SHAKESPEARE ILLUSTRATED.
The Merry Wives of Windsor. By William Shakespeare. Mus- trated by Hugh Thomson. (W. Heinemann. 15s. net.)—This masterpiece of Shakespeare's broader humour has never appeared in more attractive form. Mr. Hugh Thomson furnishes forty- one full-page illustrations, With some tail-pieces, &c. What more need we say? Every one knows what Mr. Thomson can do, and here he is at his best. It is not easy to point out this or that scene or person as better than another. Falstaff is a possible creature, and this is more than can be said of all the Falstaffs that we have seen. The "merry wives" are delightful, and Anne Page is made different from the two handsome " wives " with a charmingly girlish difference. Her two suitors are admirably contrasted,—Slender the ideal young simpleton, and Fenton the ideal young gentleman.—We have also received Hamlet, with Illustrations by W. G. Sit:amends (Hodder and Stoughton, 10s. 6d. net). Hamlet is manifestly a more difficult subject than The Merry Wives ; it is further from the life we know, more difficult to realise, and especially liable to the charge of being "theatrical." The Prince who is pictured for us here does remind A3 of stage figures. How, indeed, could he fail to do so? We are bound to think, as we look, of Kemble, Kean, Pechter, and others. Then there are special difficulties,'
the "Ghost," for instance. Mr. Simmonds certainly does not satisfy us here. But there is much that is attractive in his pictures.
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