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escaped his scrutiny; no feature of the hard and homely life the fathers of the village led has been left undescribed; no characteristic of the manners and customs and rustic wisdom of the strong-hearted men and much-enduring women, who redeemed its acres from the wilderness and drove back the fierce tenants of the forest, has been omitted by his careful pen. We trace the history of the place from its very cradle its birth being coeval with the independence of the country to its present flourishing condition. The picture is one of great interest; the characters in it, though mostly of a plain and homely sort, are such as all of us, who are familiar with New England country life, have seen and talked with; and the incidents and scenes are those which almost every American of middle age has witnessed, or played a part in. No one among us, who has passed his youth in a New England village, can fail to find himself at home among the scenes so graphically painted, and with such hearty sympathy, in this book.

In point of style, Mr. Sibley is a plain and unpretending writer. He never indulges in rhetorical flourishes, or highsounding sentences. He tells his story in the words that suggest themselves naturally; and the lifelike effect he produces is owing, in no small degree, to this simplicity and directness of manner. Sometimes he introduces the peculiar phrases that belong to Yankee common life; and, for one to whom these terms of expression are native, the Doric plainness they impart to style is not unpleasing. They have a racy significance, redolent of the soil from which they spring; and they seem the fitting forms wherewith to describe the manly homespun life of our rural societies.

After a brief geographical description, and an account of some of the more striking physical phenomena, Mr. Sibley relates the "Ante-Plantation History" and the "Plantation History" of Union, in a series of entertaining chapters; introducing many characteristic sketches, such as the log house, the bride's dower, and the like. After 1786, the annals of the place rise into the dignity of records of the affairs of an incorporated town. The resources of the region, in minerals, trees, and agricultural and garden products, receive their due attention. The introduction of the mechanic and manufacturing arts has its appropriate chapters. The municipal history, and the administration of town affairs — managed by the little primitive democracy—are minutely and instructively described. Burying-grounds, with their sad and tender associations; churches, or meeting-houses, always among the earliest structures raised by our religious communities, are dwelt upon with a pleasant antiquarian fondness,

that loves to linger around these consecrated precincts. The ecclesiastical history of a New England town is always one of its most important, though not always one of its most agreeable, parts. The freedom of religious opinion, and the absolute control which the people have always exercised over their own ecclesiastical affairs, have not so generally as could be desired conduced to peace. The Rev. Mr. True seems to have had rather a hard time of it with some of his recusant parishioners, especially with one Samuel Hills, who appears to have been really a most unreasonable fellow. It appears from the Family Register, however, that he was very deaf, which may have been the cause why he was not much edified with his pastor's sermons. Mr. True had a good deal of trouble, sometimes, to get his salary; and, what with one complication and another, it was a long time before affairs were adjusted with him. The Rev. Oren Sikes was settled in 1831, and unsettled in 1832. The cause of this short-lived connection is not stated; but perhaps the history of Mr. True had begun to be reënacted.

We have not space to follow Mr. Sibley through the various divisions of his subject. The same minute fidelity to facts is everywhere observable; in the history of taxation, of highways, bridges, and other branches of municipal affairs. One of the most entertaining parts of the book is the sketches of the schools. We have never been in the town of Union; but we can take our corporal oath that every touch in this minute delineation is perfectly and exactly true. We pass over the very amusing chapters on the military history of Union-especially the description of a muster, so true to the life that we seem to have been present at it a hundred times and come to the chapters on the zoological history, which are, perhaps, the most amusing things in the book. The chapter on bears, and the hunting anecdotes in it, are capital. The mighty Nimrods - Jessa Robbins, John Butler, Adam Martin, and Jason Ware's dog Sambo have found a chronicler, who has recorded their deeds with as much

gusto as they performed them. We give a short extract upon this topic.

