We have heretofore noticed the remarkable book of short stories, "The Wife of His Youth," etc., by Chas. W. Chesnutt, the Negro writer. He has now printed a work of fiction, in which one story fills the volume, entitled "The House Behind the Cedars." In this he deals with the old life and the new, at the South.
The scene is located in North and South Carolina, and the time is just before and after the civil war. It has a rich local color, and contains a careful study of the picturesque old Southern town where the author spent his youth and studied the types which he has faithfully and sympathetically reproduced. The action of the story, which is of thrilling interest, concerns the efforts of a beautiful girl to escape the disabilities which the sins of others and the customs of the country and the time imposed upon her.
(Boston: Houghton, Mifflin & Co.)