MORMON WIVES.—A book with this title, by Metta Victoria Fuller, purports to be "a narrative of facts." It may be "founded on facts," as the title pages of some old novels say; but it should he read and judged as essentially a work of fiction—as much so as Uncle Tom's Cabin, or Shake-speare's Coriolanus. As a work of fiction it de-serves a high place. There is much distinctness and dramatic power in the delineation of the lead-ing personages. Notwithstanding some violations of probability, there is an unflagging interest in the narrative. The descriptions are full of poetic imagination. The style, with some few inaccura-cies or inelegancies in the use of words, is far above the average of American novels. The moral and religious sentiments which pervade the work are right; and its influence on the reader is salu-tary.
How ominous a fact in the history of the Fed-eral Union is that hideous phenomenon of Mor-monism as it is to-day. What a commentary on our institutions—or, if you please, on the manner in which our institutions have been administered tinder the influence of slavery—is the territory of Utah! How happens it that the joint-sovereignty of the United States has not given law to that ter-ritory and cannot? How happens it that in the center of our empire there is growing up a state which is the opprobrium of Christendom and the scorn and horror of the civilized world? Who made that arch-scoundrel, Brigham Young, gov-ernor of Utah in the name of the United States? Who are the successive Presidents that have re-tained him in that office to this day? Whose was the statesmanship—what was the influence—that erected Utah into a Territorial government, with-out a proviso against the barbarous and brutish polygamy that was known to he dominant there? Who were the men that deliberately undertook to abdicate and renounce, the joint sovereignty of the United States over the territories which are their common property? And why was that great trea-son committed? We need not answer these ques-tions. Everybody knows how to answer them.
