No young man of his years has ever perhaps had a more brilliant public career in this country than he. Harry Armitt Brown was a born orator, and exercised an extraordinary influence over all who listened to him. Professor Hoppin says: "With the exception of Patrick Henry, Henry Clay, and Daniel Webster, and a few of our greatest orators, no speaker in the land ever had moments of completer triumph than he over the minds and feelings of his hearers-as at Carpenters' Hall, Valley Forge, and the occasion when he mastered rude and hostile assemblies by the spell of his eloquence."

We cannot forbear quoting an account of a remarkable dream, which is interesting in a psychological point of view.

"REV. AND DEAR SIR,--After many delays I send you a short account of the dream which excited your interest last summer.

"In the fall of 1865, I think it was in the month of November, while I was studying law in the city of New York, I retired to my room about midnight of a cold blustering evening. I remember distinctly hearing the clock strike twelve as I lay in bed watching the smouldering fire until drowsiness crept upon me and I slept. I had hardly lost consciousness when I seemed to hear loud and confused noises, and felt a choking sensation at my throat as if it were grasped by a strong hand. I awoke (as it seemed), and found myself lying on my back on the cobble-stones of a narrow street, writhing in the grip of a low-browed, thick-set man, with 'unkempt hair and grizzled beard,' who, with one hand at my throat and holding my wrist with the other, threw his weight upon me and held me down.

"From the first I knew that his desire was to kill me, and my struggles were for life. I recall distinctly the sense of horror at first and then that of furious determination which took possession of me.

"I did not make a sound, but with a sudden effort threw him half off me, clutched him frantically by the hair, and in my agony bit furiously at his throat. Over and over we rolled upon the stones. My strength began to give way before the fury of my struggles, I saw that my antagonist felt it and smiled a ghastly smile of triumph.

"Presently I saw him reach forth his hand aud grasp a bright hatchet. Even in this extremity I noticed that the hatchet was new and apparently unused, with glittering head and white polished handle. I made one more tremendous fight for life; for a

second I held my enemy powerless, and saw with such a thrill of delight as I cannot forget the horror-stricken faces of friends, within a rod of us, rushing to my rescue. As the foremost of them sprang upon the back of my antagonist he wrenched his wrist away from me. I saw the hatchet flash above my head, and felt instantly a dull blow on the forehead.

"I fell back on the ground, a numbness spread from my head over my body, a warm liquid flowed down upon my face and into my mouth, and I remember the taste was of blood, and my 'limbs were loosed.'

"Then I thought I was suspended in the air a few feet above my body. I could see myself as if in a glass, lying on the back, the hatchet sticking in the head, and the ghastliness of death gradually spreading over the face. I noticed especially that the wound made by the hatchet was in the centre of the forehead, at right angles to and divided equally by the line of the hair. I heard the weeping of friends, at first loud, then growing fainter, fading away into silence. A delightful sensation of sweet repose without a feeling of fatigue-precisely like that which I experienced years ago at Cape May, when beginning to drown-crept over me. I heard exquisite music; the air was full of rare perfumes; I sank upon a bed of downy softness-when, with a start, I awoke. The fire still smouldered in the grate; my watch told me I had not been more than half an hour asleep.

"Early the next morning I joined an intimate friend, with whom I spent much of my time, to accompany him, as was my daily custom, to the Law School. We talked for a moment of various topics, when suddenly he interrupted me with the remark that he had dreamed strangely of me the night before.

"Tell me,' I asked; what was it?'

"I fell asleep,' he said, 'about twelve, and immediately dreamed that I was passing through a narrow street, when I heard noises and cries of murder. Hurrying in the direction of the noise, I saw you lying on your back fighting with a rough laboring man, who held you down. I rushed forward, but as I reached you he struck you on the head with a hatchet, and killed you instantly. Many of our friends were there, and we cried bitterly. In a moment I awoke, and so vivid had been my dream that my cheeks were wet with tears."

"What sort of man was he?' I asked.

"A thick-set man, in a flannel shirt and rough trousers: his

hair was uncombed, and his beard was grizzly and of a few days' growth.'

"Within a week I was in Burlington, New Jersey. I called at a friend's house.

"My husband,' said his wife to me, 'had such a horrid dream about you the other night. He dreamed that a man killed you in a street fight. He ran to help you, but before he reached the spot your enemy had killed you with a great club.'

"Oh, no,' cried the husband across the room; 'he killed you with a hatchet.'

"These are the circumstances as I recall them. I remembered the remark of old Artaphernes, that dreams are often the result of a train of thought started by conversation or reading, or the incidents of the working time, but I could recall nothing, nor could either of my friends cite any circumstance that ever they had read, had ever heard by tale or history,' in which they could trace the origin of this remarkable dream.

