Critical Notices [pp. 242-280]

252 G~~itical Notices. LJuly,
tories. Daicho's work has been long out of print, and it needed
revision and enlargement. A new edition was resolved upon by the
Grand Lodge, and the task of preparing it was confided to Dr.
Albert G. Mackey. He has faithfully and ably performed4his duty.
He has used the original work of Daleho as the basis for one entirely new; preserving what was good and necessary of the old, but
entirely altering the arrangement, and incorporating with the contents a large amount of original matter. The work is a standard
authority among the Masons of South-Carolina, and there is, we
believe, no publication of comparable value in any other State. It
should be adopted in general use. The second of these publications
of Dr. Mackey, is a new edition of his Lexicon of Freemasonry.
This is one of those works, which, like the dictionaries of any other
craft, art or science, will he found useful in every library. It is perhaps the most complete manual of Freemasonry extant, the compiler
having devoted himself almost wholly to the brotherhood, yielding
his thoughts entirely to his subject, and accumulating material daily,
from all possible sources. The present edition is a great improve.
ment upon the precedincr and one which no Mason, certainly, can
safely dispense with.
i?eid's Fnglish Family llo6i~~son. (Ticknor.) Fvery body has
read the famous "Swiss Family Robinson." Capt. Mayne Reid has
~ndertaken in this volume to give us a companion history to that
interestin~ work, the scene of which is laid in the great American
desert. His further title, is "The Desert Home, or the Adventures
of a Lost Family in the Wilderness." Capt. Reid has made himself known by other works, all of which displayed talent, but most
of which were disfigured by the Captain's propensity to a sort of
literary and moral pyrotechnics. He was quite too apt to explode
in gunpowder, or dis~ppear in flashes of lightning. He is not altogether free from these infirmities yet, but we owe it to justice to say,
that his present work indicates a very great improvement over all
the past, and is a story of very great and peculiar interest. He has
made his desert blossom as the rose, and found for the reader a
world of pleasant fruits in th~ wilderness. His extravagances are,
in most cases, ingeniously made to seem probable~possible, certainly-though, to use the backwood's phrase, he has occasionally stretch.
ed his blanket, somewhat to the danger of its texture. It will be
hard to persuade the good reader, who has any honest instincts left,
that wolves can be tamed into proper watch dogs, and that a lady
may safely venture to substitute a panther for a tabby, giving it
-freehold privileges on the Learth rug. But we are willing to be of
easy faith, when our travelling companion lies with dexterity and
an honest face. The Captain tells a very pleasant story, and we