As to a vehicle for the translation of Homer, he gives his voice decidedly in favor of English hexameter, and tries his own hand at that measure. His success strikes us as respectable, but not eminent. Blank verse he thinks too slow in movement, and too much opposed in character. Mr. Tennyson answers this last by translating a passage from Homer into blank verse, and shows at least that he can make it run like a race-horse, and that, too, without sacrifice of fineness or of melody. Right or wrong on these matters, and notwithstanding we confess to certain sympathies with Mr. Newman, we find in Mr. Arnold's books some of the pleasantest reading we have seen this many a day, and wish that for every leisure hour of life a companion so intelligent and liberal, so cultivated and genuine, so manly and mannerly, might await us. RECENT AMERICAN PUBLICATIONS RECEIVED BY THE EDITORS OF THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY. Military Bridges: with Suggestions of New Expedients and Constructions for crossing Streams and Chasms; including, also, Designs for Trestle and Truss Bridges for Military Railroads. Adapted especially to the Wants of the Service in the United States. By Hermann Haupt, A. M., Civil Engineer, late Chief of Bureau in Charge of the Construction and Operation of United States Military Railway, Author of "General Theory of Bridge-Construction," etc. Illustrated by Sixty-Nine Lithographic Engravings. New York. D. Van Nostrand. 8vo. pp. xx., 310. $6.00. The Ear, its Diseases and their Treatment. Illustrated by Engravings. By Franz Adolph von Moschzisker, M. D., Oculist and Aurist, Author of "A Guide to Diseases of the Eye, and their Treatment." Philadelphia. Martin & Randall. 16mo. pp. xxii., 319. $1.50. Stories of the Patriarchs. By O. B. Frothingham. Boston. Walker, Wise, & Co. Square 16 mo. pp. 232. $1.00. The Ferry-Boy and the Financier. By A Contributor to the "Atlantic." Boston. Walker, Wise, & Co. 16mo. pp. 332. $1.25.