The Bubbling Teapot : a Wonder.Stary. By Mrs. Lizzie W.
Champney. (Blackie and Son.)—The central idea of this awry is a pretty conceit. Flossy Tangleakein is in the habit of posing to Mr. Rose, an artist whose studio ie on the top of a house that is opposite to her own. Between his drapery, his bric.d -brae, and his sketches, she is able to dream of, and to a certain extent to realise, different countries and past times. So one day, after hearing from Mr. Rose the Japanese legend of "The Babbling Teapot "—(" every time the teapot cried, it turned into a boiling girl ; and every time the girl babbled, she turned into a weeping teapot ")—falls asleep, and dreams that she is transformed into a teapot. Tee consequence, she plays a whole host of characters ; she becomes the Chinese girl Hi Ski, Babette the Breton peasant, Bianca the Spanish girl, Zobeide the Egyptian, Gudran the Lapp, Noarmahal the Hindu, Giovannina the Roman, dic. It is easy to see Mrs. Champney'e motive in making Flossy undergo so many transformations ; her object is to teach past history, and the manners and customs of to-day. Happily, her object is so well disguised under its covering of fiction, that it can hardly be said to be noticed at all. The narrative portion of the book—for it is full of stories and fables, as well as or sketches—is exceedingly vivacious. Mrs. Champney does not think it necessary, merely because she is writing for children, to write otherwise than carefully. Her style of gift-book is almost, if not quite unique.
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