The Continental Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 1, July, 1863, page 209 by Various Authors
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patriot, poet, and scholar--for such men are jewels in our national crown of glory!
Mr. Higginson says: 'If, in the simple process of writing, one could physically impart to his page the fragrance of this spray of azalea beside me, what a wonder it would seem!--and yet one ought to be able, by the mere use of language, to supply to every reader the total of that white, honeyed, trailing sweetness which summer insects haunt and the Spirit of the Universe loves. The defect is not in language, but in men. There is no conceivable beauty of blossom so beautiful as words--none so graceful, none so perfumed. It is possible to dream of combinations of syllables so delicious that all the dawning and decay of summer cannot rival their perfection, nor winter's stainless white and azure match their purity and their charm. To write them, were it possible, would be to take rank with nature; nor is there any other method, even by music, for human art to reach so high.'
To this very height of human art has Mr. Higginson, in the article from which the above is a quotation, himself attained!
IN THE TROPICS. By a Settler in Santo Domingo. With an Introductory Notice by RICHARD B. KIMBALL, Author of 'St. Leger,' 'Undercurrents,' &c. Carleton, publisher. 1863.
A 'Settler in Santo Domingo' has given us a good book--a fresh, wholesome, and evidently truthful narrative of his every-day experience in the tropics. It is a book eminently sui generis, reminding one of Robinson Crusoe or Dana's 'Two Years before the Mast.' There is a gentle earnestness, a mild yet positive concentration of purpose about it, that enlists our sympathies from the start. The young farmer's mind is on his work. We suspect he has capacities outside of his cornfield and yuca patch, but to this point in the record before us he gives no clue. He is a farmer, and nothing else. The bright-winged birds flit and gleam and twitter in the evergreen woods about him, but his hand is on the plough and his ear drinks in only th