The Golden Humorous Reciter. Edited by Cairns James. (Seeley and
Co. 3s. ad.)—There is a most comprehensive and well-chosen collection of some hundreds of pieces, both prose and verse, in the seven hundred pages of this volume—a most catholic array of all that is good in English literature—and we have nothing but praise for the print and the style of the book, the price of which need frighten no one. Possibly some of the selections will not appeal to us ; certain authors do not amuse us ; but the reciter can do wonders here, for he makes things go down that we might read without a smile, and emphasises the humour of those we already appreciate. A few more American selections might have been made, for we sometimes think the American humourist wastes less space and gets more sparkle into the given page than his English contemporary. But the range is wide enough in all conscience. We see a selection from the play, The Second in Command ; from an American novelist, Owen Wister ; from Boucicault, Jones, Grundy ; and from Mr. Dooley, Mark Twain, and Artemus Ward. The poetry appears to us excellently selected; and finally, we can recommend the book as a small encyclopaedia of English humour.
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