"Thoroughly a pure, original, and fresh American type. David Harum is a character whose qualities of mind and heart, eccentricities, and dry humor will win for his creator notable distinction. Buoyancy, life, and cheerfulness are dominant notes. In its vividness and force the story is a strong, fresh picture of American life. Original and true, it is worth the same distinction which is accorded the _genre_ pictures of peculiar types and places sketched by Mr. George W. Cable, Mr. Joel Chandler Harris, Mr. Thomas Nelson Page, Miss Wilkins, Miss Jewett, Mr. Garland, Miss French, Miss Murfree, Mr. Gilbert Parker, Mr. Owen Wister, and Bret Harte.... A pretty love story also adds to the attractiveness of the book, that will be appreciated at once by every one who enjoys real humor, strong character, true pictures of life, and work that is 'racy of the soil.'"--_Boston Herald._ "Mr. Westcott has created a new and interesting type.... The character sketching and building, so far as David Harum is concerned, is well-nigh perfect. The book is wonderfully bright, readable, and graphic."--_New York Times._ "The main character ought to become familiar to thousands of readers, and will probably take his place in time beside Joel Chandler Harris's and Thomas Nelson Page's and Miss Wilkins's creations."--_Chicago Times-Herald._ "We give Edward Noyes Westcott his true place in American letters--placing him as a humorist next to Mark Twain, as a master of dialect above Lowell, as a descriptive writer equal to Bret Harte, and, on the whole, as a novelist on a par with the best of those who live and have their being in the heart of hearts of American readers. If the author is dead--lamentable fact--his book will live."--_Philadelphia Item._ "True, strong, and thoroughly alive, with a humor like that of Abraham Lincoln and a nature as sweet at the core. The spirit of the book is genial and wholesome, and the love story is in keeping with it.... The book adds one more to the interesting list of native fiction destined to live, portraying certain localities and types of American life and manners."--_Boston Literary World._ "A notable contribution to those sectional studies of American life by which our literature has been so greatly enriched in the past generation.... A work of unusual merit."--_Philadelphia Press._ "One of the few distinct and living types in the American gallery."--_St. Louis Globe-Democrat._ "The quaint character of 'David Harum' proves to be an inexhaustible source of amusement."--_Chicago Evening Post._ "It would be hard to say wherein the author could have bettered the portrait he sets before us."--_Providence Journal._ "Full of wit and sweetness."--_Baltimore Herald._ "Merits the heartiest and most unequivocal praise.... It is a pleasure to call the reader's attention to this strong and most original novel, a novel that is a decided and most enduring addition to American literature."--_Boston Saturday Evening Gazette._