CURRENT LITERATURE.
CHRISTMAS BOOKS, Ere.
Job Singleton's Heir, and other Stories, by Emma Marshall (Seeleys), contains three well-written and interesting little stories, of which the second, "Baskets and Brooms," with its graphic pictures of the life of the uncared-for dwellers on the heath, is perhaps the best. There is an excellent object in these stories, and it is followed without obtru- siveness.— Uncle Chesterton's Heir, by Madame Colomb, translated by Henry Frith (Routledge), is an adaptation from the French, which might, we must say, have been more skilfully or even carefully managed. Boys in England are not crowned when they win prizes at school. Who cannot fancy the contempt with which
they would treat the notion ? Nor is it English to write to say "the profession of shoeblack is not sufficiently onerous to prevent those exercising it to gamble," &c. It would have been better to have left the tale with its French circumstances. It would then seem natural enough, and would not sh)w the incongruities which scarcely permit a reader to do justice to its really excellent and amusing qualities.—We do not know whether My Guardian : a Story of the Fen Country, by Ada Cambridge, illustrated by Frank Dicksee (Cassell and Co.), is or is not meant fora Christmas book. It has not, on the one hand, the festive garb which belongs to the season. On the other, it has pic- tures, and pretty ones, too, which really adorn its pages. The tale is a story of childhood, which gradually developes into a little love- romance. It is constructed, as the reader may guess from the title, on lines which ale tolerably familiar. The fate of the "guardian," who is called "uncle," bat is not an uncle, is tolerably certain, when the little girl of seven or eight grows into a very fair maiden of seven- teen. In this case, he affords a warning, for he makes a great deal too sure, and might have lost his happiness but for circumstances which it would not be safe to reckon on. We cannot say that we think the ex- planations which he made to the young lady were at all satisfactory. The description of the years of childhood is, as is not uncommonly the case in such books, the most attractive part of the story.—Illasfer Bobby, by the Author of "Christina North" (C. Kegan Paul), is a prettily-told story of a boy who is rescued from evil by the love of a little sister, and the help of benevolent workers in the field of Christian effort. The little sister, "Dolly," in her home at the orphanage, is very well described indeed. The religious sentiment of the book is "Catholic," and the writer of the book will probably take it as a compliment that we cannot tell whether or no the epithet should have the prefix of "Roman."—Glen Morven ; or, Child-Life in the Highlands, by N. M. R. (Edinburgh Publishing Company), is a story of the ordinary kind, about some Indian children who were transported to a Highland home, ran wild there, and had to be civilised again.—We have to mention new editions of The Swiss Family Robinson, edited by William H. G. Kingston (Routledge), a new translation from the German," with the omission of the long, sententious lectures found in the original, and some slight altera- tions calculated to enliven the narrative ;" Picciola, by X. B. Saintine (Routledge); A Narrative of the I 'oyages Round the IVorld performed by Captain Cook, by A. Keppis, D.D. (Bickers), with some pretty and interesting photographic illustrations of the scenes ; and The Young Deserter (Oliphant).—Mirth; a Miscellany of Wil and Humour, edited by Henry J. Byron (Tinsley Brothels), scarcely produces, in its collected form, the favourable impression left by its parts. But there is certainly plenty of amusing reading in it.—We need scarcely recommend to our young readers two friends, one of which is a favourite of long standing. with them, and the other of which bids fair to be so,—Roulledge's Every Boy's Annual, edited by Edmund Routledge, and Routledge's Every Girl's Annual, edited by Miss Alicia A. Leith (Routledge and Sons.)— The index of authors in both of these contains names which pro- mise excellent reading, and the promise is amply fulfilled.— We have received from Messrs. Routledge a very elegant edition of Longfellow's Poetical Works, "the author's pocket-volume edition." There are cloven volumes of a really convenient and " pocketable "size, which is not always the case with " pocket " volumes. The paper, type, and general appearance are all that can be desired. And they are conveniently enclosed in a case, a receptacle obviously more suitable for pocket volumes than a library-shelf. It should be stated that Messrs. Routledge's are the only editions in which the author has a "direct interest." From the same publishers we have also The Grimm Fairy Library, ton volumes. Here are between one and. two hundred of the fairy-tales collected by the Brothers Grimm These volumes also are conveniently enclosed in a case.— Canter but y Chimes ; or, Chaucer Tales Retold for Children, by Francis Starr and Hawes Turner. (C. Kegan Paul.) This is a very pleasing book, which will interest readers, young and old. The plan is quite different from that which Mrs. Haweis followed. Her object was to present the old poet in a shape as nearly like his own as the change in the language admitted. Messrs. Storr and Turner quite metamor- phose hint, though, indeed, they skilfully manage that you shall recognise the disjecta membra poetae. But their object is to represent his picture of Euglish life, as it is contained in the description of the pilgrims who met at the Tabard, and the tales themselves. These are all excellently rendered; all, that is, that the writers, who exercise herein a wise discretion, see fit to give us. Once or twice an expres- sion seems to jar upon us, as, for instance, in the introduction, where we read that the Prioress spoke French with a "strong Cockney accent," a phrase for which some more harmonious substitute might have been found. Generally, the style is simple and smoothly flow- ing.