OCT. 1, 1866. SIMON STEVENS, B. F. STEVENS, Messrs. STEVENS BROTHERS, 17 Henrietta Street, Covent Garden, London, W. C., Have established an American and Foreign Commission House for Publishing, Bookselling, and the execution generally of LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC ORDERS, both for Import and Export, and have undertaken the continuance of the current miscellaneous business of their brother, MR. HENRY STEVENS, of 4 TRAFALGAR Square, which was commenced in 1845. In the execution of orders for the purchase or sale of early printed and scarce books they will have the benefit of the advice and long bibliographical experience of MR. HENRY STEVENS, who, as heretofore, devotes himself to the purchase and sale of rare books. Messrs. STEVENS BROTHERS are the special agents of the International Library Exchange, established by the "American Geographical and Statistical Society of New York," and are constantly making consignments through that Institution of BOOKS, MAPS, PHILOSOPHICAL APPARATUS, MAGAZINES, &c., for Departments of the U. S. Government, Public Institutions, Libraries, Colleges, and Incorporated Societies. Messrs. STEVENS BROTHERS are honored with the special Agency of several American and British Institutions. Parcels of a literary or scientific character presented by Institutions or individuals in the United States or Canada to individuals or Institutes in Great Britain or on the Continent, are received and distributed with punctuality and economy. to LITERARY, SCIENTIFIC, AND MISCELLANEOUS ORDERS from private individuals will be executed with care and promptitude, and the goods forwarded any part of the United States or Canada direct, or in the absence of special instructions, through their usual channels. All Parcels for America, including weekly packages for France and Germany, are forwarded under special arrangements by the INMAN STEAMERS, sailing every Wednesday from Liverpool. Consignments from America are made by the same line every Saturday from New York. Messrs. STEVENS BROTHERS desire to purchase one copy of every Book, Pamphlet, or Magazine (not a reprint) published in America. They desire also to procure two copies of all Reports of every Railroad, Canal, Coal, Petroleum, Steamboat, Bank, any other Incorporated Company in America. OCT. 1, 1866. NEW BOOKS. ORANGE JUDD & CO., Agricultural and Rural Book Publishers, 41 PARK ROW, NEW YORK, HAVE JUST PUBLISHED PEAT AND ITS USES. By Prof. S. W. JOHNSON, of Yale College. Part I. Origin, Varieties, and Chemical Character of Peat. Part II. On the Agricultural Uses of Peat and Swamp Muck. Part III. On Peat as Fuel. QUINBY'S MYSTERIES OF BEE-KEEPING. (Entirely rewritten.) By M. QUINBY. This book is the result of thirty-five years' practical experience. 12mo., 348 pp., $1.50. BRECK'S NEW BOOK OF FLOWERS. Fully Illustrated. By JOSEPH BRECK, Practical Horticulturist. 12mo., 480 pp., $1 75. RIVERS' MINIATURE FRUIT GARDEN. Illustrated. By THOMAS RIVERS. First American, from the thirteenth English edition. 12mo., 132 pp., $1. MY VINEYARD AT LAKEVIEW; or, Successful Grape Culture. By A WESTERN GRAPE GROWER. 12mo., 143 pp., bevelled boards, $1 25. SAUNDERS' DOMESTIC POULTRY. Revised and enlarged. By SIMON M. SAUNDERS. Fully Illustrated. 12mo., 168 pp., paper 40 cents; cloth, 75. IN PREPARATION: AMERICAN POMOLOGY. Part I. APPLES. By Dr. JOHN A. WARDER. BARRY'S FRUIT GARDEN. Thoroughly revised edition. By P. BARRY. MARKET AND FAMILY GARDENING. By a well known Practical Gar dener of New Jersey. SMALL FRUIT CULTURIST. By ANDREW S. FULLER, author of "Grap Culturist," and "Strawberry Culturist." PRACTICAL AND SCIENTIFIC GARDENING. By WILLIAM N. WHIT of Athens, Ga., editor of the "Southern Cultivator," and author of "Gardening for the South All the above books will be thoroughly illustrated, and will prove standards in the vario departments with which they are connected, as the authors are practical as well as scienti men, and understand the subjects which they write about. O. J. & Co. publish about one hundred books on Agricultural and Rural subjects, a will be adding to the number from time to time. LIBERAL DISCOUNTS will be made to the Trade, from whom Orders are solicited. 