PLUCKY BOYS. By the author of "John Halifax, Gentleman," and other authors. Illustrated. Boston: D. Lothrop & Co. Price $1.50. If there is any book of the season that we can heartily commend to boys of the stirring wide awake kind, it is this. The eighteen stories of which it consists, are by well-known writers, all lovers of boys and admirers of pluck, truthfulness, and manliness in them. The various young heroes described represent in their characters some particular quality which entitles them to be classed under the title which the compiler has given the book. Mrs. Craik's story is called "Facing the World;" Sophie May tells about "Joe and his Business Experiences;" George Gary Eggleston contributes a sketch called "Lambert's Ferry;" Kate Upson Clark has a story called "Granny," and there are others by authors of such reputation as Amanda B. Harris, Sarah Orne Jewett, Mary Wager Fisher, Hope Ledyard, Susan Power, Edith Robinson, and Tarpley Starr. The volume is bound in holiday style, and will make a capital gift book for that class of young readers for whom it was specially prepared. * * * * * NOTES AND COMMENTS. Of Marion Harland's latest book, "Cookery for Beginners," the _London Saturday Review_ says: "Mrs. Harland's little book shows its origin by the singular predominance of sweets (which is, speaking roughly, about three to one), and by such odd phrases--odd, that is to say, to an English ear--as that the chief merit of a cook is 'the ability to make good bread.' Alas! if that be so, how many inhabitants of London, England, possess a good cook? But Mrs. Harland is free from even a rag of national prejudice. She sternly, and with almost frightful boldness, denies the sacred PIE so much as a place in her book, and she ventures on the following utterance, which we purposely place in italics, and for which we hope that the eagle, whose home is in the settin' sun, has not already torn out her eyes. '_The best way_,' says this daring inhabitant of Boston, Mass., '_to manage a boiled egg at the table_ [she speaks of it, it will be observed, as if it were a kind of wild beast] _is the English way of setting it upright in the small end of the eggcup_ [Great powers! most Britons will cry, what is the large end of an eggcup?], _making a hole in the top_ [note the precision of these indications] _large enough to admit the eggspoon, and eating it from the top, seasoning it as you go._' The courage and genius of Mrs. Harland are not more clearly indicated by this sentence than the deplorable habits of her countrymen. She ought to be called, not Marion, but Columba. To desist from folly, however, her little book is a very interesting and valuable one. Its receipts, though few, are given with singular clearness and in the most practical of manners, and the mechanical value of the book is much increased by the inclusion of a large number of blank pages for additional receipts."