This fault we look on as a fault of promise. There is always a chance that luxuriance may be pruned, but none short of a miracle that a broomstick may be made to blossom. There is, however, one absolute, and not relative fault in the book, which we find it harder to forgive, since it is one of instinct rather than of Art. The author seems to us prone to confound the _terrible_, (the only true subject of Art) with the _horrible_. The one rouses moral terror or aversion, the other only physical disgust. This is one of the worst effects of the modern French school upon literature, the inevitable result of its degrading the sensuous into the sensual. We have found all the fault we could with this volume, because we sincerely think that the author of it is destined for great things, and that she owes it to the rare gift she has been endowed with to do nothing inconsiderately, and by honest self-culture to raise natural qualities to conscious and beneficent powers. RECENT AMERICAN PUBLICATIONS RECEIVED BY THE EDITORS OF THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY. Essays of Elia. By Charles Lamb. A New Edition. Boston. William Veazie. 8vo. pp. 466. $1.25. Archaia; or, Studies of the Cosmogony and Natural History of the Hebrew Scriptures. By J. W. Dawson, LL. D., F. G. S., Principal of McGill College, Author of "Acadian Geology," etc. Montreal. B. Dawson & Son. 12mo. pp. 406. Manual of Public Libraries, Institutions, and Societies in the United States and British Provinces of North America. By William J. Rhees, Chief Clerk of the Smithsonian Institution. Philadelphia. J. B. Lippincott & Co. 8vo. pp. xxviii., 687. $3.00. The Oakland Stories. By George R. Taylor, of Virginia. Volume I. Kenny. New York. Sheldon & Co. 16mo. pp. 176. 50 cts. The Florence Stories. By Jacob Abbott. Florence and John. New York. Sheldon & Co. 16mo. pp. 252. 60 cents. Poems read at the Opening of the Fraternity Lectures, 1858-9. By F. B. Sanborn and Rufus Leighton, Jr. Boston. Printed for the Fraternity. 16mo. pp. 59. 25 cts. The Law of the Territories. Philadelphia. Printed by C. Sherman and Son. 16mo. pp. 127. 50 cts. The Wife's Trials and Triumphs. By the Author of "Grace Hamilton's School-Days," etc. New York. Sheldon & Co. 16mo. pp. 347. $1.00. The Old Battle-Ground. By J. T. Trowbridge, Author of "Father Brighthopes," etc. New York. Sheldon & Co. 24mo. pp. 276. 50 cts. Abridgment of the Debates of Congress, from 1789 to 1856. From Gales and Seaton's Annals of Congress; from their Register of Debates; and from the Official Reported Debates, by John C. Rives. By the Author of the "Thirty Years' View." Volume XII. New York. Appleton & Co. 8vo. pp. 807. $2.50. "Woman's Right to Labor"; or, Low Wages and Hard Work: in Three Lectures, delivered in Boston, November, 1859. By Caroline H. Dall. Boston. Walker, Wise, & Co. 16mo. pp. xvi., 184. 50 cts. The Diary of a Samaritan. By a Member of the Howard Association of New Orleans. New York. Harper & Brothers. 12mo. pp. 324. $1.00.