41 Park Row, New York GEORGE W. CHILDS, PUBLISHER, Nos. 628 & 630 CHESTNUT STREET, PHILADELPHIA, GEO. N. DAVIS, 119 Rua Direita, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Agent for South America. A. ROMAN, San Francisco, California, Agent for the Pacific Coast. STEPHENS & CO., 10 Calle Mercaderes, Habana, Agents for the West Indies. Subscriptions or Advertisements for the “American Literary Gazette” will be received by the above Agents, and they will forward to the Editor any Books or Publications intended for notice. career. OCT. 15, 1866. I have alluded, he lived entirely alone. He passed among the common people of the town (who had never heard of a Protestant) as a Jesuit, and was detested. Nevertheless, a more highminded, honorable, thoroughly honest man never breathed. When he was persuaded he was in the right, he was as firm as a rock; he might have been slain, (who is safe from the vulgar mob's frenzy: does not our Saviour on the Cross tower above the angry multitude as the Eternal protestation of Right against Might, and Eternal pledge of Right's ultimate supremacy ?) he could not have been forced to recant. He died after a life of hard, honorable labor, and not a dozen people were to be found following his coffin to the grave. It gives me satisfaction to record M. Emile Augier and M. Vietorien Sardou were two of the ten people who attended his funeral. were OUR CONTINENTAL CORRESPONDENCE. Paris, August 17, 1866. I was unable in my last letter to give a sketch of the late M. Théodore Muret's life. I therefore begin this communication with an epitome of his He was born in 1808, and consequently was 58 years old at the time of his death. I know nothing of his early career. He was probably born in poverty, for he labored as none but the children of the poor can labor. He wrote plays, histories, novels; was for years chief editor of a provincial paper; and for a still longer period of time the dramatic critic of the Legitimist organ, "La Gazette de France." His best work is his last work: a history of Francé told by the pieces played in the Parisian theatres. It is piquant. He labored assiduously on it; the mountains of newspapers and plays he examined to obtain materials for it were incredibly large, high, broad, and numerous. He said, after its publication: "That book has killed me;" and he spoke the truth. His other estimable works are а "History of Paris;" a History of Condé's Army;" and a "History of the Western Wars." He wrote, too, a good many pamphlets; one of them, "The Truth to Workmen, Peasants, and Soldiers," reached in 1849 a sale of 600,000 copies. One circumstance militated against the sale of his books, and indeed against the earthly success of his life. It was the same cause which has marred M. Guizot's life-M. Théodore Muret was a Protestant. The French have lost, except in company of the superiors on whom they depend for advancement or place, the manners of a dancing-master. Rudeness is quite fashionable. I do not believe there is a nation in the world so insensible to Right as the French are. I use Right in the sense Blackstone applies it when he speaks of the Rights of Persons and the Rights of Things. In this corrupt society, a Protestant is not unlike a man cased in steel armor walking the streets. He is not so nimble of motion as the other passers, and when they strike against each other the collision is broken by common yielding and by the elasticity of the soft cloth and softer flesh. Every blow given by the armor inflicts severe pain. The Protestant is encased in principles; there are actions of which he would not be guilty even in his closet; he has an inflexible rule of conduct, which governs even the ordinary deeds of life. So he is continually coming into collision with his neighbors, who have no rule of life except selfish convenience. M. Théodore Muret passed for a sort of Timon because he lived greatly alone. The truth is all Protestants in France live alone; they seem to be in and yet not of the country. They appear still to be Huguenots, and as such liable any day to be cut down by the sword, or burned at the stake, or broken on the wheel. In the provinces, they have a separate place in the burying-ground, which is hard by, if it be not par cel of the portion where suicides and the beheaded M. Alex. Dumas has made this reply to the forecriminals and infamous people are interred. Look going allegations: "You have announced that, as at the Jews with you. See how they form a city I forgot to pay my secretaries when they quitted me, in your city, and a State in your State, and a so- they, dying of hunger, committed suicide by drownciety in your society. They are buried apart from ng. In the first place, M. Piftean quitted my seryou. They pray apart from you. How their boys vice nearly two years ago, and I am not rich enough are circumcised and their maids are married are to pay my secretaries pensions equal to their salmore or less mysteries to you. This is precisely aries. The government itself, which is far richer the situation of the Protestants in France. While than I am, gives its servants after thirty years' serM. Théodore Muret was the dramatic critic of "La vice only half their salary; but gives nothing to Gazette de France" (a place he lost solely because them who remain fifteen, ten, five years, and eshe was a Protestant), he was to be seen, on the first pecially only six months in its service. I