HIS LEVEL BEST.* MR. HALE'S name heads, alphabetically, the list

of those mono- syllabic ones which spring up so rapidly just now in the United States associated with wit and fun. Hale, Harte, Hay, Twain, and Ward are most of them names well known there, and almost as well known here. There seems a sort of necessity that men with longer names should not venture to be funny on the other side of the Atlantic, for when their parents, ignorant of the reflected greatness which is to be theirs, hand down to them a name of more than a single syllable, they at once lay it aside and adopt one of the approved proportions.

Mr. Hale does not go in for nonsense merely, at any rate in this volume—for we notice that he has already published four others ; but the serious purpose of his first tale, the title of which heads this notice, is worked out by so amusing an extravaganza that we thought we had lighted on a rival to Mark Twain. Even in this story, however, the serious purpose is so much more and the humour so much less evidently the object, that we should describe Mr. Hale rather as a quaint and grotesque than a humorous writer. Some of his tales, indeed, are more remark-

' His Level Beet. By Edward E. Hale. London: Trillmer and Co.

able for the tenderness of their sympathy with the loving and un- &elfish devotedness which from time to time has attracted hiss notice and renewed his faith in human nature, than for either humour or quaintness. Of such are the pretty stories of "Mouse and Lion" and "Confidence," the latter opening most pic- turesquely, but not quite fulfilling the promise of its first paragraphs :—

" There never was a child who showed so fully what the woman was- to prove. The rst time I ever saw her was one day when her father had fallen in with me on a cross-road in the Piscataquis valley : that is far away, forty miles above Bangor in Maine. Ho was on his hay-- cart : I was sitting on a log. We nodded to each other ; and he, seeing my knapsack and stick, asked if I would not mount with him, which I did; and so, before long, we came up to his cheerful, rambling, great shingle-palace of a house, where I had already promised to pass the night with him. We brought up in front of the barn, from which we had already heard shouts of 'Coop ! Coop !' Who should appear at a little three-cornered window in the gable but little Janet, flaxen curls flying wild about her head. 'Hurrah ! said • Miss Janet." Hurrah !'

said her father: 'jump. birdie and before poor cockney I well understood the order, the child flow out of the window, down into his arms, and they both rolled over and over in the hay. I have seen many a jump into hay-carts—nay, have made my share ; but I never saw such a flight as that. And even then it was not the distance which seemed most surprising : it was the absolute promptness, so,

perfectly fearless:— "Hera not to make reply, Hers not to question why."

He said Jump 1' and she jumped, not because she calculated the- height, or had done it before, but because he told her to, and she loved and trusted him. That was little Janet all over. Now, steadiness like

that and readiness like that breed steadiness and readiness. It seems queer to me that I had never seen Janet before, I have seen her so much and so often since. I had not seen her long, before I found that I trusted her as implicitly as she did me : indeed, there was not a man who worked on the farm who had not absolute confidence in the child, or was not sure of her promptness, punctuality, and affection. Nor was it men or women alone who felt so. The horses and the cows—nay, the pigs and the hens—all knew her cheerful voice, and her ready attendance, and her steady hand. Jotham said she could collar and harness that cross brute 'Mad March ;' that she would climb into the manger, and put the wretch's collar on, and put the bit in his month, because she was such a lady. I know she could do it ; and of coarse- Mad March let her do it."

