" At the present moment the work of Miss Pamela Colman Smith is known
only to the few, but I predict that as soon as Mr Russell has her hand
colored prints on the market her name will be a household word among amateurs
of art. She is, I believe, quite a young woman, and her home is in Jamaica,
B.W.I., but she has studied at the Pratt Institute, where her original
talent was soon recognized. Miss Smith has the cleverness of Aubrey Beardsley
without his coarseness. Refinement is the key-note of her work. It is a
pity that the two examples here given are not in color, as are the originals.
They lose much by the change to black and white. Miss Smith, who is clever
with her pen as well as with the brush, has written several plays to be
performed by pasteboard figures on a stage across which they are moved
by means of grooves and strings. The stage, scenery, and the properties
are all the work of Miss Smith's deft fingers. A number of the "Annancy,"
or folk tales of Jamaica, have been written down and illustrated by Miss
Smith, and will be published by Mr. Russell. The illustrations of these
strories bear little resembrance to the examples of Miss Smith's work here
given. the are bolder, and while they show no more imagination, they are
more striking because of their weirdness."
(The Critic, 1899 January issue, p.15)