life and the manners and speech of cultivated men, and women, here recovers all its powers, and sweeps and soars with victorious and irresistible wing.  The breeze from the sea, the fresh air and wide horizon of the prairies, the noonday darkness of the forest are sure to animate his drooping energies, and breathe into his mind the inspiration of a fresh life.  Here he is at home, and in his congenial element:  he is the swan on the lake, the eagle in the air, the deer in the woods.  The escape of the frigate, in the fifth chapter of “The Pilot,” is a well-known passage of this kind; and nothing can be finer.  The technical skill, the poetical feeling, the rapidity of the narrative, the distinctness of the details, the vividness of the coloring, the life, power, and animation which breathe and burn in every line, make up a combination of the highest order of literary merit.  It is as good a sea-piece as the best of Turner’s; and we cannot give it higher praise.  We hear the whistling of the wind through the rigging, and the roar of the pitiless sea, bellowing for its prey; we see the white caps of the waves flashing with spectral light through the darkness, and the gallant ship whirled along like a bubble by the irresistible current; we hold our breath as we read of the expedients and manoeuvres which most of us but half understand, and heave a long sigh of relief when the danger is past, and the ship reaches the open sea.  A similar passage, though of more quiet and gentler beauty, is the description of the deer-chase on the lake, in the twenty-seventh chapter of “The Pioneers.”  Indeed, this whole novel is full of the finest expressions of the author’s genius.  Into none of his works has he put more of the warmth of personal feeling and the glow of early recollection.  His own heart beats through every line.  The fresh breezes of the morning of life play round its pages, and its unexhaled dew hangs upon them.  It is colored throughout with the rich hues of sympathetic emotion.  All that is attractive in pioneer life is reproduced with substantial truth; but the pictures are touched with those finer lights which time pours over the memories of childhood.  With what spirit and power all the characteristic incidents and scenes of a new settlement are described,—­pigeon-shooting, bass-fishing, deer-hunting, the making of maple-sugar, the turkey-shooting at Christmas, the sleighing-parties in winter!  How distinctly his landscapes are painted,—­the deep, impenetrable forest, the gleaming lake, the crude aspect and absurd architecture of the new-born village!  How full of poetry in the ore is the conversation of Leatherstocking!  The incongruities and peculiarities of social life which are the result of a sudden rush of population into the wilderness are also well sketched; though with a pencil less free and vivid than that with which he paints the aspects of Nature and the movements of natural man.  As respects the structure of the story, and the probability of the incidents, the novel is open to criticism; but such is the fascination that hangs over it, that it is impossible to criticize.  To do this would be as ungracious as to correct the language and pronunciation of an old friend who revives by his conversation the fading memories of school-boy and college life.