Daily Nashville patriot. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1860-1862, 1861-03-08
Rook Notice.

Book Notice.
Halls TRAVELS n EUROPE, EGYPT. AND TIE
HOLY LAND "a Twelve Months Tour during which
| ne saw many wonderful, things and vast deal Of
fun By A R. Wigs, Nashville. Tenn Printed
for the Author By j. B. McFerrin. Ag't. 1851. One
volume, PIP. sci.
| Once upon time-not so far back as the
revival of letters in Europe, nor SO recently
| as the suppression of letters in South CARROLL
na-there was a newspaper published in
! Winchester, Tenn. called the Independent.
The traditions still current among the inhab-
| itants of that ancient hamlet, tell as that the
Independent was an excellent paper, contain
! ing regularly each week a few editorials, the
customary quantity of poetry, an array of
| miscellaneous matter, q page or two of adj
yertisements, and faithful chronicle of the
prices of produce. The editor and proprie-
| tor was of the Ancient and Honorable Order
of Good Fellows, and bis journal was read
| by many. But it came to pass on certain
day that '.a trading fit" smote him nigh unto
death, and his printing Office, with all the
| types presses and appurtenances thereunto
pertaining, passed from his hands, and for
| two years or more he became an itinerant
dabbler in printers ink among the towns
and cities of the Middle Division. At the
end of that time he turned up at Huntsville,
Ala, with another Independent, which was a
| better paper still. But ere long he disposed
| of his interest in this also, and having for
year or so rested from his labors, he set out
| on tftee months pilgrimage to the shrines
of the Old World.
Such is a ..brief historical view" of the
| life and times of HAL, sometimes Familiarity
| called A. Z. VICES, distinguished through
out the continent as the first, and We may
/ say the last. country editor that ever crossed
| the Atlantic.
During bis jOurneyings amid the splendors
Of London, of Paris, of Brussels and of We
nice; the magnificent ruins of Rome, of
| Greece, and of the dead cities of the Nile,
and among the sacred scenes Of the Holy
| Land, HAL was given 10 writing series of
! sprightly letters for the Huntsville Lndepen-
dent, sometimes making desk OF his hat
crown as be sat By the bivOuac fire in front Of
his tent aud the letters thus and there writ
ten, gathered up and published in a tasteful
volume. with but little revision, constitute
the book whose title in nOnpareil crowns
these paragraphs.
1t is not to be expected that HAL would
attempt to tell us in SOL pages of all the
| wonderful things he saw, nor of half the fun
he enjoyed during his pilgrimage from Hunts
n II
few of the lions that infested bis route, as
the guide-books of the enterprising Mr.. MUIR
Ray woul have afforded him ample and easy
facilities for doing and the reader encoun-
tiers in his beautifully printed pages neither
the dimensions of st. Peters nor the cost of
st. Pauls. He tells us of the gaieties and the
fiivolities of Paris, and describes the entree
of the Grand Army of Napoleon III but of
Notre Dame, the T1ileries aud the Louvre,
of the arches of the Carrousel and the Etoile,
of the column of the Place Vendome, tie
churches of the Invalides and ST. Genevieve
and the temple of the Madeleine-of these.
and the hundred other monuments of archi-
tectural genius and taste which render Paris
the most magnificent city in the world, be
gives Us no guide book description. What
intelligent reader will not thank him for his
forbearance here-a forbearance he exercises
wherever he goes.
But HAL has an eye for the beautiful and
that eye, even amid the splendors of the
French capital, could not help but take cog
nizance of the pretty ankles of the PaTtsi-
ennes promenading the Boulevards or loter-
ing by the cool fountains of the Elysian
Fields. And then there are more pretty All
kles, scattered along from London to Grand
Cairo, whose symmetrical shape that pryiug
eye never fails to detect. The proof of these
facts are sprinkled all through the book.
But enough. Halls is a pleasant vol
ume, full of life and spirit. and though there
are here and there inelegancies oil style, and
slight blemishes of a different character,
which careful revision would have amend
ed, yet it is book which will be read with
pleasure and profit By all who take it up.
For sale by booksellers generally. =.