Nashville union and American. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1868-1875, 1873-11-01
NEW BOOKS.

THE Son OF THE OReAN-GRINDER. A Novel,
from the Swedish of Mime, Marie Sophie
Schwartz, by Misses selma Borg and Maril
A. Brown. Philadelphia: Porter q Goats,
Seven of Nine. Schwartz's novels have
now been translated and published in Amer
lea. The first of these, "Gold and Name"
was published late in the year 1870. The
last, "The Son of the Organ Grinder is
Just now eiven to the public. 1t was writ
ten in 1858. 1t is fortunate to American
| literature, that it has received these Access
sions, and to Swedish literature, that It ia
able 10 furnish works of such merit.
Madame Schwartz began her litera-
nv career in 1852. Since that time
she has written with wonderful tecundity,
| producing about forty romances and novels
| besides number of miscellaneous stories.
| Inspired by the success of her earliest fic-
| tons, she continued to write with increas-
| Jug success and increasing deman for
her productions. Many of her works have
been translated into German, French and
| English. Some of them were published at
Berlin in the German Language before they
appeared in the Swedish. Her success has
thus been as great as her ambition could
have wished. 1t is perhaps unnecessary to
add much comment as to the work before
Us. "rbe Son of the Organ Grinder"
bears the marks of genius from the first to
the last page. 1t is one of the authoresse's
"tenddnce" novels, directed against social
evils in Sweden-such evils, however, as
are common to human society everywhere
such as Miss Evans has combatted in
"Macsris." The tendance of the two works
is thus very much the same. The dramat-
ic element in the work before rs is not
quite so strong as one would wish, and there
are one or two other objections that might
be put forward, but one is not disposed sf-
ter reading this work, which possesses 80
much merit, to show up smsll defects. If
it were not stayed by the established genius
IF its authoress, it has merits of its own
that would place its writer in the first rank
of Dovelists. To give an idea OF its nature,
it is only necessary to state, that it is the
history of Swedish character, who rises
from the lowest social stratum, TO the high
est Judicial position in the kingdom, upon
the strength of merit alone.
For sale by w. T. Berry 81 Co. Ps
POLITICAL PORTRAITS, by Prominent Lon
don Journalist Philadelphia: j. b. Lippin-
colt & Co.
The author of the above named "por-
traits" has sketched in an easy and grace
full manner the mental and political Pc
culisrities of twenty British statesmen,
commencing with mir. Gladstone and Mr..
Disraeli, and ending with Sir John Duke
CoIeridge and Mr.. Ayrton. The Marquis
of Salisbury is described as "one Of the most
striking, and in a certain sense, one of the
most pathetic figures in modern political
life. He is hopeless statesman, or is ami
mated only by such hope as is too Ike
despair to impose on prudence the painful
necessity of snothering It," "He is
at war with the tendencies of the age"
If hereditary legislators, with large entaileC
estates, may not resist the tendencies of
this Revolutionary age, who else can have a
better right? The aristocracy of Great
Britain have much to lose in the natural
progress of events, and very little to gain.
The study of the portraits of eminent men
in Parliament, or high in the public esteem,
shows that liberal ideas and feelings are in
the ascendancy 10 the United Kingdom. All
efforts to create conservative reaction has
failed for forty years. A Wellington Tory
administration had to be- progressive or lose
the reins of governme 1t at once. These
sketches are instructive to Americans, as
showing the steady growth of democratic
principles in the British mind from one
generation to another Popular education
Is likely to complete the work OF political
revolution, at no distant day, in the islands
where our mother tongue had its birth.
For sale by W. T. Berry & Co.
SEXUAL SCIENCE, including Manhood Woman
hood, and their Mutual Relations, Love, its
Laws, Powers, etc. BY Prof. o. S. Fowler.
This is volume of $50 pages, which dis
cusses in free and easy, and generally
dogmatic style, very delicate subject.
But the sexes are facts in nature, and le-
Ultimate subjects for scientific research and
careful analysis. Unfortunately, they pre-
sent an inviting field for the labor of
quscSs, and all the arts of charlatanry, in
which grain of truth gilds as gold pound
Cf error and gives it currency. Ia an age
of shams, when so many like
to be cheated, what can we say?
Simply this, that ev'ry science and branch
of useful knowledge has beginning, and
usually in crude popular notions that run
into opposite extremes, developing differing
parties, secs or schools. Thus Fowler
makes hobby of phrenology and rides it,
whip and spur, into church, mstrimony,
and everywhere else. His dogmas would
fall stil-born if there were no anti-phrenol.
ogists to point ous defects in the "science"
and keep its professors" nearer o fact and
truth. All questions have st least two
sides, and the science of life as it deseends
from one generation to another, from age to
age, an infinite number. Life in man
should be more studied in the aggregate, as
it exists in The genus homo and has existed |
since the Pliocene epoch in geology. |
What has phrenology, or Darwin's ''natu al
selection" done in one hundred thousand |
years to elevate the natives of the Fiji Isl |
ands? They are still nude cannibals when |
will they cease to be By the force of natural |
laws? Science should stick to facts, and |
not vsinly imagine things to be, and then |
trest them as fundamental principles. Too |
many books are written and printed for pro-
fit in cash, whose influence on the public |
mind is more harmful than beneficial. |
Sometimes good and evil are so mixed that |
one is in doubt whether the book should be |
noticed at all for the qusckery it contains,
and other Objectionable matter, or be com.
mended for the good things that may be
found in its pages. Fowler has studied |
his subject thirty years or more, and gives |
considerable information.
For sale 0y j. A. Evans, 256 Church
street, Nashville.
F'WOnder-Lands for var. Bennett"
Under the above heading, the Cincinnati
Times publishes q half column editorial
urging Bennett, of the New York Herald,
to abandon his proposed expedition in