—Bel-Marjety, by L. T. Meade. (Shaw.) This book shows a distinct advance on the last work of the writer which we had the pleasure of noticing,—A Knight of Ta.day. Excellent as that was, it had some defects, which the writer has this time avoided, especially the impossible " business " complications which perplexed the plot. There is a something very distinct in all the characters, the surgeon being, perhaps, the least successful drawing. Peter Spumous, "poet and failure," is, we presume, suggested by that pathetic picture which Mrs. Ctaik has drawn in her "John Martin, Schoolmaster and Poet ;" but ho is something much better than a copy, and that side of the character which Mrs. Craik had no materials for describing, the side of the affections, is skilfully supplied. The heroine is a fine conception; but there is perhaps more power and originality about Anne Symmons, hard and unlovely as her portrait is. The writer has thrown in her shadows with great discrimination.—Ludy Betty's Governess; or, the Col bet Chronicles, and Winifred; or, an English Maiden in the Seventeenth Century, are two stories by Mary Ellen Guernsey (Shaw). The scenes of the latter are laid in the first half of the seventeenth century, those of the former in the second. In both, the heroines are young women of families belonging to what may be called the Puritan section of the Church of England, though they are as moderate in their opinions as they are discreet in their demeanour. But both have a pice of spirit, and can fire up when tho occasion de- mands. We do not find it easy to say which tale we prefer, but on the %%hole incline to Lady Betty's Governess, in which the story moves more rapidly. But both are very good, written in perfectly good. taste, and in a spirit of sober piety, and not without considerable force both of humour and of pathos. We can recommend them both very heartily.— True Under Trial, by Frances Palmer (W. Wells Gardner), is a story which we have seen before in some periodical of which we cannot now recall the name. It relates the adventures of a lad who is turned adrift by a schoolmaster, or rather a schoolmaster's hard-hearted sister, because his father does not pay his school-bill, and who, in company with his faithful dog, endures many griefs. How everybody turns up at last, and that exactly in the right place and at the right time, may be easily imagined.—Lost: a Tale of the English Lakes. By S. M. (Bemrose.) Two cousins from abroad, of half-Italian birth, are received into an English family, which not long afterwards goes to sojourn for a while at the Lakes. Then one of them is lost on the hills, and saved. by a young peasant lad. All this is told fairly well. — " Buttons;" the Narrative of the Trials and Travels of a Young Gentleman, by Ascott R. Hope (Griffith and Farran).—Mr. Hope does well to aim at something more than making his readers laugh at the mishaps of a now page-boy. There are some readers, and not dull fellows either, who never laugh at such things, and some to whom they are a positive pain. Even in this book they might, we think, have been ad- vantageously shortened. Its purpose is really a much better and higher one. A selfish and conceited young fellow is brought to feel that he has behaved very cruelly aud basely to a young lad, who had no fault but awkwardness about things which he had never learnt. There are boys enough who want, more or less, some such lessons, and Mr. Hope is quite the man to teach it to them effectually, if anything is ever taught effectually except by experience (which, by the way, generally fails)._ Only a Cat, by Mrs. H. B. Paull (Routledge), is the autobiography of a black cat, written with the laudable object of "exciting a feeling of
interest and pity for the race in general " Cats, on the whole, have at least as good a time as dogs, which they scarcely deserve. To this an exception ought indeed to ho made in favour of such animals as the black Tom who is the original of this story, if, as we hear, this portrait is drawn from the life. Ho was a cat worthy of a biographer as sympa- thetic as Mrs. Paull.—The Day of Wonders : a Medley of Sense and Nonse2se, by M. Sullivan (Griffith and Ferran.) Little Harry falls asleep, after rea iing some " alphabet verses," which his father, a naturalist, has written for bit',—verses of this kind, "A was an Ant, that lived down in the ground." In his sleep the letters seem to become alive, and to instruct him in the various wonders of the lives of animals, each letter introducing him to the creature of which ho is a symbol. The sense," it will be soon, predominates over the " nonsense ;" but it is always presented in a fresh and lively fashion, not without streaks of humour, as when "0," apologising to Harry for the ferocious demeanour of the Otter, remarks,—" She has not been used to the ways of human beings ; men and women get civilised by being a great deal with us, the letters of the Alphabet."—Father's Motto, and other Stories (Religious Tract Society), are didactic little tales, which we are disposed to praise, excepting a treacherous and unprovoked attack on tobacco, by a person who calls himself, not quite veraciously, we suspect, "an old smoker."—Aunt Annette's Stories to Ada, by Annette A. Selman (Griffith and Farran), are stories which enforce chiefly the useful lesson of kindness to animals. —We have received a new edition of The Life and Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, with fifty-two illustrations by J. D. Watson, and six coloured plates. (Routledge.) It is preceded by a memoir of the author, which ignores, we observe, perhaps wisely, the difficult question of his political consistency.—We have the pleasure of again recommend- ing to our readers two excellent magazines, full of reading which gives both instruction and amusement as may be wanted,— The Sunday at Home, a Family Magazine for Sabbath Reading, and The Leisure Hour, both published by the Religious Tract Society. The second of the two is good beyond the common. —We have also to acknowledge Sunday Reading for the Young (W. Wells Gardner), and from the some publisher, Chatterbox, and The Prize for Girls and Boys, edited by J. Erskine Clarke, M.A.—The Cottager and Artisan is a cheap illustrated publication (Religious Tract Society), of which wo have before us the annual issue.—Peter Parley's Annual (Bon George) has reached, we learn from the title-page, its thirty-eighth year.
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