3 JANUARY 1857, Page 30

SHADOWS AN THEY MIGHT BE.*

This little book of coloured lithographs is based on an amusing idea, and one which we do not remember to have seen before embodied in any systematic shape, although suggestions of it in a casual way are frequent enough. Each print gives a human figure (semi-human rather sometimes in caricatured burlesque) which throws its shadow in a form resembling some other figure or object. Thus, a superannuated beadle and bellman in lofty cocked-hat, throws the shadow of a donkey's head ; a drunkard tumbled against a street-post, with hat broken and indented, that of "a queer fish" ; a widower consoling the inner man with a glass of brandy, that of a crocodile. X 99, sidling up to Mary down the area, becomes a eat; a fat old dame seated with hand extended towards her bohea, a tea-pot; and so on, the shadow having in each case some grotesque likeness in unlikeness to the person shadowed. The notion is carried out with ingenuity, and about as much artistic skill as the subject demands—enough certainly to show cleverness and promise in Mr. Bennett; and the little book will beyond doubt raise a laugh in such Christmas or New Year's households of children as get it into their hands.

Shadows. By C. H. Bennett. Published by Bogue.