must performance of new pieces, all alone. Other critics consequently confess I should not feel in the least were surrounded by those courtiers which ever guilty because one of my secretaries committed hang around men in conspicuous places. While suicide eighteen months after he quitted me, or he was chief editor of the provincial paper to which rather eighteen months after I quitted him. Still It was for some days rumored in Paris that M. Benjamin Pifteau had committed suicide in despair. The rumor proved unfounded. He had been in great peril of death by drowning, but had struggled to escape it with as much energy as if he had been a millionaire's son. Before the rumor was contradicted, a newspaper gave this sketch of his career: "His history is simple. He was a professor at Nantes; he quitted his college, came up to Paris, lived by hunger, and at last died by it. In the mean time the poor fellow had been the secretary of M. Alex. Dumas, who committed real cruelties with the best heart in the world, without ruffling his composure, without wounding his moral sense. M. Alex. Dumas always has too much money at the service of the wretched with whom he is unacquainted to think of those be knows. Consequently, Pifteau's functions more glorious than lucrative. His plate was always set-with fifteen others-at M. Dumas's table. When M. Dumas was invited anywhere to dine, he said, with the best intention in the world: bring Pifteau with me, if it will not inconvenience you.' But the unfortunate secretary did not receive at the dessert the boots, shirts, and waistcoats of which he stood in absolute need. This is the way M. Alex. Dumas paid him. At that period of time M. Dumas published all sorts of stuff in the grand 'Journal,' for which he was paid eight cents a line. Every hour an order for 100f. was presented to the cashier of this newspaper. In the afternoon Pifteau would call on the cashier; it was indispensably necessary he should carry 200f. to M. Alex. Dumas, who was staying in the country, and who was expecting every moment ten guests and twelve bailiffs. When Plateau received the 200f. he would pull the cashier by the sleeve, and mysteriously say to him: 'Can't you advance 20f. to me personally? Charge it to M. Dumas: You will do me a great favor.' I am very much afraid poor Pifteau never received any other pay except these 20f. pieces, conquered by main force." I'll OCT. 15, 1866. less do I feel guilty when the secretary who was alleged to have committed suicide proves to be in as good order and as well-conditioned as any man can be. In good truth, when an accredited newspaper announces these things, it ought to ascertain whether they be true, for the following adventure has befallen me: I have had a secretary for the last three months. When he read in your newspaper that my secretaries drowned themselves because I did not pay them, he became alarmed; he grew afraid I would not pay him, and he would be obliged to drown himself. Consequently, although my account with him was square (for I paid him by the week and in advance), he put in his pocket 200f. I had ordered him to send to Marseilles; he slipped on his finger a ring the press at Havre gave me; he thrust under his arm Bouillet's Scientific Dictionary; he went off, and has never since returned. I did hope for one moment that, when M. Pifteau published a card in the newspapers to declare he was not drowned, my runaway, cured of the fear of not being paid, would bring me back my 200f., my ring, and my 'Bouillet's Scientific Dictionary.' Not a bit of it. All I have seen was his mother, who came to beg me not to prosecute her son, and who wept so bitterly I was obliged to console her by saying I gave her as a present the 200f., the ring, and the dictionary her son stole from me." Here is a note from M. Emile Augier, addressed to the chief editor of one of our daily papers: "CROISSY, 16 August. "Some newspapers have been good enough to announce I have gone travelling. This false intelligence will probably produce little emotion on 'Change, but it will prevent my friends from rapping at my door; so I pray you contradict it. Ponson du Terrail is the butt of our witlings; there is no ridicule they do not try to throw on him. Nevertheless, no novel-writer is half so successful as he is; his pen brings him some $10,000 or $16,000 a year; and he has readers in all classes. M. Dentu, the publisher, said, the other day: "I published yesterday a new novel by him; this morning I received letters from one prince, two diplomatists, three statesmen, and five commercial travellers, ordering each one copy." It is stated as positively true that M. Guizot takes so deep an interest in "Les Aventures de Rocambole," he goes a mile to meet the postman who bears the newspaper which contains it! A writer who can