NEW EDUCATIONAL WORKS. 17 principal races of men, and also of animals and plants of the tropical and emperate zones.-Berwick Warder. It is a little volume, but will be of great use, as, on perusal, we have found it one of great excellence. The facts of geography-one of the most important sciences, and which may be rendered equally interesting-are arranged by a new method, on a natural system. It comprehends the very rudiments of geography, and gives, on its scale, a general view of the physical features, the productions, and the political characteristics of the countries of the world. It will be seen to be a "first course," is, necessarily, introductory in its bearing, and can hardly fail to become a pleasant book for children. Its lessons are accompanied with woodcuts of diagrams, vegetables, animals, and of varieties of the human race.--Plymouth Times. VIII. Price 1s., or 1s. 6d. coloured. GENERAL ATLAS for ELEMENTARY Containing 12 Maps, engraved on Steel by W. HUGHES, F.R.G.S. IX. NEW SCHOOL ATLAS Of Physical, Political, and Commercial Designed for the use of Schools and Colleges. Containing Seventeen coloured Maps, with Descriptive Letterpress. The Maps engraved on Steel by E. WELLER, F.R.G.S. In One Volume, royal 8vo. CONTENTS. 1. The World, showing the Distribution of Land and Water, the Physical Features of the Land Masses, Mountain and River Systems, Volcanic Districts, Upland and Lowland Plains, Deserts, Tundra, Steppes, Prairies, Llanos, Selvas, and Pampas. Hydrographical Basins, Marine Currents and co-tidal Lines. Trade Routes. 2. The World (Mercator's Projection), showing the direction of Constant, Variable, and Periodical Winds. Storms, Distribution of Rain, Solar Distribution of Temperature, Climatology, Isotheral and Isochimenal Lines. 3. The World (Mercator's Projection), showing the Geographical Distribution of Plants, particularly those used as food and clothing for man. 4. The World (Mercator's Projection), showing the Geographical Distribution of Animals. The Habitats of Land and Marine Animals useful to man, with a small Map indicating the Distribution of the Human Family. X. Third Edition, Small Octavo, price 3s. 6d. SELECT SPECIMENS of ENGLISH POETRY, FOR THE USE OF SCHOOLS AND PRIVATE READING; Comprising Poems:-1. Historical and Geographical. 2. On the Love of Home and Country. 3. Of Work and Progress. 4. Relating to the Sea and the Sailor. 5. On the Love of Nature. 6. Of the Imagination and Fancy. 7. Religious and Moral. The pieces are taken chiefly from the best modern poets; every piece is prefaced by a note-generally selected from the works of standard writersexplanatory of the subject of the poem, and followed by notes and questions, historical, grammatical, philological, and critical, calculated to stimulate the thought and guide the taste of the pupil. The pieces in this little volume are selected with great care and judgment from the best modern poets. It is, decidedly, one of the most agreeable selections of extracts we have met with amongst the many which have been published for the use of schools from Scott down to its own date. -Globe. This volume has several features. It contains pieces rather than passages; for although some of the selections are not entire poems, they are complete subjects. The selections are judiciously made, principally from modern writers.-Spectator. The selections are of a quality to foster and promote sound taste, and comprise a very large number-perhaps the majority-of the shortest poems that have obtained a permanent standing in our literature.-Weekly Chronicle. There is a novelty of design in this book. It is very well adapted for reading in schools.-Critic. We certainly have made great progress in a right direction since the period of Enfield's "Speaker." For schools and private reading the volume will be found most acceptable.-Church and State Gazette. As a whole, we can say that we have not met with a better book for the use of advanced pupils in school, or for private reading, than Mr. Hughes's Selections of English Poetry.-Moraing Advertiser. The selections of English Poetry are well adapted for the use of schools. The cause of sound education is materially served by such compilations as these.-Morning Post. It is a selection made upon a principle and by a really able man.— Guardian. The editor of this compendious little work for schools has based it upon the intellectual system as regards education, in contradistinction to the system of learning by rote. He acts in this respect upon the dictu of Dr. Arnold, namely, that it is our wisdom as well as our duty to cultivate the faculties of youth, each in their season, "first the memory and the imagination, and then the judgment." Most of the poems are of the first order, and well known in the English tongue; and the book, therefore, cannot fail, as a whole, to be popular in schools and among the class of readers for whom it is more especially intended.-Observer. This work is worthy of Mr. Hughes's high reputation as a scholar and public teacher. Various educational works, prepared by him for his school at Greenwich Hospital, are in general use and this manual of English poetry deserves equal popularity. The leading peculiarity of the volume SELECT SPECIMENS OF ENGLISH POETRY. 