The "Advocate."

The second number of the Advocate appeared yesterday, and is fully equal to the first issue. The editorials are written in a manly, determined spirit, and treat the subjects of which they speak in a manner that evinces careful thought and deliberation. The merits of "Retrospect" are confined to the orthography of the dialect, and the poem can lay little claim to literary beauty. Quite different from this is "Acheron," a pretty simile in graceful, poetic language. The writer of "Ce Qu 'On Dit Et La Verite" shows considerable imagination and writes in a lively, entertaining style, which would be none the worse for a little more polish and elegance. The dated-letter or journal-method of telling a story is a device which is beginning to pall on readers of modern fiction. It is too frequently a convenient loop-hole for writers who have not the talent, or else wish to avoid the trouble of describing the closer detail of the surroundings of the actions portrayed. We fear that the writer of this story has not quite successfully covered up this loop-hole-the traces of it are here and there still to be seen. On the whole, the incidents of the story are well narrated.

"Night" is the name of a poem which gives sign of poetic talent that finds expression in well-turned lines and fairly well chosen words. There is, however, too much of the artificial sentimental in it to permit us to call it a very promising effort. There is not much to be said for "Anna Polanova" a story placed in the high life of St. Petersburg. There are enough larynxruffling gutterals in the name of the various "vitches" and "ovnas" to make a careless reader believe that it is a powerful Russian story, but a closer perusal will show that things are not always what they seem. It takes more than a few well-compounded consonants to make a good story Russian Turkish or Chinese. Some minor verses and book notices make up the rest of the number.