The Children's Casket. Compiled by Annie M. Hone. (Griffith, Farran,
and Co.)—Miss A. M. Hone has collected into this volume some hundred and sixty "favourite poems for recitation." Some of these are familiar ; others are new. Indeed, the compiler has drawn considerably from American sources, not a little to the advantage of the collection. But we cannot say that we alto- gether approve the choice. Children should have nothing of the cynical kind, as is Tom Hood's "Truth in Parenthesis," and, though in a very different style, "Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John ;" nor is " Magdalen" (p. 77) a fit piece for them. This deals with one of the great sorrows and sins of the world of which they must know some day, but had far better not know too soon. Books of this kind should be submitted to the revision of a com- mittee of parents.
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