19 is the plan of introducing every poem with a prose piece from some good author. In general also the poetical pieces are entire, so that it is a book of selections, not of extracts. Many modern pieces, American and English, are introduced, not hitherto found in school-books, but deserving to be classed with the old familiar poems. The notes, questions, exercises, and concluding vocabulary, render this a most convenient as well as valuable educational class-book.-Literary Gazette. We have rarely seen a book of its unambitious character got up better, with more taste, judgment, and ability, than the selection of English Poetry. Both the poetry and prose introductions prove that Mr. Hughes has read extensively, and with discernment, the best authors in our tongue, for not only is the book highly desirable as a school-book, but the adult of accomplished mind and culture may take it up at any time, and find it a temporary intellectual treat. It furnishes most agreeable desultory reading, and refreshes the memory with glimpses of the best authors.-British Times. Mr. Hughes, deserves great praise for the care with which the poems in this volume have been selected and edited. For schools and private families he has published a most useful work. We have fewer stock pieces, and more original selections, than generally is the case in works of this kind. Standard of Freedom. This is a very valuable addition to the class of books to which it belongs. It comprises Introduction, Notes, and Questions, together with an appendix of Greek, Latin, and Saxon roots; and constitutes decidedly the best book of its class that has yet appeared. Mr. Hughes, we have had occasion once and again to bring before our readers as an accomplished instructor of the young, and a superior writer of school books. As Head Master of the Royal Naval School of Greenwich Hospital, he has most worthily asserted the prerogatives of his high office, and done great credit to those he serves. The first Section is headed, Historical and Geographical; the second, Home and Country; the third, Work and Progress; the fourth, Sea and the Sailors; the fifth, Love of Nature; the sixth, Imagination and Fancy; the seventh, Religious and Moral. Under all these heads we have exquisite selections from our best writers of past and present times; finely exemplifying the adage of Dr. Arnold, that "the very essence of Poetry is that which exalts and ennobles us, and puts us into a higher state of mind than that which we are commonly living in." But it will be a great mistake to suppose that it is only a work for the young; it is a work for all. The first men and the first scholars of the realm may while away most pleasantly and profitably many a leisure hour; while the literary apparatus interspersed through the volume, and the Appendix, will be greatly helpful to even the well-informed in general history. It is a capital book.British Banner. This is a very pretty school-book, well selected, well compiled, and admirably fitted for general use. We can have no doubt, therefore, of its success.-Glasgow Courier. We have seen many poetical selections and extracts for the use of schools, but few equal, and none superior, to this.-Edinburgh Witness. The volume of "Select English Poetry" is a perfect treasure-a repertory of the best lyrical pieces in our language. We are much mistaken if it be not accounted such by " children of a larger growth" than schoolboys.--Whitehaven Herald. This is the best selection, of the most eminent English poets, which has yet come under our observation, eminently calculated as it is from its arrangement to improve the youthful mind, as well as to impart pleasure to those of maturer years. Mr. Hughes is too well known in the paths of ❘ 20 SELECT SPECIMENS OF ENGLISH POETRY. elegant and useful literature to require a lengthened notice of any work proceeding from his pen. The present publication we would strongly recommend.-Waterford Mail. This book comprises a selection of poetical gems, the productions of the best English writers. The work is one which we highly commend, and we know no other better adapted for companionship in a rural ramble.— Somerset County Gazette. This is one of the most valuable educational books which has lately come under our notice. Its object is the cultivation of the imaginative as well as the intellectual powers, to nourish the memory, to encourage the imagination, and to discipline the judgment. With an amount of labour which is almost incredible, the Editor has here furnished, not only some hundreds of excellent poems, which are of themselves calculated to enliven the intellect, enhance the store of knowledge, and correct the taste, but has prefixed to each an appropriate prose piece which is further adapted to the bringing out a feeling of love and admiration for the beautiful, and has appended an etymological table of Greek, Latin, and Saxon roots.-North Wales Chronicle. Of the contributors to Educational Literature, Mr. Hughes may be deemed among the most careful and perfect. He does manage to write books which please the learner and delight those who have to superintend the work of Education. The book before us is a charming one-so small that it will not incommode the pocket, yet full of valuable selections.