"Make their acquaintance; for Amy will be found delightful, Beth very lovely, Meg beautiful, and Jo splendid!"—The Catholic World.
LITTLE WOMEN. By Louisa M. Alcott. In Two Parts. Price of each $1.50.
"Simply one of the most charming little books that have fallen into our hands for many a day. There is just enough of sadness in it to make it true to life, while it is so full of honest work and whole-souled fun, paints so lively a picture of a home in which contentment, energy, high spirits, and real goodness make up for the lack of money, that it will do good wherever it finds its way. Few will read it without lasting profit."—Hartford Courant.
"Little Women. By Louisa M. Alcott. We regard these volumes as two of the most fascinating that ever came into a household. Old and young read them with the same eagerness. Lifelike in all their delineations of time, place, and character, they are not only intensely interesting, but full of a cheerful morality, that makes them healthy reading for both fireside and the Sunday school. We think we love "Jo" a little better than all the rest, her genius is so happy tempered with affection."—The Guiding Star.
The following verbatim copy of a letter from a "little woman" is a specimen of many which enthusiasm for her book has dictated to the author of "Little Women:"—
Dear Jo, or Miss Alcott,—We have all been reading "Little Women," and we liked it so much I could not help wanting to write to you. We think you are perfectly splendid; I like you better every time I read it. We were all so disappointed about your not marrying Laurie; I cried over that part, I could not help it. We all liked Laurie ever so much, and almost killed ourselves laughing over the funny things you and he said. We are six sisters and two brothers; and there were so many things in "Little Women" that seemed so natural, especially selling the rags. Eddie is the oldest; then there is Annie (our Meg), then Nelly (that's me), May and Milly (our Beths), Rosie, Rollie, and dear little Carrie (the baby). Eddie goes away to school, and when he comes home for the holidays we have lots of fun, playing cricket, croquet, base ball, and every thing. If you ever want to play any of those games, just come to our house, and you will find plenty children to play with you.
If you ever come to———, I do wish you would come and see us,—we would like it so much.
I have named my doll after you, and I hope she will try and deserve it.
I do wish you would send me a picture of you. I hope your health is better, and you are having a nice time.
If you write to me, please direct ———Ill. All the children send their love.
With ever so much love, from your affectionate friend,
Mailed to any address, postpaid, on receipt of the advertised price.
Boston.
AN OLD-FASHIONED GIRL. By Louisa M. Alcott. With Illustrations. Price $1.50.
"Miss Alcott has a faculty of entering into the lives and feelings of children that is conspicuously wanting in most writers who address them; and to this cause, to the consciousness among her readers that they are hearing about people like themselves, instead of abstract qualities labelled with names, the popularity of her books is due. Meg, Jo, Beth, and Amy are friends in every nursery and schoolroom, and even in the parlor and office they are not unknown; for a good story is interesting to older folks as well, and Miss Alcott carries on her children to manhood and womanhood, and leaves them only on the wedding-day."—Mrs. Sarah J. Hale in Godey's Ladies' Book.
"We are glad to see that Miss Alcott is becoming naturalized among us as a writer, and cannot help congratulating ourselves on having done something to bring about the result. The author of 'Little Women' is so manifestly on the side of all that is 'lovely, pure, and of good report' in the life of women, and writes with such genuine power and humor, and with such a tender charity and sympathy, that we hail her books with no common pleasure. 'An Old-Fashioned Girl' is a protest from the other side of the Atlantic against the manners of the creature which we know on this by the name of 'the Girl of the Period;' but the attack is delivered with delicacy as well as force."—The London Spectator.
"A charming little book, brimful of the good qualities of intellect and heart which made 'Little Women' so successful. The 'Old-Fashioned Girl' carries with it a teaching specially needed at the present day, and we are glad to know it is even already a decided and great success."—New York Independent.
"Miss Alcott's new story deserves quite as-great a success as her famous "Little Women," and we dare say will secure it. She has written a book which child and parent alike ought to read, for it is neither above the comprehension of the one, nor below the taste of the other. Her boys and girls are so fresh, hearty, and natural, the incidents of her story are so true to life, and the tone is so thoroughly healthy, that a chapter of the 'Old-Fashioned Girl' wakes up the unartificial better life within us almost as effectually as an hour spent in the company of good, honest, sprightly children. The Old-Fashioned Girl, Polly Milton, is a delightful creature!"—New York Tribune.
