PUBLICATIONS RECEIVED.

Otago Witness, Issue 2360, 18 May 1899, Page 46

PUBLICATIONS RECEIVED.

The Triad for -he current month runs its accustomed course of light and plea>sant "causerie" concerning the arts generally and special of their modern exponents particularly. The note of this little magazinelet is always brightness and brevity — two very good things, especially if they are not permitted to run into " scrappiness." Some extremely pretty landscape photographs and one or two attractive portrait studies are well reproduced in The Triad, while the musical supplement is an elaborate vocal "Aye Maria."

The April number of the Windsor Magazine will be no disappointment to its many readers, for " Stalky and Co. " it, full of Kipling "vim," and there are such a number of bright and interesting articles that a repioach which used to be levelled at the Windsor bill of fare, " too much fiction," has lost its point. An interesting sketch of the Marquis Ito, under the title of "The Father of Modern Japan," "The Cave-dwellers of the Canary Islands," and the "Wool Industry of South Africa " are a sample of the pleas-antly-instructive themes dealt with in Hie April number. Then we have fiction in abundance by Bret Harte, Crockett, L. I. ileade, and other magazine writers, the whole copiously illustrated. It is a subject for wonder what becomes of all the coloured plates issued with the Christmas Annuals year after yeai. Those of 10 or a dozen years age are now being sought after by collectors at Home, and sums ranging from a shilling to a guinea are freely paid for the rarer ones. Perhaps the best of the series was the reproduction of Sir John Millais's masterpiece "Bubbles." This beautiful plate was first issued by the Illustrated London News, whose edition would probably run into a million copies. This, however, apparently, only whetted the appetite of the public as Messrs Pears, of soap fame, then purchased the original, and issued two million copies in connection with their annual. Though this if= some years ago, the demand for the picture has continued steady, and Messrs W. J. Prictor and Co. recently felt justified in sending Home an oider for about a thousand copies. These have arrived, and as will be seen from advertisement elsewhere in this ip&ue are now on, sale at the firm's shop.

Last month, it is reported, nearly 1000 articles, left by absent-minded passengers, were found by the New South Wales railway officials in empty carriages.