The Undiscovered Country, W. D. Howells, 1st Ed, 1880

The Undiscovered Countryby W. D. HowellsFIRST EDITIONPublisher: Houghton, Mifflin and Company, BostonCopyright: 1880Undiscovered Country, The, by W. D. Howells (1880), is a favorite with many of the author's fans. The central figure, Dr. Boynton, an enthusiastic spiritualist, is an admirable study of a self-deceiver, an honest charlatan. He is a country doctor, who has become a monomaniac on the subject of spiritualistic manifestations and has brought up his daughter, a delicate, high-strung, nervous girl, as a medium. His attempts to take Boston by storm end in disaster. He is branded as a cheat, his daughter is believed to be his confederate, and he and Egeria seek refuge in a community of Shakers, whose quaint and kindly ways are portrayed with a loving pen. The peaceful monotony of the daily life, its plain plenty, its orderliness, its thrift, its constant and unoppressive industry, the moral uprightness of the broad-brimmed and straight-skirted community, the strangeness of the sp