THE CHILD WITHIN.
iTo-rite Einton or THE " %mentos.") Sta,—The writer of an article with the above title in the Spectator of December 27th says that " No woman has Written any fairy-stories of an fame." Surely an exception to this statement must be made in favour of the Cenntesse d'Aulnoy. Her delightful story of Gracieuse et Persinet, to quote only one of them, must remain in the memory Of any one who was privileged to read it in childhood. Her surroundingi and out- look were entirely different from those of Grimm and Andersen; the daughter of a great French house in pre- Revolution days would naturally take a different view of life from the dreamy, picturesque Norseman or the downright, and sometimes almost coarse, German. Her Gracieuse, the beautiful princess who reaches happiness through great tribu- lation, does not belong to the same world as the Little Match Girl, nor has she a tithe of her pathos. Equally far removed is she from the Gretel who, with her brother, stumbles upon the witch's gingerbread cottage in the wood. The brain that conceived either of these children could not have conceived Gracieuse, but I venture to think that her designer deserves a high place in the ranks Of fairy-story writers.—I am, Sir, &c., Little Bounds, Fleet, Hampshire. STEPAEN Simzog.
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