The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1877-11-03
Recent Publications.

Phil, Rob and Louis; or the Haps and Mis-
haps of Three Average Boys, is the second
volume in Miss Mary s. Deering's Forest City
Series, published by Dresser Mcclellan s. Go.
Those who were so fortunate as to make the
acquaintance of the Iboys of Allen street last
year will rejoice to meet them once more, and
the young people to whom they are yet
strangers have a great pleasure in store in
the coming introduction. In this volume as in
the preceding Miss Deering gives some natural
and charming pictures of boy life. She has
discovered that "there is good deal of human
nature in boy," and she never falls into the
common mistake of portraying the thing boy
ought to be but never is, and of crediting her
little heroes with the intellectual ability of Ba-
con and the conversational powers of Coleridge.
Yet they are not wanting in the child-like wis
dom which puts their elders to shame Miss
Deering tells US in her bright, chatty way, how
Phil and Rob held tournaments and how, like
the world, as they grew older they put away
such childish things and joined baseball clubs:
how they got.excited over torchlight professions
and howled themselves hoarse for their candi-
dates and stuffed ballot-boxes just like their
fathers; and how when the election was over
|
Thanksgiving at the old farmhouse among
the hills where grandmother served them as
they had served the ballot-boxes. A new char
acter and charming one comes into the story
in the dainty person of Daisy. little lady of
four summers The volume is neatly gotten
up, and the illustrations, which are excellentIy
dcne really illustrate.
Miss Phelps Story of Avis Boston J. R. Os
good & Co. Portland, Loring, Short & Harmony
is romance which, notwithstanding its notable-
beautie. of language and sentiment, and vivid
ly colored and strenuous style, would better not
have been written. 1t intensifies by setting
forth in words type of woman and of her un-
happiness that, existing especially in New
England, has no right to existence anywhere.
Moreover, Miss Phelps is a passionate and
skillful special pleader; she assumes certain
conditions as Inevitable and POUNDS her claims
upon these; it is an exaggerated, and over col
ored delineation that insists rather than per-
suades. Avis, the heroine of the story, is in
plain words, a selfish and uncomfortable wo-
man who assumes that the development of her
talents and mind is the pivot on which affairs
should turn; and whose sorrows, tragic as they
are, are the result of q narrow and limited ma
ture that mistakes itself for mental breadth.
This tragedy is read between the lines, and ap-
preciating it, one has less pity for the sorrows
of Avis as they are recorded, and more for the
nature that changed good into grief. There is
already too much of vague mental discomfort
among New England women; undefned aspir-
alton that has nothing of the pleasure of con-
scious though imperfectly developed power; but
l. &I,a 81 ton
great ambition of the bra in, and not enough of
lively, wholesome interests. Given written
type like Avis, such discomfort will hasten to
mould itself and take form after it. The litera-
ry merit of this novel is decided: and Miss
Phelps describes every phase of suffering
which Avis experiences with extraordinary
minuteness and sharpness Of detail. The pas
sion OF the work is unfailing, and is sustained
with power at times almost terrible. 1t is a
work which will be eagerly read by the very
women to whom it will do no good, and health
ier, happier natures can only stand apart, and.
wondering at the force of its needless tragedy,
recognize its dreariness.
Surly Tim and other stories, by Mrs. Francis
Hodgson Burnett New York: Scribner &
Armstrong; Portland: Loring, Short s. Har
mon Is q taSte1ul ultlo VOlu u6 COutdluluS sew
etal of the choicest of recent stories. Mrs.
Burnett's gift is thoroughly dramatic; the
characters that she draws have genuine warmth
and movement and her style is varied, unaf-
fected and telling, not seldom rising to the
heights of poetic beauty and true pathos.
Among these stories-which by the way have
already appeared in Scribner's aud in Lippin-
colts Magazine-Mere Graud's Little Daugh-
ter is notable for its exquisite finish and deca-
cy; Esmeralda is piquant AMI charming and is
full of subtle and dramatic touches. Mrs.
Burnett has taken at once her place in the
| foremost rank of the storytelers of to-day and
| the polish and beauty of her style assure the
success of it essential traits of dramatic force
| and womanly perception.
Another romance by Mrs Burnett is entitled
'Theo." philadelphia: 7. B. Peterson & Co..
| To say, as one must, that it does not equal the
stories just noticed, is merely to dispraise il by
comparison with the authors own finer work,
1t is graceful, bright and well-wrtten novel,
| but lacks the last touches that impress upon
| other works of Mrs Burnett the individuality
| of the writer 1t is tender little story, whose
| clouds finally part into pleasant sunshine.
| Forbidden Fruit from the German OF +. W.
| Hacklander, by Rosalie Kaufman Boston: