CHILDREN’S BOOKS
AND READING

BY MONTROSE J. MOSES

FAMOUS ACTOR FAMILIES IN AMERICA

LITERATURE OF THE SOUTH In preparation

EDITED BY MR. MOSES

EVERYMAN A Morality Play

Children’s Books and Reading

By

MONTROSE J. MOSES

NEW YORK

MITCHELL KENNERLEY

Copyright, 1907, by Mitchell Kennerley

TABLE OF CONTENTS

INTRODUCTORY NOTE

In the course of preparing the material for the following sketch, I was brought into very agreeable relations with many persons whose practical experience in library work proved of exceptional value to me. I wish to take this means of thanking Miss Annie Carroll Moore, Supervisor of Children’s Rooms in the New York Public Library, and Mr. C. G. Leland, Supervisor of School Libraries and member of the New York Board of Education, for every encouragement and assistance.

To Miss Caroline M. Hewins of the Hartford Public Library, Miss Frances Jenkins Olcott of the Pittsburgh Carnegie Library, Miss Caroline Burnite of the Cleveland Public Library, the Reverend Joseph McMahon, a member of the Advisory Board of the New York Public Library, Mr. Frederic W. Erb of the Columbia University Library, and to Mr. Tudor Jenks, I am indebted for general advice.

In special lines, I had the privilege of consultation with Mr. Frank Damrosch, Mr. C. Whitney Coombs, and Miss Kate Cohen for music; Miss Emilie Michel for French; and Miss Hedwig Hotopf for German.

The librarians of Columbia University, the Pratt Institute, and the Astor Library have rendered me marked service for which I am grateful.

I wish to thank the New York Outlook, Independent, and Evening Post for affording me opportunities to publish from time to time data relating to juvenile books and reading.

Finally, I wish to fix the responsibility for whatever statements are made in the way of criticism upon myself; this is only due to those whose extensive knowledge of the subject is being exerted in a professional capacity; and to those many authors whose books and papers are indicated in the bibliographical notes.

M. J. M.

New York, August, 1907.

CHILDREN’S BOOKS AND READING

I. THE PROBLEM

Any good book, any book that is wiser than yourself, will teach you some things.—Carlyle, to an unknown correspondent, March 13, 1843.

Therfore I pray that no man Reprehende

This lytyl Book, the whiche for you I make;

But where defaute ys, latte ylke man amende,

And nouhte deme yt; [I] pray thaym for youre sake.

—The Babees Book.

The field of children’s books is by no means an uninterrupted host of dancing daffodils; it is not yellow with imperishable gold. In fact, there is a deplorable preponderance of the sere and yellow leaf. Yet there is no fairer opportunity for the writer than that which offers itself in the voluntary spirit of a boy or girl reader. Here are to be met no crotchets or fads, no prejudices or unthinkable canons of art. Because the body is surcharged with surplus energy necessary to growth, because the mind is throwing out delicate tendrils that foreshadow its potential future, one realises how vital is the problem of children’s reading, how significant the manner in which it is being handled.

At the outset, it is essential for us to distinguish between theory, history, and practice. The field, with all its rich soil, is in need of weeding. Not so very long ago, it lay unrecognised by the library, as of sufficient importance for separate and specialised consideration. But now, with the prominence being given to children’s reading-rooms, the field needs to be furrowed. Let us not ignore the salubrious under-stratum of the past; it has served its mission in asserting the claims of childhood; it has both negatively and positively marked the individuality of childhood, in a distinctive juvenile literature. Perhaps the writers who were inspired by the Rousseau doctrine of education, and those who abetted the Sunday-school movement of the last century, were deceived in their attitude; for they considered the machinery by which they hoped to mould character, rather than the nature of the heart and soul upon which they were actually working. A right action, a large, human, melodramatic deed, are more healthy for boys and girls than all the reasons that could be given for them. In literature for children, as in life, the moral habit should be unquestioning. All leading educators and ethical teachers recognise this fact.

The whole matter simply resolves itself into a difference in viewpoint between the past and present. Smile as we must over the self-conscious piousness of early juvenile literature, it contained a great deal of sincerity; it did its pioneer work excellently well. To the writer of children’s books, to the home, where one essential duty is personal guidance, to the librarian whose work is not the science of numbers, but a profession of culture-distributing, some knowledge of the past harvests from this field would appear indispensable. For the forgotten tales of long ago, the old-fashioned stories represent something more than stained pages and crude woodcuts, than stilted manners and seeming priggishness; they stand for the personal effort and service of men and women striving with staunch purpose in the interests of childhood, however mistaken their estimates of this childhood may have been. These books, to the library, are so much fallow material as a practical circulating proposition, but they represent forces significant in the history of children’s books. I would much rather see a librarian fully equipped with a knowledge of Miss Edgeworth’s life, of her human associations, together with the inclinations prompting her to write “The Parent’s Assistant,” than have her read a whole list of moral tales of the same purport and tone.

The immediate problem, therefore, necessitates a glance at this field of children’s literature, and some knowledge of its essential details. It involves a contact with books of all grades; it calls into play, with the increasing number of libraries, and with the yearly addition of children’s rooms, a keen discerning judgment on the part of the librarian, not only as to child nature, but as to the best methods of elimination, by which bad books may be separated from good, and by which the best may preponderate. But the librarian is not the only factor; the parent and the writer also come into account. They, too, must share a responsibility which will be more fully determined later on, but which now means that they both owe the child an indispensable duty; the one in giving to the growing boy or girl most intelligent guidance along the path of fullest development; the other in satisfying this need—not in deflecting juvenile taste by means of endless mediocrity and mild sentimentalism. It is an unfortunate circumstance that the effects of mediocrity are longer-lived than the immediate evil itself.

In the problem of children’s reading we must consider two aspects; there is the bogey image of a theoretical or sociological or educational child, and also the book as a circulating commodity. There is the machinery of “The Child”; Dr. Isaac Watts shaped one; Jean Jacques Rousseau another; the Edgeworths still another, and now the psychologist’s framework of childhood, more subtle, more scientific, more interesting, threatens us everywhere. But no patent has so far supplanted the fundamental excellence of human nature. There are assuredly demarkations and successive steps in elementary education, but are not these becoming too specialised? Since we are dealing with the Boy and the Story rather than with the Scholar and the Text-book, with culture which is personal, and not with expediency, we needs must choose the human model in preference to all others.

And so it is with the choice of the librarian. In dealing with books in the bulk, there is a tendency to emphasise system above the humanising excellence of what the books contain. After all the mechanical detail is done, when the cover has been labelled, when the catalogue notation has been figured, when the class distribution has been determined, the librarian stands middleman in a threefold capacity. She is a purveyor, in the sense that she passes a book over the counter; she is a custodian, in so far as books need protection; she is the high priestess, since the library is a temple of treasures, a storehouse for our literary heritage. In any library, whether it be yours at home, with your own books upon the shelves, or the public’s, with volumes representing so much of your taxation on which you base your citizenship, the rare companionship of books is one of their humanising qualities. This is as much a truth for children as for grown-ups.

With the fear that there is an effort on the part of many to crystallise reading into a science, comes the necessity to foster a love of reading for its own sake. The democracy of books has grown larger with the cheapening process of manufacture; while the establishment of public libraries offers to every one an equal privilege. In an assemblage of many books, a certain spiritual dignity should attach itself to the utilitarian fact.

There is no definition for children’s books; the essential point is appeal, interest. As far back as 1844, a writer in the Quarterly Review very aptly claimed that “a genuine child’s book is as little like a book for grown people cut down, as the child himself is like a little old man.” Peculiarly, there is a popular misconception that an author of juveniles advances in art only when he or she leaves off penning stories or fairy tales, and begins publishing novels. On the face of it, this is absurd. Like any other gift, writing for children cannot be taught; it has to be born. If possible, with the exception of drama, it is the most difficult art to master, since its narrative will not stand imitation, since its simplicity must represent naturalness and not effort, since its meaning must be within reach, and without the tone of condescension.

Professor Richard Burton has written: “A piece of literature is an organism, and should, therefore, be put before the scholar, no matter how young, with its head on, and standing on both feet.” This injunction applies to all books. Where the classics excel is in their very fulness and honesty of narrative. Can the same be said of our “series” brand?

The writing of children’s books is more aptly phrased the writing of books for children. There was a time when such books, as a class by themselves, were unknown; yet boys and girls expanded, and perhaps remembered more of what they read than they do to-day, although they were not taught as much. There are some pessimists, not so unwise in their pessimism, who believe that if less emphasis was bestowed upon the word children, and more upon the word literature, the situation would be materially bettered.

Can we recall any of our great men—literary, scientific, or otherwise—who were brought up on distinctively juvenile literature. A present-day boy who would read what Lamb or Wordsworth, Coleridge or Tennyson, Gladstone or Huxley devoured with gusto in their youth, would set the psychologists in a flutter, would become an object for head-lines in our papers. There is a mistaken conception regarding what are children’s books, in the best sense of the word. A standard which might have excellent conservative results, although it would be thoroughly one-sided and liable to false interpretation, could be based on the assertion that those books only are children’s classics which can be relished by a grown-up public. “Alice in Wonderland,” “The Water Babies,” “Peter Pan”—such stories have a universal appeal. And it is well to remember that at least five of the world’s classics, not originally written for children, have been appropriated by them: “The Arabian Nights”; “Pilgrim’s Progress”; “Robinson Crusoe”; “Gulliver’s Travels”; “Baron Münchausen.”

With the reading democracy created by public libraries, there has developed the need for this special kind of writing. Excesses have unfortunately arisen such as made a critic once exclaim in disgust, “Froissart is cut into spoon-meat, and Josephus put into swaddling clothes.” While we shall, in the following pages, find many odd theories and statements regarding simplification of style, it is as well to be forearmed against this species of writing. Democracy in literature is falsely associated with mediocrity. When one reads the vitiating “series” class of story-book, the colourless college record, the diluted historical narrative, there is cause for despair. But there is no need for such cheapening. The wrong impression is being created in the popular mind that literature is synonymous with dulness; that only current fiction is worth while. And we find children confessing that they rarely read non-fiction, a term they only dimly comprehend. It is not right that a middle-class population should have relegated to it a middle-class literature. Such, however, at the present moment, seems to be the situation. And as a consequence all departments suffer. Except for a very few volumes, there is no biography for children that is worthy of endorsement, for the simple reason that the dignity of a whole life, its meaning and growth, are subordinated to the accentuation of a single incident. History becomes a handmaiden to the slender story. Let those writers who are looking for an unworked vein ponder this. The fictionising of all things is one of the causes for this poverty; the text-book habit another.

The poet Blake sings:

“Thou hast a lap full of seed,

And this is a fine country.

Why dost thou not cast thy seed,

And live in it merrily?”

But, though we are repeatedly casting our seed in the field of juvenile literature, we are not reaping the full harvest, because we are not living in the land of childhood merrily.

Start as you will to treat of children’s books as the mere vehicle for giving joy, and education will pursue you. Acknowledging all the benefits that the moral tale and the instructive walk have bestowed, we know not which to pity most—the child in a moral strait-jacket, or the child observing nature! The terms we use in describing these writers of a past generation are always the same; they are not prepossessing, though they may sound quaint. We turn from such critical phrases as “flabby treatment of the Bible,” “dear, didactic, deadly dull” Mrs. Barbauld, Miss Edgeworth’s “overplus of sublime purpose,” to definite terms of protest such as those of the “Professor at the Breakfast Table,” condemning the little meek sufferers with their spiritual exercises, and those of Emerson ending in his cry of “What right have you to one virtue!” The mistaken attitude, which has slipped from the moral to the educational sphere, seems to be that self-development is not just as important as prescribed courses. While the latter are necessary to the school, the librarian must reckon differently; for, to her, the child is not so much a class as a unit.

Elementary education is marked by the compulsory factor; in reading, a child’s interest is voluntary. On the other hand, the severity of a Puritan Sunday, the grimness of a New England Primer, developed in childhood sound principles of righteousness; they erected a high fence between heaven and hell. But the moral tale utilised “little meannesses of conventional life,” suggested sly deceit and trivial pettiness; it quibbled and its ethics were often doubtful. The reaction that followed let slip a valuable adjunct in culture; to-day the knowledge of the Bible in schools and colleges is appallingly shallow; this fact was revealed in the results of an examination or test held by President Thwing some years ago. Dr. Felix Adler, pleading from the non-sectarian platform, asks for the re-establishment of ethics in our schools as a study of social relations, and for the extended use of Bible stories, shorn of religious meaning, yet robbed of none of their essential strength or beauty or truth. The librarian has wisely mapped out for her story hour such a course, gleaned from the parables, and from the vast treasure houses of narrative abounding in both Testaments and in fables.

Turn to your colleges and your schools, and you will find that, generally speaking, there is dug a deep channel between literature and life, which has no right to be. We should study our ethics as one of the inherent elements in poetry and in prose. The moral habit is part of the structure of the Arthurian legends.

Since the time of Rousseau the emancipation of the child has steadily advanced; in society, he has taken his place. No longer is it incumbent upon him to be seen and not heard, no longer are his answers written out for him to memorise. Mr. E. V. Lucas, in the preface to his “Forgotten Tales of Long Ago,” calls attention to one story, “Ellen and George; or, The Game at Cricket,” culled from “Tales for Ellen,” by Alicia Catherine Mant, and in a characteristically droll manner he says, “Ellen’s very sensible question (as it really was) on p. 184, ‘Then why don’t you send the cat away?’ is one of the first examples of independent—almost revolutionary—thought in a child, recorded by a writer for children in the early days.”

But the chains that have fallen from one door have been threatening to shackle another. Where once children could scarcely escape the moral, their imaginations now have no room for flight. Fancy is bestrided by fact. We must give reasons for everything. When Artemus Ward was asked why the summer flowers fade, he exclaimed, “Because it’s their biz, let ’em fade.” In nature study for children the general effect leaves a deeper impression than the technical structure. We do not know whether it is necessary to have Mr. Seton’s “Story of Wahb” vouched for as to accuracy in every detail. The scientific naturalists and story-writers are constantly wrangling, but there is not so much harm done to nature after all. An author who wilfully perverts fact, who states as true for the class what he knows to be a variant in the one coming under his observation, should be called to account. Otherwise a human interest attached to animals creates a wide appeal. But to use this vehicle for exploiting the commonplace, and what properly belongs to the text-book, should be condemned by the librarian. Mr. Tudor Jenks[1] humorously declares: “We ask our little ones to weep over the tribulations of a destitute cock-roach or a bankrupt tumble-bug.” And another critic of an earlier age writes of those same children—“They are delighted, it is true, with the romantic story of ‘Peter, the wild boy,’ but they have not the slightest curiosity to know the natural history, or Linnæan nomenclature of the pig-nuts he ate.”

The following pages have been written after some extensive investigation. Within the past few years, about fifteen hundred of the latest books for children have come to my desk; they have not been without meaning for the present, or without connection with the past. While it has not been the intention to write a full history of children’s books, some idea is given of the extent and possibilities of the field; the historical development is sketched in outline. There is need for a comprehensive volume. In addition, an attempt is here made to reconcile system with culture; to discover what the library is aiming to do with juvenile readers in the community; to show the relation which the Library, the School, and the Home, bear, one to the other, and all to the child. Having carefully examined lists of books recommended by libraries for children of all ages and grades, a limited number of volumes, marked by an excellence which makes them worthy of preservation, is recommended as suitable for boys and girls. These titles are given in an appendix. The fault with most lists of this character is that they too often represent the choice of one person. To counteract this one-sidedness, the co-operation of an advisory board was obtained, marked by wide experience, by an intimate contact with and knowledge of the books considered, and by a desire to show a human respect for the tastes of children.

There are certain phases in the consideration of the departments that have been suggested by young readers themselves. The desire for books about musicians, and for piano and violin scores, brought to light the lack of any guaranteed assemblage of songs which, in variety, in quality, in sentiment and imagination, might be called distinctive. The interest in a certain type of drawing as shown by the juvenile demand for Boutet de Monvel, Kate Greenaway, and Caldecott picture-books, suggested the advisability of including a full list of these publications.[2] One cannot approach the subject with any ironclad rules, yet it is always profitable to heed experiments based on common sense. The results of such experiments are but mileposts in the general advance; they must not be taken as final. Yet it is well to experiment in order to avoid crystallisation.

Children are entitled to their full heritage; education is paramount, culture is the saving grace. Your memory of a child is the healthy glow of the unfettered spirit. None of us want him with a book in his hand all the time. We wish him to take the freshness of life as his nature, to run with hair tossing to the wind. But glance into his eyes and you will find a craving look that a ball will not satisfy, a far-away expression that no shout from the roadside will change. It is the placid gleam of sunset after physical storm, the moment of rest after the overflow of animal energy. Children have their hero moments when they are not of the present, but are part of that perennial truth which is clearer-visioned in the past, since we have to dream of it. Kate Douglas Wiggin claims that the book is a fact to a child. It should be an idealising fact.

Not long ago a crazy man died, after having drawn up a will: his world’s goods consisted of the wide, wide world; his legatees were every living soul. He said:

“I leave to children, inclusively, but only for the term of their childhood, all and every, the flowers of the fields, and the blossoms of the woods, with the right to play among them freely, according to the customs of children, warning them at the same time against thistles and thorns. And I devise to children the banks of the brooks, and the golden sands beneath the waters thereof, and the odors of the willows that dip therein, and the white clouds that float high over the giant trees. And I leave the children the long, long days to be merry in, in a thousand ways, and the night and the moon and the train of the milky way to wonder at.”

What thinks the teacher of such riches, what the librarian with her catalogue number? A book is a fact, nay, a friend, a dream. Is there not a creed for us all in the wisdom of that crazy man? Here was one with clear vision, to whom fact was as nothing before the essential of one’s nature—a prophet, a seer, one to whom the tragedy of growing up had been no tragedy, but whose memory of childhood had produced a chastening effect upon his manhood. Are we surprised to find him adding:

“I give to good fathers and mothers, in trust for their children, all good little words of praise and encouragement, and all quaint pet names and endearments, and I charge said parents to use them justly and generously, as the needs of their children may require.”

And so, we ask, more especially the parent than the librarian, is there not excitement in the very drawing out from a child his heart’s desire? Imperative it is in all cases that book-buying should not be a lottery, but more persistently apparent does it become that a child’s one individual book upon the Christmas-tree or for a birthday should not represent a grown-up’s after-thought.

Bibliographical Note

The articles referred to in this chapter are:

Burton, Richard—Literature for Children. No. Amer. 167:278 (Sept., 1898).

Children’s Books—[From the Quarterly Review.] Liv. Age, 2:1–12 (Aug. 10, 1841).

Thwing, Charles F.—Significant Ignorance About the Bible as Shown Among College Students of Both Sexes. Century, 60:123–128 (May, 1900).

FOOTNOTES

[1] Mr. Jenks, besides editing for St. Nicholas Magazine during many years a unique department known as “Books and Reading,” has written widely on the subject of juvenile literature. See his “The Modern Child as a Reader.” The Book-buyer, August, 1901, p. 17.

[2] An interesting field for research is that of the illustration of children’s books. Note Thomas Bewick, John Bewick, etc. Of a later period, Tenniel, Cruikshank, Doré, Herr Richter. Vide “The Child and His Book,” Mrs. E. M. Field, chap. xiv; “Some Illustrators of Children’s Books.” Also “Children’s Books and their Illustrators.” Gleeson White, The International Studio. Special Winter No., 1897–98.

THE GROWTH OF JUVENILE LITERATURE

Transcriber's Note: Text version of the above two diagrams.

GROWTH OF JUVENILE LITERATURE

A PARTIAL INDICATION, BY DIAGRAM

FRENCH IMPETUS

|

+---------------------+------------+----------------------------------------+

| | | |

| | | |

Jean de La Fontaine[6][7] | Charles Perrault[6][7] Comtesse D’Aulnoy[6][7]

(1621–1695) | (1628–1703) (1650–1705)

| |

| |

ENGLISH IMPETUS | |

| | |

| | +--------------------+

Horn-books | Mother Goose |

| | |

| | |

+-------+ | Oliver Goldsmith[3]-------John Newbery[3]

| | | (1728–1774) (1713–1767)

| | | |

| | | |

Chap-books | +------------+ |

| | |

New England Primer | |

| Jean Jacques Rousseau[6][7] Isaiah Thomas[4]

| (1712–1778) (1749–1831)

| | |

+----------------------------------+---------------------------------------------+

DIDACTIC SCHOOL

|

Sarah Kirby Trimmer[3]--------------------------------+

(1741–1810) |

|

+-------------------------+-----------------------+--------------------+ |

| | | | |

Joseph Jacotot[6][7][11] F. Froebel[8][12] F. A. W. Diesterweg[8][12] | C. G. Salzmann[12]

(1770–1840) (1782–1852) (1790–1866) | (1744–1811)

+---------------------+-------------+----------+----------+--------+-------+-------+--------------+

| | | | | | | | |

| | | | | | | | |

Madame de Arnaud Berquin[6][7] | R. L. Edgeworth[3] | John Aikin[3] | Thomas Day[3] Maria

Genlis[7] (1749?-1791) | (1744–1817) | (1747–1821) | (1748–1789) Edgeworth[3]

(1746–1830) | | | | (1767–1849)

| | Anna L. Barbauld[3][11] | |

| | (1743–1825) | |

+---------------------+---------+-------------------------+ +-------+

| | | |

| Mme. Le Prince de Hannah More[3] tr. Mary Wollstonecraft[3]

| Beaumont[6][10] (1745–1833) [Godwin]

| (1711–1780) | (1759–1797)

| | Patty More | Dr. Isaac Watts[3]

| | | | (1674–1748)

| | BOOKS FOR THE POOR | |

| | | | |

--+-----------------------+---------+--+ | William Godwin[3]------------+

| | | (1756–1836) |

Aikin Mrs. Margaret Scott Gatty[3] | Mrs. Godwin[3] William Blake[3]

(1809–1873) | | (1757–1827)

| | |

+---------------------------------------------+----- +------+--------------------+

| | | |

Peter Parley Robert Raikes[3] Mary Lamb Charles Lamb[3]

S. G. Goodrich[5] (1735–1811) (1765–1847) (1775–1834)

(1793–1860) | |

| | +----------------Jane Taylor[3]

William Martin[3] | | (1783–1824)

(1801–1867) | Mrs. Cecil Ann Taylor[3]

| | Frances Alexander (1782–1866)

SPURIOUS PARLEYS | (b. circa 1830) |

| | | |

Jacob Abbott[5] | +---------------R. L. Stevenson[3]

(1803–1879) | (1850–1894)

[13] SUNDAY SCHOOLS [14]

|

+---------------------------------------------+---------------------------------------------+

| | |

Mary M. Sherwood Manzoni[9] Catherine Sinclair[3]

(1775–1851) (1784–1873) (1800–1864)

FOOTNOTES

[3] Dictionary of National Biography. Gives further bibliography.

[4] Appleton’s Biographical Dictionary.

[5] Lamb’s Biographical Dictionary.

[6] Nouvelle Biographie Générale. Gives further bibl.

[7] La Grande Encyclopédie. Gives further bibl.

[8] Meyers Konversations-Lexikon. Bibl.

[9] Diccionario Enciclopedico Hispano-Americano.

[10] Influence of Perrault.

[11] Sister of John Aikin.

[12] Influence of Rousseau.

[13] American End of the Development.

[14] English End of the Development.

