Chapter 4

Four hundred songs, sacred and secular, comic and sentimental, pathetic and humorous, are given in this collection, so harmonized and arranged that they may be played upon the piano or organ or sung with or without accompaniment. Every variety of song is given, and every one will find in the book something suited to his taste. The arranger has done his work well, and the music printer has made the book an attractive one. The selections range from "Old Folks at Home" and the "Sweet By and By" to "Comrades" and "Annie Rooney," and the price of the book, considering the quantity of music it contains, is remarkably low. It will undoubtedly have an extensive sale.

W. H. H.

A FIRST FAMILY OF TASAJARA. By Bret Harte. 301 pp. Cloth, $1.25. Boston: Houghton, Mifflin, & Co. 1892.

The charm of Bret Harte's stories lies in their originality of conception, their well-defined local color, and the chaste richness of their literary style. The power to pique one's interest to the last page belongs to Mr. Harte above all other writers of stories of American life. His latest book has all the good qualities of its predecessors. It tells a perfectly natural story of life in California. The hero is a newspaper man; the other characters are a man who makes a big "strike" in land, and becomes suddenly rich, his two daughters, a newspaper proprietor with an axe to grind and a secret love, a beautiful and rich Boston widow, and a civil engineer. The denouement is startling, being none other than the wiping out by a flood of the town which made the rich man's fortune, and the lesson of the story is the suddenness with which in the West riches have been made, and also lost.

L. F.

BOOKS RECEIVED.

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[All books sent to the editor of THE WRITER will be acknowledged under this heading. They will receive such further notice as may be warranted by their importance to readers of the magazine.]

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PARAGRAPH-WRITING, WITH APPENDICES ON NEWSPAPER STYLE AND PROOF-READING. By Fred N. Scott, Ph. D., and Joseph V. Denney, A. B. 107 pp. Stiff paper. Ann Arbor, Michigan: Register Publishing Company. 1891.

THE PRINCIPLES OF STYLE. By Fred N. Scott, Ph. D. 51 pp. Stiff paper. Ann Arbor, Michigan: Register Publishing Company. 1891.

AESTHETICS, ITS PROBLEMS AND LITERATURE. By Fred N. Scott, Ph. D. 32 pp. Paper. Ann Arbor, Michigan: Register Publishing Company. 1891.

HELEN YOUNG. By Paul Lindau. Translated from the German by P. J. McFadden. 183 pp. Paper, 25 cents. Chicago: Rand, McNally, & Company. 1892.

THE TREASURE TOWER. A Story of Malta. By Virginia W. Johnson. 223 pp. Paper, 25 cents. New York: Rand, McNally, & Company. 1892.

THE LIGHT OF ASIA. By Sir Edwin Arnold. With Notes by Mrs. I. L. Hauser. 309 pp. Paper, 50 cents. Chicago: Rand, McNally, & Company. 1892.

THE BOOK OF RUTH. A novel. By P. L. Gray. 219 pp. Paper. Bendena, Kan.: P. L. Gray. 1892.

THE BLUE SCARAB. By David Graham Adee. 348 pp. Paper, 50 cents. Chicago: Laird & Lee. 1892.

A LOYAL LOVER. By E. Lovett Cameron. 294 pp. Paper, 50 cents. New York: John A. Taylor & Company. 1892.

MRS. LYGON. A Domestic Detective Story. By Shirley Brooks. 385 pp. Paper, 50 cents. St. Paul, Minn.: Price, McGill Company. 1892.

A MORAL INHERITANCE. By Lydia Hoyt Farmer. 240 pp. New York: J. S. Ogilvie. 1890.

HOW TO GET MARRIED, ALTHOUGH A WOMAN. By a Young Widow. 144 pp. Paper, 25 cents. New York: J. S. Ogilvie. 1892.

CLASSICAL POEMS. By William Entriken Bailey. 108 pp. Cloth. Cincinnati: Robert Clarke & Company. 1892.

THE PARSON. A Satire. By Charles J. Bayne. Twelfth Edition. 19 pp. Paper. Augusta, Ga.: Chronicle Office. 1892.

HELPFUL HINTS AND SUGGESTIONS.

=Envelope Pigeon-holes.=--One of the most useful appliances that I use in daily work is the row of envelopes in the front compartment of the upper left-hand drawer of my desk. The envelopes are made of stout manila paper, almost as high as the drawer is deep, and eight and one-half inches long. They are arranged in the drawer at right angles with the front, so that as I sit at the desk the face of each envelope is toward me. The flaps are turned inside, and each envelope has an inscription on the upper left-hand corner. They are used for filing material wanted for early reference, and they keep such material classified, within immediate reach, and in much smaller space than if pigeon-holes were used. The first twenty-six envelopes are inscribed with the letters of the alphabet, and are used for filing material alphabetically. Those beyond are labelled with subjects, also arranged alphabetically, the subjects being those in which I have an immediate special interest. For instance, if I am preparing an article on "Misprints," any examples noted are filed away in an envelope so marked, and when I get ready to write the article the material is ready at hand. "Bills Unpaid," "Receipted Bills," "Ideas and Suggestions," "Postage Stamps," "Addresses," "Cards and Circulars," may be marked on other envelopes. If a drawer is not available, the envelopes may be kept in a box within easy reach, but the drawer is best. The scheme is easily adapted to any special needs. In the case of a writer collecting material, when an envelope bulges too much, it suggests profitable action.

W. H. H.

SOMERVILLE, Mass.

LITERARY ARTICLES IN PERIODICALS.

[Readers who send to the publishers of the periodicals indexed for copies containing the articles mentioned in the following list, will confer a favor if they will mention THE WRITER when they write.]

