The Christmas stories appear in their usual abundance. We have
already noticed a considerable number. Marmaduke Merry, the Midship- enon. By W. H. G. Kingston. (Bemrose.)—This is a tale of a kind which Mr. Kingston always writes very well. Marmaduko gets fairly afloat after a few pages of introduction, and thereafter encounters various perils of the sea, storms, Frenchmen, and so on, in a most exciting suc- cession. Meanwhile a comic element is supplied by a bouncing boatswain fashioned after the model of Captain Marryat's famous liar, who died declaring that he knew a man who lived six mouths after the death- rattle had been heard in his throat. For him Mr. Kingston contrives an appropriate end, marrying him to a baroness and turning him into a baronet. And that a moral may not be wanting, we learn the sad end of a gentleman who fights a duel ; on the whole a very good tale. — Sylvia and Janet, by A. C. D. (Warne), is a pretty story of domestic life, though not very skilfully contrived ; and Sylvia, too, charming creature as she is, transfers her heart a little too readily.— Deborah's Drawer, by Eleanor Grace O'Reilly (Bell and Daldy), comes from a pen which knows how to write what is comparatively rare, even in the multitude of volumes that bear the name, a real "book for children." The heroine is a little child, who, by an amusing coincidence, is thrown upon the ease of a certain old maid, and whom the old maid amuses with stories out of a certain drawer called after an Aunt Deborah. —Short Stories for Young People, by Mrs. F. Marshall Ward (Bemrose), are, for the most part, far too melancholy for our taste. Why torment the young with these glimpses of difficulties which they must encounter before long, but which at present are mere darkness and pain to them ? —Silken Cords and Iron Fetters, by Mande J. Frane (Sampson Low and Co.), is a story from Australia, the industrious and idle apprentices over again, only our idle friend is mercifully dealt with.—Stories for Darlings, by the Sun (Murray), is a book of little tales, partly from fairyland, partly from real life, which are simply and prettily told.
Hearts of Oak, by W. Noel Sainsbury (Bradbury and Evans), is a collection of narrative concerning some of our early colonies. It is a book which, written as it is, by a man who knows his subject well, and knows, moreover, how to tell a story, deserves a permanent place in literature of this kind. We see that Mr. Sainsbury cannot make up his mind to tell the real story of Pocahontas.—Truly Noble, by Madame de Chatelain (Cassell and Co.), is a French story of a very foolish
Telemachus, a young noble who finds a most excellent mentor in a "truly noble" young peasant The lines of character are too sharply drawn, the noble is too foolish, the peasant too good and wise, and the whole too obtrusively didactic. If the author really wished to point a moral, why is she so tender with the young fool? she should have let him starve, instead of giving him back his fortnne.—Tales from Chaucer, by C. Cowden Clarke (Lockwood), appear in a second edition, revised.—Dr. Savory's Tongs (Cassell and Co.) is a collection of stories after the manner of Hans Christian Andersen, and not unworthy of the master.—F'ou• Messengers, by E. M. H. (Ball and Daldy), is the story of how a little girl learnt wisdom and self-restraint=—Only Just Once (Cassell and Co) enforces a variety of excellent morals.—Getting from fiction into the world of real things, we have a book specially adapted for children, though, perhaps, if we may venture the criticism, a little too elaborately simple, the Sea and Its Wonders, by Mary and Elizabeth Kirby (Nelson); and Charley's Lessons about Animals (Cassell and Co.). Why will draughtsmen always flatter the horse by giving him so small a head ?
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