Tales for boys and girls accumulate about this time in
overwhelming numbers. Tho first place must be given to Stories of School Life, by Ascott R. Hope. (Nimmo.)—Mr. Hope is the author of two books, About Dominies and About Boys, which many of our readers will remember with pleasure. He knows some aspects of his subject very well, writes, at least, without affectation or exaggeration, and contrives, we should say, to impress on his young readers some very good morals without any weariness of sermonizing. The book, indeed, will scarcely bear comparison with the one story of school life which most readers will be inclined to make their standard ; we mean, of course, Tom Brown. There is a want of breadth about its pictures of life, and something petty in its interests. On the athletic side of school-boy existence we have nothing like some of Mr. Hughes's famous scones, like the description of the Marylebone Match, for instance. With the intel- lectual side Mr. Hope is apparently more familiar, but even here we do not consider him entirely satisfactory. By the way, does he approve of such very rough Lynch law as the kicking of a mauvais sujet of a boy round the playground by his schoolfellows ?
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