"I am, dear sir, very truly yours,

"HENRY ARMITT BROWN.

"P.S.--I may add that these friends of mine were personally unknown to each other.

"The first one, in New York, dreamed that he was the foremost who reached the scene, the other that he was one of the number who followed; both of which points coincided with my own dream."

LETTERS OF CHARLES DICKENS.*—No one who has ever laughed or wept over the pages of Charles Dickens can fail to be interested in these CC letters," which appear in two volumes, and cover over a thousand pages. There is the same charm of style, clearness of expression, and idiomatic English, which mark his published works; and the information given, and the opinions expressed, with not infrequent touches of humor or pathos, keep up the interest throughout. The one characteristic of these letters which we will emphasize-among the many upon which we might dwell -is their friendly tone. In the haste of life, so common in this country, do not our American literary men fail to exhibit that warm interest in their friends which would make their own lives

* The Letters of Charles Dickens: Edited by his sister-in-law and eldest daughter. In two volumes. Charles Scribner's Sons: New York. 12mo. pp. 544, 536. For sale by E. P. Judd, New Haven.

richer and more mellow? No person can read these pages, however uncongenial the character of Charles Dickens may be to him personally, without saying: "How many friends he had, and how he loved them!" We cannot forbear, too, noticing the tenderness of his feelings. A single illustration must suffice from his correspondence at the time he was finishing the "Curiosity Shop." To a friend he writes: "I am breaking my heart over this story, and cannot bear to finish it."

We cannot forbear quoting a part of what he wrote from Baltimore to his son, who was at school in England, about "taking pains" and "careful work." "I am very glad to hear of the success of your reading, and still more glad that you went at it in downright earnest. I should never have made my success in life if I had been shy of taking pains, or if I had not bestowed upon the least thing I have ever undertaken exactly the same attention and care that I have bestowed upon the greatest. Do everything at your best. . . . . Look at such of my manuscripts as are in the library at Gad's, and think of the patient hours devoted year after year to single lines."

The letters to his son Henry (page 455), and to his son Edward (page 466), will surprise most persons, and are both worth looking up and reading through. He commends to each of them the study of the character of Christ, and concludes his letter to Edward: "I now most solemnly impress upon you the truth and beauty of the Christian religion, as it came from Christ himself, and the impossibility of your going far wrong if you humbly but heartily respect it. Only one thing more on this head. . . . Never abandon the wholesome practice of saying your own private prayers, night and morning. I have never abandoned it myself, and I know the comfort of it."

MEMOIRS OF PRINCE METTERNICH.*-This important work is not properly a biography of Prince Metternich, so long one of the great leaders of the Conservative party in Europe, but a "collection of materials" prepared by him, after his retirement from office, to be used hereafter "as a clue " to guide in the preparation of what may be written of his public life. He says *Memoirs of Prince Metternich, 1773-1815. Edited by Prince RICHARD METTERNICH; translated by Mrs. Alexander Napier. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1880. 2 vols. 8vo. pp. 430, 638. For sale by E. P. Judd, New

Haven.

himself, "I have made history, and therefore have not found time to write it." The two volumes which are now given to the public cover the years from 1773 to 1815, and comprise a series of brief comments on all the most important events which took place within that period. When it is remembered that it is Metternich himself who is speaking of men whom he had the best of opportunities to know, and of measures with which he was thoroughly conversant, every page has a special value.

It is useless to attempt within the limits at our command to quote what he has said with regard to particular events or persons, but it may be worth while to call attention to the principle which, as he avows, has been the guide of his life. He claims that he has been governed in all his public actions by "that precept of the Book of books," which is as obligatory on States as it is on individuals, "Do unto others as ye would they should do unto you." He says that his motto has been "True Strength lies in Right." This may seem strange words to some who have read the history of his career, but we doubt not that he was conscientious in it all. Within the scope of his vision the people did not appear, and the great powers of Europe and their interests alone seemed of any consequence, while among them the interests of Austria was predominant for the reason that she was the “surest guardian of the principles which alone guaranteed the general peace and equilibrium." But however the reader may regard the public life of Prince Metternich, he will be impressed by the fact that through this memoir he appears everywhere the same commanding figure which he was for so long a period among his contemporaries. The very opening paragraphs are pervaded with a dignity which would become the might of "buried Denmark:" "A spectator of the order of things before the Revolution in French society, and an observer of or a participator in all the cir cumstances which accompanied and followed the overthrow of that order, of all my contemporaries I now stand alone on the lofty stage on which neither my will nor my inclination placed me."

These volumes are to be followed by others which will include the period of the general peace, and end with the Chancellor's retirement from political life in 1848; and then by still others which will embrace the period from 1848 to 1859, the year of his

death.

There is very little in these volumes before us of the nature of anecdote. The bow is scarcely ever unbent. One story, how