Binko's Blues : a Tale for Children of all Ages.
By Herman Charles Merivale. (Chapman and Hall).—Mr. Merivale means his book to amuse " children of all ages." We should think,—but we say it with diffidence, knowing bow amazingly 'cute the little folks are nowadays,—that it would be chiefly "children of a larger growth"
who would appreciate it. For it is in part a satire, always good- humoured, on social wrongs and actual personages—satire which it must require a good deal of knowledge of " who is who," among other things, to appreciate. Still, there is incident which readers whom the satire will not touch, will like, and a general sense of fun, with jokes and puns somewhat of the Christmas-time kind, which do not make much impression as they are silently read, but might well move laughter when they are uttered aloud. We shall give a speci- men of Mr. Merivale's manner, a portrait which it will not be difficult to recognise :—
"Another remarkable figure in the procession was the Court tragedian Monopol, or the Only One. His was a fine, keen face, and a curious manner and expression. His hair was long and dreamy as .a woman's, and about the man there was a singular magnetism which much affected men and women both, and caused him to be much flattered in public and much run down in private (except by his few friends), as was the moat unusual habit of the world in which my story happened. What was oddest about him was this,—that he seemed to quiet observers to have, while in private something reserved and reticent and modest, a keen sense of fun of his own as to the real worth of all the trumpet-blowing that went on in the Court of Floriline. When he took up the blowing of his own trumpet as I have described it, it was with a curious wink of the eye and an odd smile about the month, which suggested to those same observers that he knew more than he cared to say. And it is a fact that, in varying degrees, the same seemed generally true of the chief celebrities in this procession [They] walked arm- in-arm in the procession, crowned with roses and bearing images of silver in the form of boats, which contained pure and flowing butter, with which at intervals they playfully sprinkled each other."
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