"Jessa Robbins says, that, on a Sunday morning, John Butler, then a young man, living at the Mill Farm, called to him across the pond to bring him some fire, as he had none, and no gunpowder to enable him to get any. After he had gone over, and had begun to assist Butler in kindling it, an object was discovered swimming from Hill's Point towards the other shore. Taking an axe, they hastened to the boat, threw into it a few stones, and plied the paddles. At first it was thought it might be a loon; but, as they approached it, they discovered it to be a bear, swimming towards Philip Robbins's cow-pasture, which was on the south side of the river, where it enters the pond. Hogs were in

the pasture; and a gentle, steady breeze, blowing from that quarter, had probably been snuffed by the bear, and led him to make a movement for a dinner of pork. Jessa Robbins and John Butler shouted, and thus aroused Philip Robbins's family. The bear was alarmed, and put forth all his strength to reach the land. Robbins and Butler redoubled their exertions, and it became a race between them and Bruin. The bear, however, was intercepted, about five or six rods from the shore. Robbins sprang to the bow of the boat, and, with the axe raised, was about to strike him; but he was dissuaded from it by Butler, who was afraid, if the blow should not be fatal, that Bruin would attack the boat, and their lives be endangered. Bruin was terribly enraged. He growled, and ground his teeth; but, finding he could not be permitted to land, he turned towards the island. He crossed it from the north end to the south, and again entered the water to swim to the shore. Here he was intercepted by Philip Robbins's boat, and obliged to return to the island. No alternative now remained for him but to climb one of the seven trees. He went to the foot of a large dead pine; and, after deliberately seating himself, and looking towards the top, he made a leap up the tree. He hugged it, holding on to the sides with his paws and claws, and climbed; using sometimes his legs, at other times taking hold of the limbs with his teeth, till he went up nearly to the top. After seven or eight discharges of a gun, the bear fell dead at the bottom of the tree. pp. 397, 398.

The good people of Union were much troubled, also, with wolves, catamounts, and other “ varmint; "on these topics Mr. Sibley is quite at home, and equally entertaining. hunting, it appears, he is not without personal experience.

In fox

The narrative closes with the following just reflections. "The little colony which was begun here three quarters of a century since, with one family, has become one of the little republics which constitute the great republic of the United States. It is continually sending abroad influences, which, though almost imperceptible, are, nevertheless, affecting in some degree the destinies of the nation. No individual lives here or elsewhere, however humble, virtuous, or vicious, whose influence is not far more extensive than he imagines. The eloquence and power which waken into life the energies of a people, perhaps, are first discovered when opposing iniquity and misrule, or pleading in behalf of justice, virtue, humanity, in a quiet country town. Men are often surprised at the discovery of talents, of which they were utterly unconscious, till a dire necessity or pressing emergency drew them out. Possibly, from the colony planted on the shores of SevenTree-Pond may spring up for mankind a reformer, whose good deeds shall create a reverence for the spot where he was born. The time has been when people would smile, if directed for benefactors of their race to such unpromising youths as Christopher Columbus and Martin Luther, begging bread; George Washington, surveying land in the wilderness; Andrew Jackson, a servant boy; Benjamin Franklin, assisting his father in making candles for a living; or Noah Worcester, in humble but honorable poverty, pounding on his lap-stone. A casual remark overheard by a boy has sometimes awakened ambition and talent, which have

changed his destiny, and made him a blessing to mankind. So it may be here, under genial influences. No man can foresee the important consequences which may result from his one vote at town-meeting, or even from an apparently insignificant word or act in his intercourse with his child, his neighbor, or society. If you wish the town to present attractions for intelligent strangers to settle among you, and your children to become men and women, and to do something for the improvement of the world, you must liberally and zealously encourage public worship, common-school education, temperance, integrity, piety." pp. 427, 428.

A very copious Family Register, prepared with incredible labor, and a minute index of references, both together filling more than a hundred pages, close the volume, which we now take leave of, with many thanks to the author for the instruction and entertainment he has afforded us.

