From Punch “Our Booking-Office”: Review of The Savoy, Vol. 2 and The Yellow Book, Vol. 9

    The Yellow Book has reached
its ninth volume, and appears in
the merry, merry spring – time
with a new front cover and title-
page by Mrs. PERCY DEARMER ;
which name I would re – write
“Mrs. Per se DREAMER,” for the
designs are of that grotesque,
fantastio stuff that dreams are
made of. Inability to admire them
is my new loss—somehow. E.H.
NEWʼS “Stanstead Abbots” is
delightful. We know that typical
old-fashioned village, be it called
by any other name. Mr. J. E.
SOUTHALLʼS “Night” (dated 1894)
is as hard in drawing as it is to
understand. Why should a female
with classically bound hair and
white classic drapery, surrounded
by signs of the zodiac, all white
on a grey ground, be the repre-
sentative of “Night”? Unless
the artist intended us to under-.
stand that, though he was showing
a drawing light-tinted, he was
yet “keeping it dark.”
    “Oh where are the pipes of
Pan?” asks Mr. RICHARD LE
GALLIENNE, in his “Four Prose
Fancies.” At certain corners of
certain streets, at certain times,
Mr. LE GALLIENNE may hear the
pipes of Pan with drum accom-
paniment, and may witness the
performance of the immortal
drama of Signor PUNCINELLO and
his GIULIA translated into right
good English of the “Stratford-
-atte-Bow kind.” Then shall RICHARD
(LA GALLIENE) be himself again, and,
returning to his home, shall he write, in
his own inimitable style, the true story of
Punch and Judy.
    What has the Baron to say of The Saveloy
—no, beg pardon, The Savoy—No. 2, for
April, edited by ARTHUR SYMONS, and
Illustrated by one AUBREY BEARDSLEY–
WEIRDSLEY? Wonderful — most won-
derful! “But as it takes my breath
away,” says the Baron, “and paralyzes I
my writing hand, I am compelled to reserve i
my criticism.”
    No wise collector will fail to secure for
his library Mr. TUERʼs most complete, ex-
haustive, and exhausting History of the
Horn-book, in two volumes,
édition de luxe. The account
is most interesting, illustrating
history, and bringing the reader
in” touoh with the new – born
yearning for “something popu-
lar to read,” and for that
craving for news of the day whioh
has been developing in England
since the fourteenth century, and
is not likely to be satisfied until
centuries themselves have passed
out of all record of time. “To a
hint in Punch,” says Mr. TUER
in a prefatial note, “are due the
real horn-books, &c., stowed away
in the cover of this work.”
    Mr. Punch is delighted to have
been thus taken at his word, and
hereby heartily congratulates Mr.
TUER on the highly satisfactory
result of his labour as exhibited
in the present volumes issned by
the Leadenhall Press.
                        THE BARON