The Portland daily press., 1877-04-28
Recent Publications.

THROUGH PERSIA By CARAVAN, by Arthur Ar
mold. New York: Harper & Brothers. Portland:
Lorng, Short & Harmon,
Accompanied by his wife, the author trav-
ersed Persia during the winter of 1856, max
ing journey of more than thousand miles.
Ihe narrative is interesting and shows US
people three or four hundred wears behind
Christians in civilization; people priest-rid-
den, Ignorant, badly governed, oppressed by
farmers of revenues, thinned by famine and
pestilence and apparently retrogradng in num-
bers. Their customs remind one of the tales in
the Arabian Nights: the sayes come in pro-
cession bearing gifts of sweetmeats in dishes,
to meet the distinguished guest, and pompous
escorts conduct them through dirty kennels
which take the place of streets, between squalid
huts to official residences with tawdry plas-
tered walls. The great cities are half ruins,
and ruins of mud walls at that. The most
interesting relics of ancient splendor are the
ruins of Persepolis, of which little remains
except the magnificent platform upon which
the palace of Xerxes was built, mass of ma
sonry forty-fye feet high, fifteen hundred feet
long and eight hundred feet wide, with steps
up which regiment of cavalry ten abreast
fifteen inches tread each rising only three and
half inches, hewn out of the hardest syenite,
with blocks so huge that three or four steps are
cut in one block. Sculptured winged bulls and
cuneiform inscription show a relationship be-
tween the Medes and the Assyriaus. Their
literature, like their civilization, is limited and
dates back to the Middle Ages. The picture is
melancholy, and when change comes it will
probably come with conquerirg people, prob
ably the Muscovites, who are pressing them
closely, though Mr. Arnold seems to earnestly
wish Great Britain to administer upon the
estate
YOUNG FOLKS Book OF AMERICAN EXPLORERS,
BY Thomas Wentworth Higginson. Boston: Lee
q Shepard. Portland: Bailey & Noyes
Col. Higginson has hit upon the very happy
idea of collating the narratives of the Early
Explorers of America from the Norsemen to
the Pilgrims, giving them in their original lam
guage with brief explanatory foot notes. The
result is collection of rare papers which will
not only prove very interesting to young read
ers, but equally so to older ones who have not
the time or opportunity to seek them in the
historical tones whence they are drawn.
Among the stories are found Weymouth's voy-
age up the Penobscot, and Popham's Colony on
the Kennebec. Pocahontas appears again in
the original guise and so truthfully as to 90 far
to restore our faith so rudely shaken by late
historic doubters. Hendrix Hudson's story is
finely told from the old Dutch chronicles; the
landing of the Pilgrims is given in their own
words; and the book concludes with the story
of the Massachusetts, Bay Coonists. 1t is in
teresting to note that the climate of New Eng.
land was then found to be balm for all dis
eases. Certainly this new departure in child
literature is an improvement on the diluted ar
ticle which has hitherto been given.
FROM TRADITIONAL TO RATIONAL FAITH Yor the
way came from Baptist to Liberal Christianity.
By R. Andrew Griffin. Town and Country series
Boston; Roberts Brothers, Portland: Lering
Short & Harmon.
The title OF this volume conveys its purpose
which proves to be the diagnosis of the differ
ent states of mind which the author noted in
himself during the process of unclothing from
faith in which he was i'll at ease-the brief
shiveriug that followed-and the subsequent
clothing upon according to his proportions In
this case it is the Baptist who becomes the
Unitarian. The manner of the writer has the
sobriety and earnestness which alone can justi-
ly or render tolerable, the discussion of per-
sonal religious experience; and, while the very
highest authority has decided against any ''tra-
ditional' faiths which shall make the word of
God of none effect, yet the Liberal Christian,
finding the "effect'' in the lives of those OF
widely differing creeds, learns the valuable les
son that each must be left to decide for himself
what means best conduce to the desired end.
Should all strive toward this with the earnest
ness felt by the author of the present volume,
the result would be in church of all souls
the only truly broad church-upon a sure
foundation of charity.