2. The Principles of the Chrono-Thermal System of Medicine, with the Fallacies of the Faculty, in a Series of Lectures. By SAMUEL DICKSON, M. D., formerly a Medical Officer on the British Staff. Containing also an Introduction and Notes by WILLIAM TURNER, M. D. New York: Long & Brothers. 1850. 8vo. pp. 224.

ALTHOUGH the system of medicine of which this volume treats made its appearance in London more than twenty years ago, it is only within a few years that an American edition of Dr. Dickson's work has been offered to the public on this side the water. This may be considered as a sufficient reason for all non-professional periodicals taking no earlier notice of it; and the notice now taken will be little more than a record of the title, with such extracts as may serve to convey to the reader some notion of the principles of a system of medicine, which, whatever its merits may be and we pretend not to speak to that point-rejoices in a name not easily pronounced by any, and understood only by those who have not only been to college, but have remembered somewhat of the Latin and Greek they learned there. Certainly, there is no good fortune in the name.

The author of this new theory of Medicine, styled the ChronoThermal, it appears from a notice prefixed to the lectures, is a native of Edinburgh; he was first bred to the law, but becoming dissatisfied with that profession, soon abandoned it, and adopted that of medicine. In 1825, he received his diploma from the Edinburgh College of Physicians and Surgeons, bearing away at the

same time the "Gold Medal" for an essay on the food of plants. After studying a few months in Paris, he obtained a commission as a medical officer in the army, in which capacity he served with distinction both at home and abroad, particularly in India, and, on his return, published a work on the diseases of that country. He then took his degree of M. D. in Glasgow, left the army, and settled in Cheltenham, England, whence, in 1839, he removed to London, where he still resides and practises his profession. In 1840, he published the volume before us, "The Fallacies of the Faculty," giving the outlines of his system in a series of ten lectures, delivered in London, and constituting the present volume. It has had considerable success, both the theory and the book, according to both Dr. Dickson and Dr. Turner, the lectures having been translated into French, German, and Swedish.

What this New Theory in Medicine is, will best appear from a few paragraphs drawn from the preface of the American editor, and from the lectures.

Dr. Turner thus presents, in brief, the main features of the system.

"1. The phenomena of perfect health consist in a regular series of alternate motions or events, each embracing a special period of time. "2. Disease, under all its modifications, is in the first place a simple exaggeration or diminution of the amount of the same motions or events, and being universally alternative with a period of comparative health, strictly resolves itself into Fever - Remittent or Intermittent, Chronic or Acute; every kind of structural disorganization, from Tooth-Decay to Pulmonary Consumption, and that decomposition of the knee-joint, familiarly known as White Swelling, being merely developments in its course; Tooth-consumption, Lung consumption, Knee-consumption. "3. The tendency to disorganization, usually denominated Acute or Inflammatory, differs from the Chronic or Scrofulous in the mere amount of motion and temperature; the former being more remarkably characterized by excess of both, consequently exhibits a more rapid progress to decomposition or cure; while the latter approaches its respective terminations by more subdued, and therefore slower and less obvious terminations of the same action and temperature. In what does consumption of a tooth differ from consumption of the lungs, except in the difference of the tissue involved, and the degree of danger to life arising out of the nature of the respective offices of each?

"The remedies used in the treatment of disease, Dr. Dickson terms Chrono-Thermal, from the relation which their influence bears to Time or Period, and Temperature, (cold and heat,) Chronos being the Greek word for Time, and Thermà for Heat or Temperature. These remedies are all treated of in the various modern works upon the Materia Medica. The only agents this system rejects, are the leech, the bleeding lancet, and the cupping instrument."

"Disease being thus simplified, according to the system of Dr. Dickson, it follows that it is, to use his own words, amenable to a principle of treatment equally simple. Partaking, throughout all its modifications, of the nature of Ague, it will be best met by a practice in accordance