3 NOVEMBER 1888, Page 43

Gleanings from the " Graphic." By Randolph Caldecott. (Rout- ledge

and Sons.)—It would be unreasonable to expect the same quality in gleanings as in the harvest. The best are naturally gathered first. Still, this volume, gathered from the contributions of eleven years (1876-1886), is full of the charm that distinguishes the work of this most graceful of humorists. The first in point of time is " Christmas Visitors," and belongs to the type of drawing with which Caldecott illustrated Washington Irving's " Sketch- Book." Then come " Letters from Monaco " and " Sketches from Buxton," both excellent in their way, the first being the more forcible of the two. Two covers to the Graphic Christmas number, with their admirable variety of faces, are notably good. In Trouville, Caldecott seems to have found little to occupy his pencil beyond the humours of the baigneurs and baigneuses. But he was seldom better than is what must be some of the latest work of his pencil, "American Facts and Fancies." This is dated June, 1886, and the artist died, if our memory serves us, in the autumn of that year.