The Sun. — 1862-09-13 (London, England)

LITERAT URE.  Nelly Armstrong. By the author of " Rose Douglas." Bentley.  This is the latest issue of Mr. Bentley's h arccrown series of standard novels, and is a simple, interesting, and well told tale. It depicts the temptation and fall of a heroine in humble life who leaves the country for service in Edinburgh, where she is seduced, abandoned, forced to take to the streets, but is rescued by the efforts of a former mistress, though only to die of a decline. The picture drawn of the condition of the lower classes of Edinburgh (but which is applicable to all our great cities) is evidently drawn from observation, and is, we fear, only too true. We give an extract from this picture of the work :  " It was a very small room, but lit contained two beds besides an infant's cradle, and Mr. Duncan informed Mary that its inmates every night amounted to eleven. Five of them were at present within—a very old woman being one of them—but the rest, with the exception of the person who opened the door, were children. For this hole the family had to pay a high rent, which at that time they could ill afford, as the father was out of work. Their neighbours, too, both above and below, were of the worst description.  " ' But,' as the poor woman said, how could they help themselves ? Working folks couldn't easily get houses to suit them, and they had just to take what they could get. The thing she most disliked about their present situation was, that her children were making acquaintances in the wynd, which she could not prevent, and were learning bad ways. The air, too, was so foul that none of them were strong. The old mother, besides, was very bad with rheumatism, and they had little to cover her with, for they had been obliged to part with some of their blankets to the pawnshop to keep body and soul together lately.'  "It was a painful account. Mary was glad to pull out her purse again, thankful that it was in her power to relieve immediate necessity. She then retired with tears in her eyes.  " Ay, it is hard for such as them to live in this neigh. bourhood, Miss Elliot,' said the missionary, who observed the impression upon her feelings. ' But the worst of it is, that their bairns will never be so decent as themselves; they will sink lower. The sights here, besides the filth and the foul air, have a vitiating effect upon the mind. The woman knows this, and I have witnessed it again and again myself.' "'Can they net get houses elsewhere ?' asked Mary. "'More than they could afford to pay for. The working classes have little choice in Edinburgh, and the consequences of living in such a locality are dreadful. That family now is still struggling on in a poor but a respectable way. They have not been above half a year here. But they will probably end as others have dons before them. They lose heart at length—for the bad air here has a most depressing effect upon the spirits—and then either father or mother, perhaps both, will take to drinking, after which the course down the bill is fearfully rapid. I know it by experience. Oh I Miss Elliot, I often feel my courage fail when I witness these things ; but it is God's work, and I dare not desert it.' "  Britons Robbed, Tortured, and Murdered in Peru. From the Pen of Captain Malville White, M.E. Hardwicke, Piccadilly.  A third edition of the little work in which Capt. Melville White details his wrongs and those of some of his fellow-countrymen in Peru is now published, and it will no doubt have the effect of strongly directing attention to the state of affairs in that wretched country. The subject, however, oeiongs rather to the domain of politics than of literature, and it is, seemingly, now under the consideration of Government.