This book has been lying on our table two or three weeks. It seemed to us, at first, either a heap of rubbish or a long and tedious quiz. But, looking into it at leisure from time to time, we find deep meanings, beautiful pictures, and real wit. Probably we now apprehend the thought. But, if we do, the author will not expect from us a critical notice of the usual sort; and as to the public, we can only commend it to those who would know how to read a volume detected amid old-fashioned odds and ends in the family chest of a lonely farm-house. The rail-road-car readers would find nothing in it but a dull attempt at joke. But those who have patience to wade in the pond may reach water-lilies. Those who feel inclined to make the attempt had better begin p. 432 and read on as long as they feel interested. Should this prove to be the case through the two letters of Mr. Evelyn and Margaret, they can then begin at the beginning of this thick volume and go through, skipping more or less, according to their habits in the precisely similar volume of daily life. Sometimes they will “tarry a long spell;”—with Deacon Ramsdill, and Chilien’s violin. We think they may be inclined to do so. We should esteem it a favor if the author would acquaint us with his name; he is so fond of names, we see not why he should keep back his own.*
“Margaret . . .” New-York Daily Tribune, 1 September 1845, p. 1.