"Mouse and Lion" rises in the scale of humour. It is of two devoted school-friends who help each other out of all sorts of scrapes, gnawing away the other's net, as they call it, so that each is. alternately the lion, and each the mouse. One of them is a rela- tionless orphan, or supposed to be ; but an Irish Roman Catholic' bishop traces her out, and calls to claim her as his niece, on his way to a Canadian see to which he has been appointed by the Pope; the- method by which the mouse of this occasion gnaws away the lion's net, and releases her friend from this terrible and impending part- ing, is both original and humorous. The vivacious, pretty, and lively mouse presents herself with her friend to the bishop and his chaplain, and having first flattered him by kneeling for his blessing,. engages him in so lively a discussion on theology, deferring entirely to his superior judgment, and occupies him with so many questions. asto the opinions, customs, countries and otherwise of Catholics,. besets him so with fascinating attentions and offers of refresh- ment that cannot be refused, that the poor bishop finds all the time he can spare gone before he has been able to produce- credentials and proofs and make the necessary arrangements- for carrying off his young niece. "The Modern Sindbs.d " rises- still higher, and is a most amusing, because not too long or wearisome, skit on the modern English plutocrat's method of foreign travel, his utter absence of real curiosity, and his inability to appreciate the beauty and interest of the journey, with his. pompous pretence of research and inquiry and his profound desire- to 'do' the country in a given time. We have often seen more- or less amusing caricatures of the British sight-seer, but they are- generally too grossly burlesque, and are made up too much of grum- bling at hotel charges or self-gratulation on the British incapability of being "done)' Ehere is, however, nothing of this here, and there is- no Yankee sneering at the Britisher or boasting over him. It is a. journal of a thirty day's run through thirty-one States of the Union, and the humour consists iu the absolute faithfulness of the- representation. It is exactly what we can conceive the journal would be of a thoroughly unimaginative, punctual British merchant, who. reads his newspapers regularly, and has learnt all he knows of America from his studies in the Times. The profound ignorance, the hasty judgments, the little scraps of information he parades, and his pride in his girls as his authorities, his desire to get on and carry out bis programme religiously—even though he has to sacrifice his son's society, who gets separated from them in New York, and never overtakes them till they are about to re-embark for England, and to whom it is his great delight to telegraph daily—are all little points of humour dotted about in the narrative, 'which, if they are to be fully appreciated, must be read entire ; here, however, is a sample of it :—

" We had to wait but little at Prairie du Chien, and, soon after dark, were on our way again. The ladies enjoyed the comparative stillness of the steamboat berths, and we slept late. Going on deck I found that our ran had been very rapid in the night, and we were approaching the celebrated bridge at Rock Island. Here we expected to meet George; and we left our friendly Captain Parsons, and landed here. We were again disappointed. I could learn nothing of George at any of the hotels. There is no railway below Rock Island on the river shore; and it seemed certain that he had attempted to strike us at Fulton, higher up the stream. I telegraphed him at that point to await us there. We were fortunate enough to be able to strike a pleasant evening train up the river, and, before dark, again had re- traced our course, and arrived in Fulton. At Fulton, on the hotel book, was his name ! The keeper of the hotel said he had inquired after the General Logan on arriving, and, learning that she had passed down the stream, had taken another boat which was passing, and had followed us to Rock Island ! Ellen declares that at this very spot on the river the same adventure happened to Evangeline in one of Mr. Longfellow's poems. But Maud thinks this was lower down, at a spot which we shall visit in a few days. I telegraphed him at once not to attempt to overtake us here, but to await our arrival at St. Louis. I was obliged to do this that we might secure passage by daylight in the train for Omaha in Nebraska, which leaves Clinton, opposite this place, at seven o'clock every morning. This we succeeded in doing; and after a little more than twenty-four hours, having tried the sleeping- ' car' again, on yet a different arrangement, we find ourselves in Omaha. We have been travelling with four young men who are on their way to Porthos, where they have established their families. I was sorry not to visit that place with them, as it is to be the commer- cial capital of the whole country within a few years. I was very fortunate in meeting these gentlemen, who kindly gave me a full account of it. It is on the Missouri River, just half-way between the two oceans; and when railroads, now contemplated in each direction, are finished, it will be tho great entrepot of Eastern and Western trade. It is also half-way between the Gulf of Mexico and the parallel of 54° north latitude, and must be always a great centre of the trade North and South. Whether the Seat of Government is soon removed there or not, Porthos must become a great mercantile city, and nothing would save interested ma more than a visit to it. Of course, also, the temp- tation is very great to leave Omaha westward, and across the continent to San Francisco by the Union Pacific Railway just now opened. Four days would carry us to the Pacific Ocean, and in five more we could -return to St. Louis, adding thus five to our list of States visited. But the plans we made in London do not permit this extension of time. To see the Southern States thoroughly will require all the time I have between this and July 24th, on which day our berths are taken in the

New York steamer. With reluctance, therefore, we turn eastward at nine o'clock, Omaha time, which is twenty-four minutes after two by

London time. We have travelled more than one quarter round the

world. Finding, after breakfast, a boat with steam up, about to start for the lower landings, we enjoyed a day's sail between Kansas and Missouri, arriving at St. Joseph early enough the next morning to take

an express train for Kansas City. We entered this city by a new bridge over the Missouri River, finished and opened on Saturday last. We

went on shore at Elwood, in Kansas, and by starlight had a fine view of that State. We have thus made a survey of all the States generally known as the Loyal or Northern States in the late contest. Missouri, Tennessee, Kentucky, Delaware, and Maryland were generally in the hands of the Foderals, but were known as Border States. These we are yet to visit, as well as the Gulf States and Arkansas and the Carolinas. I see that I have nowhere summed up our view of Illinois. It is a State rapidly growing in population, with large supplies of provisions for all parts of the world."