-The Welshman. This is a very useful volume of select English poetry, with prose introductions, notes, and questions. Considerable taste has been displayed in the selection, which consists of almost all the best short poems in the language. As a whole, the work is worthy of the most extended patronage.Windsor Express. The volume of Selections in Verse may be used with advantage. The pieces are extracted from our best poets, and each is introduced by a prose quotation, appropriately chosen from some standard writer. They will serve the double purpose of either being committed to memory, or used as reading lessons.-Edinburgh Advertiser. The design of the elegantly got-up little volume now before us is to adapt the best specimens of the principal British poets to the instruction of youth, in the same way as the poetry of classic times has been made. There can be no doubt that great advantages might be attained by directing and purifying the taste of young persons in schools through a judicious intercourse with the works of the principal English and American poets, provided that they were not forced upon the mind, as under the old system Greek and Latin poetry has been, until the only result attained was the impression upon the scholar of a fixed and unalterable distaste for the glorious models of genius and style which had been made his task and his punishment while at school. The present volume contains from two to three hundred pieces of poetry, principally selected from the works of this and the past age, and each prefaced by an appropriate motto of argument taken from some prose author of eminence On the whole the book is one of considerable value, and, from the excellence of the selections, will be found of much use not alone to the student but to readers of matured age and refined taste.-Cork Examiner. Here is a great improvement on the English Reader, the Speaker, and other books of that class intended for the improvement of youth. There are few persons who will deny that the imaginative, as well as the intellectual and imitative powers of the young, should be cultivated; and we believe that the former exercise the greatest influence in softening the SELECT SPECIMENS OF ENGLISH PROSE. 21 temper, refining the manners, and enlarging the mind. For these purposes there is nothing more efficient than genuine poetry, by which youths are rendered familiar with high thoughts expressed in appropriate language. We therefore welcome Mr. Hughes's volume as an aid in the cultivation of the imaginative powers, as calculated to excite the social sympathies and a love for the beautiful in nature and art. In carrying out a comprehensive design, hehas produced a work far surpassing anything similar in character, and fully answering the purpose which he had in view.-Norfolk Chronicle. The plan of this work is a decided improvement on the old system of preparing selections of poetry for the use of schools. The selection has been made with great care and judgment, and not only to the teacher and the private student, but to parents and general readers, the volume will be found of vast service in the work of education and private improvement; "the best thoughts," as the preface says, "in the best language will be rendered familiar to them, and indelibly impressed on their memory; their sympathies will be called forth and properly directed, and their taste at once elevated and improved."-Liverpool Chronicle. Mr. Hughes has selected a body of poetical pieces upon various subjects, and of various degrees of excellence, each of which he introduces with a prose piece, and appends questions on etymology, syntax, history, &c., which seems to us well fitted to test a boy's knowledge. The book is a very neat one, and independent of its educational purpose, presents a good collection of British and American poetry.-Cambridge Chronicle. XI. Just published, price 4s. 6d., SELECT SPECIMENS of ENGLISH PROSE, FOR THE USE OF SCHOOLS AND PRIVATE READING; Comprising Pieces relating to -1. Natural History and Geography. 2. Biography and Civil History. 3. Education and the Progress of Society. 4. The Sea and Maritime Adventure. 5. The Imagina6. Science and General Knowtion and Sympathetic Affections. ledge. 7. Religion and Morals. Small Octavo. * This book is intended to be a companion volume to the "Select Specimens of English Poetry." ." The selections are in a great measure from modern works, many of which have not hitherto been introduced into School Books. Though the bulk of the work is prose, yet a few congenial poetical pieces have been interspersed to give variety to the readings. In the volume of Poetry, the prose is subordinate; but in that of Prose. it is the poetry that takes the second place. In each, however, the one throws light on the other. "The distinguishing feature of this selection is the practically instructive spirit which has guided the compiler's choice of specimens without losing sight of the elevated and the philosophical. The older readers' were purely literary; not only was excellence in composition the first thing thought of, but it was almost the only thing; historical information, or moral or religious instruction, coming as it were by the by. Mr. Hughes has proceeded upon a different principle. Literary merit is not forgotten, but the subject and the matter, sometimes in reference to the affairs of life or the questions of the day, are also considered. Adam Smith, for example, is quoted, and Robertson's Disquisition on Ancient India' contributes views on commerce; modern travellers and cosmogonists are laid under contribution for geographica. pictures or information; a 'part' of the book is devoted to education; and those extracts which have a more |