GIFT-BOOKS.
Pauline's Picture Alphabet. By Lady Bell. Illustrated by Hilda Broughton. (A. L. Humphreys. 2s. net.)—Nursery readers will, we are certain, welcome with enthusiasm Lady Bell's delightful Picture Alphabet. . Her verses are innocently witty and artfully artless, as versas for children ought to he, and she has
had the good fortune to meet with a peculiarly attractive and. original illustrator. Working hand-in-hand, the poet and painter have produced a book of extraordinary charm, and, be it remem- bered, not merely of charm for grown-up people, but of charm for those for whom the book is intended. Take, for example, the letter "C." It is difficult to know whether to commend morn the enchanting picture of the sly white cat sitting in the best armchair in front of the fire, or the verses under it :—
"' C was a Cosy Cat
Who took the best armchair.
Jane's mother said : ' Well, but for that I should be sitting there.'"
The wicked twinkle depicted in the cat's eye is above praise. How often has the true cat-lover to take the second place in the way of chairs and comfortable seats because the cat has taken the first. No genuine cat-lover from Mohammed downwards would ever disturb a cat taking her ease. Another very delightful picture and verse is that of the Lazy Lion, who would not learn to read when the Ape took so much trouble to teach him, but growled and roared instead. Of Lady Bell's and Miss Broughton's Alphabet generally, and comparing it with its mighty predecessors, such, for example, as the classical work of Lear, we feel inclined to say with a slight alteration what Dryden said of Chaucer when he compared him to the ancients :—
"You match their beauties where they most excel.
Of babes sing better, and of cats as well."
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