Travels in Dreamland. By Alfred C. Fryer. (Sonnenschein.) —Mr. Fryer
has already obtained some reputation as a writer of fairy-tales, and it will be enhanced by this sprightly story of the adventures in Dreamland of a little boy of the name of Harold, who lives with his mother and sister in a big,
rambling house in the Midlands. One Midsummer night after he has gone to sleep, Harold is visited by Old Father Time, and goes on long excursions with the Months, which take various disguises, such as those of a sparrow and of a gull, and which, as a rule, bear off the boy on their backs. A good deal of natural history and other science is insinuated into the story, and
it is pervaded by a .very quiet and effective humour. Perhaps,
indeed, the humour is occasionally too subtle—or at least too Gilbertian—for little boys. Thus, when Harold is at the mercy of the Black Cat, who is bent on revenging the drowning of three of his cousin's kittens, he pleads :—" I assure you, we were so sorry, sister Ethel and I, when the three poor little kittens had to be drowned. But we kept one, you know, and indeed we love it very much, and are very kind to it." The Black Cat retorts :— " Tears and sorrow are no use when a murder has been com- mitted." This is very comic, unquestionably, but it will scarcely be understood by children under ten years of age. The illustra- tions, especially the smaller ones, are quite as humorous as the letterpress.
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