"Alice's Adventures in Wonderland" gave a new stimulus to children's literature, with its effective magic for youthful minds and its brilliant success among all classes of readers. "Davy the Goblin" is one of the many volumes which have been founded, so to say, on its idea and been carried along by its impulse. Thus little can be said for the actual originality of the book, although it deals in new combinations and abounds in droll situations. It is well printed and illustrated, and most children will be glad to have a new excursion into Wonderland.
Mrs. Burton Harrison's "Bric-à-Brac Stories," illustrated by Walter Crane, make an attractive volume with a good deal of solid reading within its covers. The stories are told with the verve and skill of a genuine story-teller, old themes are reset, and new material dexterously worked in, with characters drawn from fairy- and dream-land, and, set off by Mr. Crane's delightful drawings, the whole book is particularly attractive.
"Rudder Grange" is one of the books which it is essential to have always with us, and we are glad to see the stories so well illustrated, although the subject passes the domain of the artist, Mr. Stockton's humor being of that delicate and elusive order which strikes the inward and not the outward sense. "Pomona reading" in the wrecked canal-boat is a droll contribution, and many of the cuts show that the artist is in full harmony with the spirit of the author.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] On another occasion he remarked of Trollope, "What drivel the man writes! He is the very essence of the commonplace."
TRANSCRIBER'S NOTES:
[A] Original reads 'Corresponddence'