20 JANUARY 1894, Page 24

Up the Spider's Web. By Herbert E. Inman. (James Clarke

and Co.)—This is a very amusing attempt to people Fairyland, into which the heroine of the story enters through the gate of dreams, with realities, chiefly in the shape of representatives of lower animal life. It is indeed too elaborate and clever, and is another of the too many evidences of our time that authors of books for children imagine that their constituents delight in " smartness " almost as much as the spectators of a society play are supposed to do. The illustrations, chiefly by "animal" artists of the clam in which Mr. Louis Wain holds the first place, are, however, full of a humour which is easily intelligible, and are, indeed, in every way admirable.