Cassell's Penny Readings. Edited by Tom Hood. (Cassell, Peter, and
Moron's Standard Penny Readings. Vol IL (Moxon.)—The first of these books is, apparently, a private pennyworth, for the illus- trations can be of little use in a public room and before a numerous audience. The second is evidently written, like one of Mr. Charles Reade's tales, to be read aloud. It contains selections from authors whose works are copyright, or almost copyright, while the volume sent us by Messrs. Cassell ranges over a wider field. We presume Mr. Hood has made a slip of the pen at page 105, but it is one which is unpar- donable in an editor. To attribute Gray's " Ode on the Death of a Favourite Cat" to Cowper argues not only a want of critical discern- ment, but a forgetfulness of one of the most curious passages in literary history, Dr. Johnson's censure of the ode in question.
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