GIFT-BOOKS.
NEW ILLUSTRATED EDITIONS.* IT must be nearly sixty years sine* Dante Gabriel Rossetti illustrated his translation of La Vies Nuove.1 A new and very elaborate edition of the translation is now published. It takes In part the form of an imitation of an old illuminated manuscript, though the prose portions are in Roman type. The Mustratinai are rich in appearance and are the work of a clever artist, Mum Evelyn Paul. There are drawings in line and page decorations.
• (1) The New Life, By Dante Alighted. Being Li Vita Nuns trenalated
0. Roasetti. london : H (10
arrap and Co. s. 6d. netj--(2) TAs Drama a &tongue. By Cardinal Newman. London : J. Lane. Ds. 6d. ( ) 4 christmea enrol. By Charles Dickens. London William Heinemann. [6s. net.]—(4) Orford. By Andrew Lang. London: Seeley, Service. and Co. (12s. &L meta
and the full-page pictures in which colour and gilding give that appearance of richness to which we have referred. It is impossible altogether to hide the artificiality of the whole scheme, but the pictures are clear in design and execution. There is also a short musical setting by Mr. Alfred Mercer.
Another mystical poem, Cardinal Newman's Dream of Gerontius,1 is published with an introduction by Mr. Gordon Tidy. It is illustrated by Miss Stella Langdon, who makes a great effort to convey the mystery and quality of a dream. To our mind, she succeeds too well to achieve any valuable result. —These two books were not written for the multitude, but Dickens probably wrote nothing that has kept a. wider popularity than his Christmas Carol, 3 and if superior persons writhe under the lavish Christmassy sentiment, we may be sure that Dickens does not care. John Leech's illustrations in a new well-printed edition give way to those of Mr. Arthur Rackham. His style is so individual and well known that it needs little comment. Here he is, of course, more restrained than in some of his most imaginative efforts, and yet in some of the black-and-white illustrations he gives great play to his fancy, and the full-page pictures in colour are hero and there open to a charge of exagger- ation, but they are sure of the popularity they deserve.
Lastly, Mr. Andrew Lang's Oxford has been reissued in a hand- some and finely printed form, with coloured pictures by Mr. C. F. Carline. To illustrate Mr. Lang's praise of Oxford and reconstruction of the old life there the artist has picked out Borne good views of streets and College buildings, and a few interiors such as Merton Library.
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