own day.  The first part of the volume gives the history of the place as it has been occupied for strategic purposes.  The second part is devoted to its history as the seat of the Military Academy, a history which succeeds immediately to the former, and is intimately connected with the history of our internal government from its first organization under the Constitution to the present hour; so that the history of the locality presents itself as a brilliantly colored thread running through the warp of the national history.  In the composition of this portion, as of the other, the author has presented his subject, not so much in his own narrative, as by a judicious combination of extracts from documents and papers of original authority; although his own observations, by way of connection and explanation, are given in good taste, and indicate a candid judgment, founded upon a manifestly loving, but still essentially impartial, observation.  It should be no wonder, if the graduates of the Academy, who continue their connection with the army in mature years, should always regard the place through a vista of memory and affection, shedding over it a brilliancy to which others might be insensible.  To most of them it has been as a home,—­to many, probably, the only home of their youth; and, in the unsettled life of the soldier, we can conceive that to no other spot would their recollections recur with like feeling.  We believe, that, in the society which gathers more or less permanently around the Academy, the feeling of a home-circle towards its absent members follows the graduates during their military service; and that they, on the other hand, are always conscious of a peculiar observation exercised from the place over their conduct; so that each one, during an honorable career, may look forward to revisiting it, from time to time, as a place associated by family-ties.  This influence upon the individual graduate must be a very powerful incentive.  It must, in the nature of the case, be unperceived by the public, but its value to the public will be enhanced by the observation which they may extend to the Academy; and it is eminently proper that such observation should be courted by the Government, and by those who represent it on the spot; the opportunity should be given to all, irrespectively of civil or military place, to become acquainted with its general management, the principles on which it is established, and the terms which the cadet makes with the country on entering, and to see, from time to time, a general resume of its working and success.  A book which tells this, in its natural association with the narrative of all that gives the locality its name in our history, promotes a national interest and supplies a public want.  Captain Boynton’s book should command the interest of those who know most of West Point, and of those who know nothing about it.  To some it will be a grateful source of reminiscence, and to others of entertainment combined with information which has acquired an increased interest for the citizen.