The Rural Poetry of the English Language, illustrating the Seasons and Months of the Year, their Changes, Employments, Lessons, and Pleasures, topically paragraphed, with a complete Index. By James William Jenks, M. A. Boston: Jewett & Co.

This very superb volume of 540 pages of doable columns, has been on our table for some weeks, and deserves to have had an earlier notice at oar hands, because it is adapted to the readers and workers who love the country and country employments. Professor Jenks has undoubtedly employed much time and taste in the collection of the rarest gems of English poetry, and he has been most successful in getting publishers to execute his design well. Independently of the poetry, the dedication is addressed to the proper persons. It is as follows: -

TO

THE HON. MARSHALL PINCKNEY WILDER,

PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATEs AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY,

AND

PRESIDENT OF THE AMERICAN POMOLOGICAL SOCIETY,

TO WHOM, BY TITLE OF HIs LONG, INTELLIGENT, GENEROUS, AND SUCCESSFUL EXERTIONS,

ALL LOVERs OF NATURE AED HER CULTURE ACCORD A FOREMOST PLACE

As THE FRIEND OF AGRICULTURE ARD RURAL ART: -

And also to

THE MEMBERs GENERALLY

OF THE ABOVE-NAMED USEFUL AND HONORED NATIONAL SOCIETIES,

As TO THOSE WHO WILL BEST APPRECIATE,

AND WHO BEST DESERVE THE PLACE OF PATRONs TO,

A PAINSTAKING ENTERPRIES, CONCEIVED IN A SPIRIT KINDRED TO THEIR OWN,

This Volume of Rural Poetry

Is RESPECTFULLY INSCRIBED BY HIs AND THEIR OBEDIENT, HUMBLE SERVANT,

J. W. JENKS.

This is complimentary to Mr. Wilder, who is so intelligent and so active; he works in the cause with such a will, that it has become a wonder among his friends where he gets the time to do so mnch. No celebration or meeting is complete without Col. Wilder. In the morning, before breakfast, he is to be seen trimming in his garden; at breakfast, he presides at a bountiful table, surrounded by guests from all parts of the Union; the next hour, look at him, in Boston, with a pile of letters to answer on horticultural subjects, as well as important public and private business, sending a clerk to the Bank with one hand, while the other is deciding upon the name of some apple or pear; dry good dealers and partners ask questions, and take a bite of the fruit; a cargo of dry goods is bought or sold while you wait for a friendly greeting. In another hour, our cosmopolitan is seen presiding at the weekly meeting of some benevolent or agricultural society, and receiving a deputation of admiring fellow-citizens who want him to fill some civil office. At dinner, he presides at some restaurant, over a moderate meal, but with all the prominent agriculturists listening to his wisdom or his wit.

A new-comer from Georgia or Wisconsin is waiting outside for information which is soon freely imparted, and the two new (but now) friends are seen making their way out of town, to visit some garden or orchard. At dusk, he is fondling his children in his home again at Dorchester, or showing some other party who has been waiting his return, the growth of pears on the quince, and delivering the experience of twenty-five years' success. Look at him next, giving minute directions in his greenhouse, or driving the last nail in his new and admirable fruit-room. Lamps are now requisite, and we will leave him chatting with good neighbors, but with one hand arranging other letters that must be answered before sleep is permitted, or complying with some editorial request for an article detailing his experiences. Such is Col. Wilder's career at home. We all know what it is abroad, as a leading mind and an active hand.

Professor Jenks has done his task well. We could have wished that even some few more of our favorites had found admission to his pages; we cannot find the second part of Lady Barnard's "Auld Robin Gray," which, though not so beautiful as the first, is required to make it complete, The exquisite history of its composition, and the correct version, will be found in that admirable book, Lord Lindsay's Lives of the Lindsays, than which there is no more delightful biography in the English language.

This volume is one to be appreciated by all lovers of rural art, and we hope to see it on every table where we visit.