a partaker, a sharer, and a beholder of the things whereof she writes. We commend the work most heartily to the possession of every reader.-Springfield Republican.

It is one of the most interesting books we have seen for many a day. It tells the story of prairie life to a charm; and we defy any one to open and read any one of its pages, and not open them all in its continuous perusal.Cleveland Gazette.

The authoress describes with a good deal of point and piquancy the trials and amusing adventures of emigrating to the West, and a residence there. -Cincinnati Gazette.

Written by one familiar with all the details of western life, and possessing the genius to describe them vividly.-Albany Spectator.

XIII.

Voyages of Discovery

AND RESEARCH WITHIN THE ARCTIC REGIONS, FROM THE YEAR 1818 TO THE PRESENT TIME, ETC. ARRANGED FROM THE OFFICIAL NARRATIVES, WITH OCCASIONAL REMARKS.

BY SIR JOHN BARROW.

With Maps. 12mo, Muslin, extra gilt, 50 cents. This work is one of great value-full of information interesting to every man of intelligence-and no library of current literature can be any thing like complete without it. It contains, in a well-condensed form, the substance of several works that separately would cost each more than the price of this. It embraces, indeed, an abstract of all the voyages performed by order of the British government, since the year 1818, to find a northwest passage.-Cincinnati Gazette.

It comprises a history of one of the most remarkable developments of English civilization, with scattered portions of which the public is more or less familiar-a narrative which will be very acceptable in its present form, and in the judicious style of the veteran Sir John Barrow, who dates the present work in the 82d year of his age. The original of this work is a costly octavo; the present edition is neat and compact, illustrated by maps. Harper's New Miscellany is thus far a series of valuable works. We trust the high standing of scientific and philosophical works will be adhered to.-News.

We have here, in the compass of 359 pages, all that is necessary to the man of science, or thrilling to the lover of perilous adventure, culled from many ponderous folios, which are only to be found, at least in this country, in the most extensive libraries. This volume is characterized by the baronet's usual merits-perspicuity, industry, and love of truth.-Eve. Gaz.

It presents in a condensed form the spirit of all the great expeditions instituted under the authority of the British Admiralty for the extension of maritime discovery and science, and contains the sum and substance of the learned and ambitious productiens of many navigators. To show still further the value of this work, we need only quote a passage from Sir John's preface: "The present epitome is meant to convey the substance of six or seven large quarto volumes." Well has the author carried out his design; for there is not a superfluous word; all is lucid, concise, and at the same time flowing in style and thought. The work evidently has been prepared with the utmost circumspection, in the very atmosphere of the Lords of the Admiralty. It is seldom that we take so much pleasure in recommending a volume. It has all the breathless interest of romance, with the stubborn truth of history. The map of the Arctic regions is of itself worth four times the price of the book.-Mirror.

This is another very valuable accession to Harper's New Miscellany. It is exceedingly instructive and interesting, giving within small space, and admirably condensed from the voluminous official narratives, a clear, graphic, and lucid history of all the voyages which have been undertaken by the British government for research and discovery in the Arctic regions. These narratives embrace incidents of the most thrilling interest, and are scarcely surpassed in this respect by histories of even the most brilliant battles of the age. Courier.