ABSTRACT
Six hundred and fifty pages of open and declared fun-very strongly accented with wood-cuts at that-might go far toward frightening the fastidious reader. But the Hartford publishers, we imagine, do not print for the fastidious reader, nor do traveling book agents sell much to that rarely occurring man, who prefers to find books rather than let them find him. So that, unless he has already made 'Mark Twain's' acquaintance through the press, he will not probably meet him until, belated in the rural districts, he takes from the parlor table of a country farm-house an illustrated Bible, Greeley's Amcrica11 Co11j/ict, Mr. Parton's apocryphal Biographies, successively and listlessly, and so
comesatlastupon'MarkTwain's'Itmocctlfslikeajoyousrevelation -anIndianspringinanalkalineliterarydesert.Forthebookhasthat intrinsicworthofbignessanddurabilitywhichcommendsitselftothe ruraleconomist,wholikestogetamaterialreturnforhismoney.Itis aboutthesizeofTheFamilyPhysicia11,forwhichitwilldoubtlessbe oftenmistaken-withgreatadvantagetothepatient.