enlist this interest is surely no ordinary author. Here is a note he has just addressed to the chief editor of "La Presse Illustrée," which in a few days assumes the title of "La Petite Presse." "MY DEAR FRIEND: I am asked from every quarter to continue Rocambole. Born in 'La Patrie,' he was long a resident of 'Le Petit Journal.' The engagement I have signed with 'La Presse Illustrée' interdiets me from giving the continuation to 'La Patrie' or to Le Petit Journal'. I am assured my readers are impatient. Consequently, I shall publish 'Le Dernier Mot de Rocambole' in 'La Petite Presse' from next Monday. Yours, "PONSON DU TERRAIL." The last novel, "Pas de Chance," of this prolific novelist is dedicated to M. Paul Dalloz, the manager of the "Moniteur." One phrase of the dedication: "I have never hitherto had a co-laborer," has raised some criticism. The rumor had long been current that M. Albert Monnier was his co-laborer in nearly all his novels, and that he and M. Paul de Lascaux were working together on a sort of history of Italy. M. Ponson du Terrail has protested that these rumors have no foundation in truth: "I have never had a co-laborer, and I maintain the expression of my dedication to P. Dalloz. Of a truth once I did write with M. Paul de Lascaux a History of Italy,' but it was not a novel; besides, it was signed by M. de Lascaux. Albert Monnier (who, I believe, is now travelling) began with me a play drawn from my novel 'Les Gandins,' and we have completed another, 'Le Capitaine Coquelicot.' This novel, which will soon be published in 'La France,' is written by me alone, and so are all the others. Believe me, etc. FONSON DU TERRAIL." "E. AUGIER." You may wonder why I record so insignificant a note. Because nothing is here really insignificant; even in these few lines one can detect French impatience of quiet even in the country. He is a lucky man who cannot assemble all his friends by taking the trouble to write three or four letters. When a man appeals to the daily newspapers to summon them, he wants not friends' visits, but company. While I am speaking of letters, let me tell you an ingenious and quite a reasonable way adopted by a public writer in Italy to satisfy all of his customers (they were Bohemians, Hungarians, Croats, Poles), although he knew only two languages, German and Italian. Do you know what a This statement is remarkable. M. Alex. Dumas public writer is? There are none in America. They himself had almost as many co-laborers as he are disappearing here, as education is becoming has written novels; the name of M. Scribe's comore general. Onr most curious specimens are to laborers was legion. Nevertheless, M. Ponson du be seen in the long gallery of the Court-house. Terrail, whose name is on nearly as many volThere were many of them there some years ago, one umes as M. Alex. Dumas's (to instance only two at nearly every pillar, with his little table and years, 1858-59; the catalogues of books published appliances for writing; they spoke and wrote all the here mention 73 volumes by him: during the dialects of France. I do not think there are above whole of 1360 he supplied the feuilleton of 'L'Opina half dozen now, and they keep to the wall. In ion Nationale'), has written all his works withthe lower quarters of Paris they are still to be seen. out a co-laborer. He was decorated with the LeThe public writers are the amanuenses of the illite- gion of Honor on the 15th of August. Pierre Alexis rate. The public writer to whom I allude lives in Ponson du Terrail was born at Montmaur, near Italy, and he is charged with the correspondence of Grenoble, July 8, 1829. His father destined him all the privates of the Austrian army. When his for the navy, but he could not make sufficient procustomers come, he makes them dictate to him, and gress in mathematics to pass the examination. It writes phonetically what they say without under- is said he early showed a desire to become a litestanding one word of it. The illiterate persons to rary man, and won his father's consent by this whom the missive is addressed, knowing nothing fraud: He sent a novel in manuscript to M. Alex. of orthography, and their literary friends who read Dumas (as he said), and in the course of time reit being nearly as ignorant, they find the letter ceived a letter from the author of "Monte Christo" perfectly intelligible. If one would borrow their urging him to come up, as a man of his talents was weapons from Strauss, Rénan, and other infidels, sure to succeed. His father upon this letter gave and turn them on grammar, it would not be hard his consent and blessing. Young Ponson du Terto demonstrate orthography, etymology, syntax, rail was the author of the letter signed Alex. and prosody utterly useless. You know M. Dumas. Soon after he reached Paris the Revolu |
