H WIND." BY
ARTHUR HUGHES (STRAHAN. 1869. NOW PUBLISHED BY BLACKIE AND SON)]

Of works primarily intended for little people, an "Hieroglyphical Bible"
for the amusement and instruction of the younger generation (1814) may
be noted. This was a mixture of picture-puns and broken words, after the
fashion of the dreary puzzles still published in snippet weeklies. It is
a melancholy attempt to turn Bible texts to picture puzzles, a book
permitted by the unco' guid to children on wet Sunday afternoons, as
some younger members of large families, whose elder brothers' books yet
lingered forty or even fifty years after publication, are able to
endorse with vivid and depressed remembrance. Foxe's "Book of Martyrs"
and Bunyan's "Pilgrim's Progress" are of the same type, and calculated
to fill a nervous child with grim terrors, not lightened by Watts's
"Divine and Moral Songs," that gloated on the dreadful hell to which
sinful children were doomed, "with devils in darkness, fire and chains."
But this painful side of the subject is not to be discussed here.
Luckily the artists--except in the "grown-up" books referred
to--disdained to enforce the terrors of Dr. Watts, and pictured less
horrible themes.

With Cruikshank we encounter almost the first glimpse of the modern
ideal. His "Grimm's Fairy Tales" are delightful in themselves, and
marvellous in comparison with all before, and no little after.

[Illustration: ILLUSTRATION FROM "THE LITTLE WONDER HORN." BY J. MAHONEY
(H. S. KING AND CO. 1872. GRIFFITH AND FARRAN. 1887)]

These famous illustrations to the first selection of Grimm's "German
Popular Stories" appeared in 1824, followed by a second series in 1826.
Coming across this work after many days spent in hunting up children's
books of the period, the designs flashed upon one as masterpieces, and
for the first time seemed to justify the great popularity of Cruikshank.
For their vigour and brilliant invention, their _diablerie_ and true
local colour, are amazing when contrasted with what had been previously.
Wearied of the excessive eulogy bestowed upon Cruikshank's illustrations
to Dickens, and unable to accept the artist as an illustrator of real
characters in fiction, when he studies his elfish and other-worldly
personages, the most grudging critic must needs yield a full tribute of
praise. The volumes (published by Charles Tilt, of 82 Fleet Street) are
extremely rare; for many years past the sale-room has recorded fancy
p