The Spaniel - Prince. From the French of M. Laboulaye. By Mary
E. Robinson. (Simpkin, Marshall, and Co.) — Prince- Jacinth, at his christening, is presented by the Fairy of Night with the gifts of intelligence, strength, and beauty. This looks like a very handsome present, but is really ill-meant, and the Fairy of Day counteracts it with the ordinance that on attaining his sixteenth year, when the Prince would come of age, he shall be periodically changed into a spanieL This would give him the opportunity of seeing human life from another point of view. On these lines M. Laboulaye has constructed a very pungent satire on his country and countrymen, for the Flycatchers, over whom Prince Jacinth is called to reign, are, of course, the French. The book was written—in something like a prophetic spirit—a year or so before the fall of that Empire, of which an eminent per- sonage said " C'est la Paix." "Happy is the country where amusement is sought in innocent pleasures only, and where the sound of the cannon is never heard but as a signal of the joy of a delighted nation." So wrote the journal, Official Truth, but, "a week after this peaceful intelligence, war was declared."
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