BY FRANCIS PARKMAN.

THE exploit which forms the basis of the following story is one of the most notable feats of arms in American annals, and it is as real as it is romantic.

The chief personages of the tale—except, always, the heroine—were actual men and women two and a quarter centuries ago, and Adam Dollard was no whit less a hero than he is represented by the writer, though it is true that as regards his position, his past career, and, above all, his love affairs, romance supplies some information which history denies us. The brave Huron Annahotaha also is historical. Even Jouaneaux, the servant of the hospital nuns, was once a living man, whose curious story is faithfully set forth; and Sisters BrÉsoles, MaÇÉ, and Maillet were genuine Sisters of the old HÔtel-Dieu at Montreal, with traits much like those assigned to them in the story.

The author is a pioneer in what may be called a new departure in American fiction. Fenimore Cooper, in his fresh and manly way, sometimes touches Canadian subjects and introduces us to French soldiers and bush-rangers; but he knew Canada only from the outside, having no means of making its acquaintance from within, and it is only from within that its quality as material for romance can be appreciated. The hard and practical features of English colonization seem to frown down every excursion of fancy as pitilessly as puritanism itself did in its day. A feudal society, on the other hand, with its contrasted lights and shadows, its rivalries and passions, is the natural theme of romance; and when to lord and vassal is joined a dominant hierarchy with its patient martyrs and its spiritual despots, side by side with savage chiefs and warriors jostling the representatives of the most gorgeous civilization of modern times,—the whole strange scene set in an environment of primeval forests,—the spectacle is as striking as it is unique.

The realism of our time has its place and function; but an eternal analysis of the familiar and commonplace is cloying after a while, and one turns with relief and refreshment to such fare as that set before us in Mrs. Catherwood’s animated story.

Francis Parkman.