Christmas Books. By W. M. Thackeray. Vol. IX. of the
"Biographical Edition." (6s )—The Rose and the Ring. By W. M. Thackeray. (2s. 6d.)—Mrs. Perkins's Ball. By M. A. Titmarsh. (7s. 6d. All Smith, Elder, and Co.)—The separate reprints of The Rose and the Ring and of Mrs. Perkins's Ball add immensely to the debt which all lovers of Thackeray owe to Messrs. Smith and Elder for the publication of the "Biographical Edition." The Christmas Books—including the two named above—form the last published volume of the "Biographical Edition," and of course that de- lightful reprint would have been very incomplete without them. Still, it is impossible not to welcome the appearance of the well-loved books of one's childhood in the actual form and shape in which one pored over them so long. An added plea- sure in Mrs. Perkins's Ball is given by the coloured illustrations, for that exuberant personage, The Mulligan, loses much when reduced to plain black and white. Again, one wants the repro- duction of the square, wide page of the old Rose and the Ring to be able to read in comfort the inimitable rhymed headlines which stand above every page,—".A.h, I fear King Valoroso, That your conduct is but so so " ; "How the Monarch ruled his nation. Gruffannff, and what her Station " ; "Hasten, Rescue, Giglio run ! for, Else our poor Rosalba's done for." These are a few of these delightful couplets, picked at random from different parts of the book. It is gratifying to observe that in spite of the yearly flood of Christmas books, The Rose and the Ring still remains a prime favourite with the children themselves, and a reading from its classic pages is as often loudly demanded "after tea" in 1898 as it was in the fifties and sixties.
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