I've never read any Beloc before so this was a new experience for me, and mostly I found these to be wonderful, funny, charming poems. My favourites were Obiter Dicta, which could have been a Goons skit, and Lord Abbot, which made me laugh a lot. ( )

This is a hilarious book, with its cautionary verses, such as 'Sarah Byng who could not read and was tossed into a thorny hedge by a bull' or'Godolphin Horne who was cursed with the sin of pride and became a bootblack'. I love the last lines of 'Jim who ran away from his nurse and was eaten by a lion' which run "always keep a-hold of nurse, for fear of finding something worse". There then comes a section called 'the bad child's book of beasts' and some comic verses on lords and ladies.
Belloc's verse on 'the three races' is brilliant, with its conclusion "the most degraded of them all Mediterranean we call. His hair is crisp and even curls, and he is saucy with the girls" with its accompanying picture of an Italian icecream seller leering at his female customer!
Lovely little drawings add to the feel of the whole thing. I think the adult reader will get more humour out of it than the child

It's hilarity continues to amaze and baffle me as the years go on. It's creativity is eminent, and so is its morals. A book to read to your children, and then laugh at them while they try to desperately cling to their nurse, or study for hours learning to read incase they are thrown into a thorny bush by a charging bull. Pure excellency. ( )