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WRITINGS OF W. H. H. MURRAY. George Stewart, Jr. _Belford's Magazine_ for March.

REPORTERS AND THEIR TRIALS. _Inland Printer_ for March.

THEORY OF THE COMMA. _American Bookmaker_ for March.

CHARACTERISTICS OF MAGIC IN EASTERN AND WESTERN LITERATURE. Talcott Williams. _Poet-Lore_ for March 15.

WHAT A BIBLIOGRAPHY SHOULD BE. Victor Chauvin. _Library Journal_ for March.

SOME NEWSPAPER BAD HABITS. With Portrait of E. W. Howe. E. W. Howe. _Newspaperdom_ for March.

THE DANBURY NEWS MAN. George Watson Hallock. _Newspaperdom_ for March.

A COMPLETE REFERENCE SYSTEM. I. D. Marshall. _Newspaperdom_ for March.

THE COMPLETE AND AUTHENTIC HISTORY OF A NEWS DESPATCH. Samuel Merrill. _Engraver and Printer_ (Boston) for March.

EDWARD AUGUSTUS FREEMAN. _Critic_ for March 26.

COUNT LEON TOLSTOI. Madame Dovidoff. _Cosmopolitan_ for April.

GOODRIDGE BLISS ROBERTS. With Portrait. Charles G. Abbott. _Dominion Illustrated Monthly_ (Montreal) for April.

LITERATURE AND THE MINISTRY. Leverett W. Spring. _Atlantic Monthly_ for April.

GEORGE ELIOT AND MRS. HUMPHRY WARD. Charles T. Copeland. _North American Review_ for April.

CHARLES KEENE, OF PUNCH. George Somes Layard. _Scribner's Magazine_ for April.

ISAAC JUDSON POTTER, PUBLISHER OF THE YANKEE BLADE. With Portrait. _Weekly Journalist_ (Boston) for March 24.

FICTION IN THE COURT ROOM. George Stewart. _Toronto Week_ for March 11.

T. W. HIGGINSON. With Portrait. _Weekly Journalist_ (Boston) for March 31.

WHY BOOKS SUCCEED. Duffield Osborne. _American Bookseller_ for April 1.

EUGENE FIELD. _Inland Printer_ for April.

WHAT IS POETRY. Edmund Clarence Stedman. _Century_ for April.

WOLCOTT BALESTIER. Edmund Gosse. _Century_ for April.

THE WIFE OF EUGENE FIELD. John Ballantyne. _Ladies' Home Journal_ for April.

MISTAKEN LITERARY SUCCESS. Wolstan Dixey. _Ladies' Home Journal_ for April.

POETRY AND ELOQUENCE. John Burroughs. _Chautauquan_ for April.

NEWS AND NOTES.

D. Appleton & Co. announce a Holland Fiction Series, introducing to American readers the best literature of modern Holland. They have been led to do this by the interest shown in Maarten Maartens' "Joost Avelingh," which they published some time ago. A new novel by Maarten Maartens will be included in the series.

Mrs. James T. Field is abroad with Miss Sarah Orne Jewett.

Daniel Lothrop, head of the D. Lothrop Company, of Boston, died February 18. He was born August 11, 1831.

Edward Augustus Freeman, the English historian, died of smallpox February 16, at Alicante, Spain, aged sixty-nine years.

With the issue of March 11 the _Epoch_ ceased to exist as a separate publication, having been merged with _Munsey's Magazine_.

Edward Everett Hale will be seventy years old April 3.

Rev. George Thomas Dowling, D. D., who has been pastor of the Madison-avenue Reformed Church in Albany for nearly three years, has offered his resignation, to take effect July 1. It is his intention, he says, to devote himself for a few years to rest and literary pursuits, probably in Boston. Dr. Dowling's salary is $6,500.

In the _New York Herald_ for March 13 were printed the opening lines of a story, entitled "The Way Out," which American writers have been invited to complete. The opening lines are by John Habberton. The entire tale, inclusive of the opening, should not exceed eight thousand words, nor contain less than seven thousand words. No limitations are imposed as to scenes, characters, or incidents. The decision will be left to Mr. Charles Ledyard Norton. For the best story offered the _Herald_ will pay $100, the story to become the property of the _Herald_, and be published in full Sunday, May 1. Manuscripts must be typewritten, and must reach the _Herald_ office not later than Saturday, April 16.

The frontispiece of the _Magazine of Art_ (New York) for April is an etching by Chauvel from Troyon's "The Watering-place."

The _Chautauquan_ (Meadville, Penn.) for April contains an excellent portrait of John Vance Cheney, the popular poet and critic.

Charles Keene, the famous caricaturist of _Punch_, who died about a year ago, is the subject of an article in _Scribner's_ for April, illustrated with many pictures from his original drawings.

A portrait of Walt Whitman, from the painting by J. W. Alexander, forms the frontispiece to _Harper's Magazine_ for April. Guido Biagi writes of "The Last Days of Percy Bysshe Shelley."

A society of American authors, on lines similar to the British and French societies of the same name, is proposed by Charles Burr Todd, who has set forth the grievances of American authors in a paper in the March _Forum_. The first meeting is to be held privately in New York on or before May 1, and when one hundred members are enrolled the society will be organized at once. Its objects are extension of copyright, abolition of letter-rate postage on manuscripts, amendment of international copyright law, and the adoption in America of the French statutes in regard to literary property. All persons who have written a book, or are engaged in writing for the press, are eligible to membership.

End of Project Gutenberg's The Writer, Volume VI, April 1892., by Various