New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1897-07-11

charge Of pedantry. They have all made read
able, pleasant books out Of their researches
Mr.. Harris handsome volume is nothing less
than a judiciously made anthology OF those
fragments Of history from which the long mar
rative Of American colonization has been pieced
together He begins his selections with the
Saga Of the Morse Discovery Of Greenland and
the finding of Wineland the Good. His book is
a library in little. arranged in such a manner
that the student systematically explore the
chief lines of our early history in the writings
Of its makers. Mr.. Arber's book is not so well
planned. but it is full of good material. and the
reader who is industrious and clever at follow
ing the threads of a somewhat obscure MARIA
tive will readily increase from these pages his
knowledge Of Old Colonial affairs In Dr.
Chamberans volume attention is concentrated
upon Chief Justice Samuel Sewal but the lat
ters diary. which provides most of the material
is marvellously illustrative of the entire period
and therefore the book falls into perfect har-
mOny with the two other productions noted
above. Their respective publishers have
brought out each one Of these books in ad-
mirabe form. To sit down to them is to ex-
perience a peculiarly simple and interesting
pleasure.
We have said that the authors Of these vol
Umes avoided pedantry. Perhaps they could
not help themselves. The first and last impress
sion derived from the original sources Of Ameri-
can history is that those who had most to do
with ii rarely inclined to assume important
airs in their writings Stilted they often were
it was the iGiosyncrasy of the fifteenth and sue
ceeding centuries. But even when they are
stilted these old captains and soldiers handle
the pen with notable power Their defect-if
defect it is-consists Of no more than DISPOSE
that they write with extraordinary directness
and force. The charm Of the volumes before
us lies in their narrative graces. Their sub
stance is not new Mr.. Arber for example
makes fewer revelations of Importance than he
likes to think he makes. But in their
styles, so various and yet 50 homogeneous
80 similar in accent one TO the other
they have a freshn Ass that is positively
enchanting We do not need to traverse
In this place the facts connected with the dis
coyery of America or the founding Of the Massa-
chusetts Bay Colony, but the reader who knows
all about them may proftably be directed to
these old feelings of old tales. Somehow the
latter seem more genuine and. above all things,
more human than ever before. There is. for
example Sir Francis Drake. His sturdy
traits known to most or us. ana IL
needs no minute examination into the records
of his decentralization of the globe at the close
OF the sixteenth century to tell US the quality of
the man and his methods Drake, like Hawkins
and many another Elizabethan freelance,
looms upon the horizon Of British adventure as
a man whose scruples never dreamed OF Keep
ing pace with his patriotism He secured the
seas for the good of his country and himself
Whose got in his way might beware But the
reader might be told this a thousand times and
never grasp its significance so completely as
upon perusal Of the following paragraph
taken from the text Of Francis Pretty VINO