The Middlebury register. [volume] (Middlebury, Vt.) 1850-1882, 1872-07-23
For the REGISTER.
IWI VIZ FtHV'FF
tompend iums.
BY PROF. moLToS, EVERETT, MASS

BY PROF. IoLToS, EVERETT, MASS
The bulk of literature has vastly iu-
creased with our memory. Men can
read hut IA small fraction Of the good
reading annually issued. Not one in ten
thousand who are now babes will ever
read the whole o. one of Scott's novels.
Oar standard literature defics human iu-
dustry. These full works must bo gar.
uered into vast libraries, where important
pages will wait u century for reader
he will come ut last aud find what he
needs.
Guides in selecting books arc becoming
more and more necessary. Among these
might he named What 10 Read and Hov
10 Read, by c. N. Moore, published by
the Appletons. 1t is small, handy
volume, costing but fifty cents, postpaid,
but it might save great Waste of time
aud money.
hree Centurics Of English Litera.
tire, oy Prof. Yonge, published by the
Appletons, gives an account Of the lead
ing authors from Chauccr to Thackeray,
with extracts from many of them. Any
one who would carefully read these $50
duodecimo pages twice would pass for
an urcommonly well informed gentleman
or lady aud might have the satisfaction
OF knowing what he was talking about
much oftener than some takers do.
! CHAMBERS CycLoPRDIA OF ENGLISH
LITERATURE, published by Gould Il Lin
coin, Is much more extensive work on a
similar plan, less ably executed but con.
tanning ten or twenty times as much 1t
has more than l4OO largo two.columned
pages. Not one person in twenty thous-
aud is as well up in English literature as
this work alone would make him. The
substitution of this for the Ledger and
the flood O: cheap novels in single Green
Mountain village would so mark the
countenances of its youth that the casual
traveller would be struck by the peculiar
ity.
ARvINE's CYcLopEDIA OF ANECDOTES
OF LITERATURE AND THE FINE ARTS, also
published by Gould L. Lincoln, is anoth.
er immense repository of what is often
wanted and can rarely be found by hunt
ing. The anecdotes are more than three
thousand in number and admirably clas-
sifed. If there Is supcrhuous line iu
these seven hundred large, dose pages
we have not noticed it.
MARK BoYD's "REMINISCENCES OF FIFTY
YEAHs, by the Appctous, is book Of
original anecdotes Of leading Euglish
characters With whom the faithful item.
User came into personal contact. Two
oceaDs-of time aud space-lie between
US and many Of tho characters to whom
the gossipy Mark introduces us, ard
whom we are glad TO meet.
FE-sEs DIALOGUES FROM DICKENS, two
handsome aud convenient volumes frou
Lee & Shepard, are u remarkable aud
peculiar compendium of what is mos
valuable in all the works Of Dickeus,-
his characters. He is read for them NOR,
than for his plots; their names are bouse
hold words,-are symbols. Fepse ex
hibts about one huhdred and fifty o
them in Dialogue. keeping nearly rs pos
eible to the original wordS in which tn
word-master created them. There il
convenient index Of them ut the close.
lu foreign languages we need compen
; diums much more than in English.
have mysteriously lost one of the best o
these : The Poetry of Germany, By Al
fred Baskerville, published by Leypol,
Il Holt OF New York. 1t contains al
f admirable selection in Roman characters
, with an English translation in the sam
, measure. aud very well dene.
MayiN's French Prose and Poetry
/ published by Woolworth d Aiusworl
| of New York, or by Hall, OF Boston,
|, am not sure which, contains specimens Q
f forty.seven prose writers, ARA ged i
order of their births, and of thirty-tw
, poets, in y similar order, besides valua
, BILE notes. 1t adds what every tyro i
. French needs-,n essay in French versi
t fcation, of iorty-two pages. This close
| with fable containing Il specimen Of a
t the different measures of French vers
{ except those Of eleven and nine syllable;
which are rarely used. 1t is worth cop
ying as curiosity and as an Illustrate
: of French versifcation
. 80 Mort, viens terminerl ina misere crueis"
, S'ecrait Charl,s accablo parle sort
La mort account du sombre bord:
D ''C'est bien lei qu,on mappclle'
| Or ca, de par Pluton,
4 Que denande.t-on,-'
''Je veux," dit Charlie.
r "'ru yeux Parle'--
Ila hgn