"Gladly we welcome the 'Old-Fashioned Girl' to heart and home! Joyfully we herald her progress over the land! Hopefully we look forward to the time when our young people, following her example, will also be old-fashioned in purity of heart and simplicity of life, thus brightening like a sunbeam the atmosphere around them."—Providence Journal.
Mailed, postpaid, on receipt of the advertised price, by the Publishers,
Boston.
HOSPITAL SKETCHES AND CAMP AND FIRESIDE STORIES. By Louisa M. Alcott. With Illustrations. Price $1.50.
"Miss Alcott performed a brief tour of hospital duty during the late war. Her career as nurse was terminated by an attack of dangerous illness. But she made good use of her time, and her sketches of hospital life, if briefer than could be wished, make up in quality what they lack in quantity. They are, indeed, the most graphic and natural pictures of life in the great army hospitals that have yet appeared. Free from all affected sentimentalism, they blend in a strange and piquant manner the grave and gay, the lively and severe."—Phila. Inquirer.
"It is a book which is thoroughly enjoyable, and with which little fault need be found. It is not a pretentious work, and the author has only aimed at telling the story of her experience as an army hospital nurse, in an easy, natural style; but the incidents which she has given us are so varied, sometimes amusingly humorous and sometimes tenderly pathetic, and her narrative is so simple and straightforward and truthful, that the reader's attention is chained, and he finds it impossible to resist the charm of the pleasant, kindly, keen-sighted Nurse Perriwinkle."—Round Table.
"Such is the title of a volume by Miss Louisa M. Alcott, author of 'Little Women,' one of the most charming productions of the day. Miss Alcott is a New England woman of the best type, gifted, refined, progressive in her opinions, heroic, self-sacrificing. She devoted her time and means to the service of her country in the darkest days of the Rebellion, visiting the camp and the hospital, devoting herself to the care of the sick and the dying, braving danger and privation in the sacred cause of humanity. The results of her experience are embodied in these 'Sketches,' which are graphic in narrative, rich in incident, and dramatic in style. Miss Alcott has a keen sense of the ludicrous, and, while she does not trifle with her subject, seeks to amuse as well as instruct her reader. She has the sunniest of tempers, and sees a humorous side even to the sad life of the hospital."—San Francisco Bulletin.
"This volume illustrates excellently well the characteristics of Miss Alcott's talent as a novelist. Her subjects are always portions of her own experience; her characters always the people she has known, under slight disguises, or strangely metamorphosed, as may happen, but easily to be recognized by those who have the key to them. In this she resembles many other writers; but there is a peculiar blending of this realism with extreme idealization in most of her stories. She succeeds best—indeed, she only succeeds at all—in her real pictures. Her descriptions are as faithful and as varied in their fidelity as life itself, so long as she restricts herself to what she has actually seen and known. When she cleaves to real experiences, she is sure of her effect; and her success is always greater in proportion to the depth of the experience she has to portray. For this reason we have always thought 'Hospital Sketches' her best piece of work."—Springfield Republican.
Mailed, postpaid, on receipt of the advertised price, by the Publishers,
NEARLY READY.
By MRS. HARRIET BEECHER STOWE,
Author of "Uncle Tom's Cabin," "The Minister's Wooing," &c.
With Illustrations, 1 vol. 16mo. Price $1.50.
This vivid and pointed novel of modern society presents to us in a story, which will not be called exaggerated, some of those phases of life around us which are none the less dangerous because they are called contemptible. The extravagance of the newly rich, who have never learned the use of money, and the failure of the substitutes by which people who live by sensation try to supply the place of honor and religion, have never been portrayed more precisely. At the same time Mrs. Stowe does justice to that sex which is not enough remembered in the discussion of the wrongs of Woman. For she describes, as no one else can describe, the tyranny under which a loyal and chivalrous gentleman suffers most terribly. The pen, which more than any other quickened the public heart till the black slavery of centuries was broken, will render a service not less considerable, if it so wake the conscience of men and women that pink and white tyranny of women over men shall be impossible.
Boston.