This is the happiest _title_ in the whole list of annuals. There
is nothing sentimental or lachrymose in it; but it is warm and
seasonable, and done up in a holly-green binding, it is all over
old Christmas.
The first story in the volume is Old Christmas; one of the gems or
sweets is Garry Owen, or the Snow-Woman, by Miss Edgeworth, for it
abounds with good sentiment, just such as we should wish in the hearts
and mouths of our own children, as a spice for their prattle.
We pass over _L'Egotiste Corrigée_, par Madame de Labourt--pretty
enough--and the Ambitious Primrose, by Miss Dagley. Then a Song, by
Miss Mitford; and a Story of Old Times, by Mrs. Hofland; and the
Tragical History of Major Brown, a capital piece of fun; and Pretty
Bobby, one of Miss Mitford's delightful sketches. The Visit to
the Zoological Gardens is not just what we expected; still it is
attractive. Major Beamish has accommodated military tactics to the
nursery in a pleasant little sketch; and the proverb of Much Coin Much
Care, by Mrs. R.S. Jameson is a little farce for the same stage.
But the Cuts--the pictures--of which it would have been more
_juvenile_ to have spoken first. These are from the pencil of our
"right trustye" friend and excellent artist, Mr. W.H. Brooke, whose
horses, coaches, and dogs excite so much mirth among the young friends
of the MIRROR--for, in truth, Mr. Brooke is an A.M.--an _associate_
of the MIRROR, and enables us to jump from Whitehall to Constantine's
Arch at Rome, shake _hands_ with the Bears of the Zoological Society,
and Peg in the Ring at Abury.
The _Christmas Box cuts_ are all fun and frolic--the tail-piece of the
preface, a bricklayer on a ladder, "spilling" a hod of bricks--the
Lord of Misrule, with his polichinel army--the Boar's Head--a little
squat Cook and a steaming Plum-Pudding--the Bee and Honeysuckle--Major
Brown with a Munchausen face--the Bear Pit, Monkeys' Houses, and
Horned Owl, in the Zoological Gardens--and the Parliament of Animals,
with the Elephant as Chancellor, the Tortoise for "the table," and
Monkeys for Counsel--the groups of Toy Soldiers--and the head pieces
of the Cobbler and his Wife--all excellent. Then the Cricket and
Friar, and a pair of Dancing Crickets--worth all the fairy figures
of the Smirkes, and a hundred others into the bargain. These are the
little quips of the pencil that curl up our eye-lashes and dimple
our faces more than all the Vatican gallery. They are trifles--aye,
"trifles light as air"--but their influence convinces us that trifling
is part of the great business of life.
Now we are trifling our readers' time; so to recommend the _Christmas
Box_ for 1829, as one of the prettiest presents, and as much better
suited to children than was its predecessor--and--pass we off.
* * * * *
Here our motley-minded sheet finishes, and we leave our readers in
possession of its sweet fancies. Its little compartments of poetry and
prose remind us of mosaic work, and its sentimentalities have all the
varieties of the kaleidoscope. To gladden the eye, study the taste,
and improve the heart, of each reader has been our aim--feelings which
we hope pervade this and every other Number of the MIRROR.
* * * * *
Number 340 of the MIRROR contains the Notices of the Literary
Souvenir, Forget-Me-Not, Gem, and Amulet, and with the present Number
forms the Spirit of the Annuals for 1829.
* * * * *
_Printed and Published by J. LIMBIRD, 143, Strand, (near
Somerset-House,) London; sold by ERNEST FLEISCHER, 626, New Market,
Leipsic; and by all Newsmen and Booksellers._