Perhaps less amusing because more broadly extravagant is the story which gives its name to the book—His Level Best—and which is designed to teach us how little good we can do if we fritter away our time and money amongst a thousand objects, giving our ear to every newspaper appeal, or every agent that calls to make known the object of the invaluable association which he represents. It was this story which reminded us of Mark Twain, but it is the only one that does so. Mr. Hale has nothing like Mark Twain's breadth of fun, while there is far more of serious purpose, more of cultivation, refinement, and tenderness in his writings. But the following passage, in which the supposed relater begins, as it were, at the end, will serve to explain the resemblance which we saw :— "My wife and I had no causes for dissent, and we have never quar- relled from that hour to this. We hare faithfully followed each other's fortunes. Tree, we have been parted. but not by oursAves. I am now in the Male Department of the poor-house, Dormitory B, native whites. She is in the Female Department, also Dormitory B, native whites also. 'The children are in what is known as the Nursery Department, also Dormitory B, native whites also. We have been married seven years, and have known no material difference of opinions. Tiffs we have had, but not quarrels. I own to tiffs, but I do not own to quarrels. There was no reason why we should quarrel. We both had good appetites and good health. We were both fond of books, and yet we did not always want to read the same book at a time. We had the same views .on papal infallibility, on the doctrine of election, on regeneration, on the fall of man, on the vicarious atonement, on baptism, and on the future life. In a paper to be read before a mixed audience. I do not think it proper or desirable to state what those views were ;. but mine were here and hors were mine. We went to the same church, we taught in the same Sunday school, and believed in the same—minister. Under these circumstances we were married. There was a large at- tendance, and the minister married us first-rate. I have no fault to

find with the minister. Then they all congratulated us. I sometimes wonder if they would congratulate us now, if they came down to see the poor-house some day with the Board of Overseers of the Poor, and I should be detailed to see to their horses, and my wife to wait at table when they had the collation. But they congratulated us then."

" Water-talk " is little more than a quaint way of illustrating the force of association. Two friends are swimming together, and one begins to tell the other of a lost and found child. The other is not deeply interested, and rather disappoints his friend, who does not care to finish it on shore. Months afterwards, when again bathing, the friend asks for the conclusion, which is again not arrived at, and it is not till separations and changes have happened that,

again in the sea together, the denouement is asked for and related. The result is that the friend seeks the found young lady in mar- riage. "The Tale of a Salamander" is a curious bit of imagina- tive dreaming, and "The Queen of California" is a translation of parts of an old Spanish romance, which curiously enough explains

the origin of the name of that State. But the most grotesque extravagance of all is that of "The Brick Moon ;" and readers must not shut it up in despair because it begins scientifically about latitude and longitude. Some wild and highly-mathematical and astronomical philanthropists, full of the dangers to mariners who cannot find their whereabouts, conceive the possibility of launch- ing a brick moon into space by centrifugal power, in such a direc- tion that it shall revolve at a certain angle to the equator—let the author excuse us if we are sketching his theory all wrongly—and of such a size that it shall always be seen, and at such a height that nothing terrestrial shall hide it from observers on the earth or seas. Water-wheels of extraordinary powers are built, and a correspondingly extraordinary mass of water is brought to bear on them, and a brick moon of the requisite dimen- sions is constructed at the top of the ways down which when finished it is to slip on to the wheels that are to launch it forth to find its orbit. Meantime some of these enthusi- asts of engineers in their American wilderness use the hollow chambers of the tremendous sphere as houses for themselves and their families, and there they stable their animals and store their provisions; alas! one night, a week or two before the date fixed for the launch, but when all is ready, some accident loosens the moon from her moorings, and gliding gently down the ways, the little colony is shot into space ; the orbit is known, the new satel- lite is observed, and the delighted relatives discover their friends moving on the new world; they telegraph to them, and soon com- municate regularly, and discover that they have wonderful ad- vantages, with every sort of climate within a few hours' reach, and with all the elements of happiness in their little society. The moral is that people may be happy—nay, happier—in a little circle of their own, where everyone is very dear and very inti- mate and very dependent, and that railways and civilisation do not make us happier than were the pioneers of the settlements of the once distant West. The impression left by Mr. Hale's book is that though the stories are all of such a various kind that they scarcely seem to come from one pen, there is nothing common- place or tiresome about them, and that none of them will be easily forgotten.