II. THE RISE OF CHILDREN’S BOOKS

I wish Mrs. Marcet, the Right Honourable T. B. Macaulay, or any other person possessing universal knowledge, would take a toy and child’s emporium in hand, and explain to us all the geographical and historical wonders it contains. That Noah’s ark, with its varied contents—its leopards and lions, with glued pump-handled tails; its light-blue elephants and ꓕ footed ducks—that ark containing the cylindrical family of the patriarch—was fashioned in Holland, most likely, by some kind pipe-smoking friends of youth by the side of a slimy canal. A peasant in a Danubian pine-wood carved that extraordinary nut-cracker, who was painted up at Nuremberg afterwards in the costume of a hideous hussar. That little fir lion, more like his roaring original than the lion at Barnet, or the lion of Northumberland House, was cut by a Swiss shepherd boy tending his goats on a mountain-side, where the chamois were jumping about in their untanned leather. I have seen a little Mahometan on the Etmeidan at Constantinople twiddling about just such a whirligig as you may behold any day in the hands of a small Parisian in the Tuileries Gardens. And as with the toys, so with the toy books. They exist everywhere: there is no calculating the distance through which the stories come to us, the number of languages through which they have been filtered, or the centuries during which they have been told. Many of them have been narrated, almost in their present shape, for thousands of years since, to little copper-coloured Sanscrit children, listening to their mother under the palm-trees by the banks of the yellow Jumna—their Brahmin mother, who softly narrated them through the ring in her nose. The very same tale has been heard by the Northmen Vikings as they lay on their shields on deck; and by Arabs couched under the stars on the Syrian plains when the flocks were gathered in and the mares were picketed by the tents. With regard to the story of Cinderella, I have heard the late Thomas Hill say that he remembered to have heard, two years before Richard Cœur de Lion came back from Palestine, a Norman jongleur—but, in a word, there is no end to the antiquity of these tales....”—“Michael Angelo Titmarsh on Some Illustrated Children’s Books,” in Fraser’s Magazine for April, 1846.

I. Horn-books; Chap-books; The New England Primer.

Previous to the impetus given to child study by the educational theories of Rousseau, little was written intentionally for children that would not at the same time appeal to adults. Yet there are chapters still to be penned, stretching back into English history as far as 1430 and earlier, when words of instruction were framed for youth; when conduct, formality, austere manners, complete submission, were not only becoming to the child, but were forced upon him.[15]

There are several manuscripts extant of that year, 1430, one whose authorship is ascribed to John Lydgate and which bears the Latin title, “Puer ad Mensam.” There is also the “Babees Book” of 1475, intended for those boys of royal blood who served as pages in the palace. The American student has to reach an understanding of the purport of most of these treatises from secondary sources; the manuscripts are not easily accessible, and have so far been utilised only in a fragmentary character. For the present purpose, the mention of a few examples will suffice.

We note “A Booke in Englyssh metre, of the great marchaunt man called Dyves Pragmaticus, very pretye for chyldren to rede; wherby they may the better, and more readyer rede and wryte Wares and Implementes in this worlde contayned.... When thou sellest aught unto thy neighbour, or byest anything of him, deceave not, nor oppresse him, etc. Imprinted at London in Aldersgate strete by Alexander Lacy, dwellyng beside the Wall. The XXV. of April 11, 1563.”[16]

Those boys bound out or apprenticed to members of the Middle Age crafts and guilds perhaps benefited by the moral of this; no doubt they bethought themselves of the friendly warning, whenever they cried their master’s wares outside the stalls; perhaps they were forearmed as well as forewarned by the friendly rules contained in the “Books of Good Manners” (1560) which, though they could not own, were repeated to them by others more fortunate. These same boys, who played the angels in the miracle plays, and the Innocents in the “Rachel” dramas, who were held suspended by a rope high up in the nave of the church, to proclaim the birth of the Lord in the Christmas cycles, were actors also, around 1563, in “A New Enterlude for Chyldren to Play, named Jacke Jugeler, both wytte, and very playsent.”

Fundamentally, the boys of the early centuries must have been not unlike the boys of all ages, although the customs of an age usually stunt whatever is not in conformity with the times. He who, in 1572, was warned in “Youth’s Behaviour” (“or, Decency in Conversation Amongst Men, Composed in French by Grave Persons, for the use and benefit of their youth, now newly turned into English, by Francis Hawkins, nephew to Sir Thomas Hawkins. The tenth impression.”), was likewise warned in the New-England township, and needs to be warned to-day. No necessity to paint the picture in more definite colours than those emanating from the mandates direct. “Hearing thy Master, or likewise the Preacher, wriggle not thyself, as seeming unable to contain thyself within thy skin.” Uncomfortable in frills or stiff collars, and given no backs to benches, the child was doomed to a dreary sermon full of brimstone and fire; he was expected, “in yawning, [to] howl not.” The translation, it will be remarked, was made by Master Francis when he had scarce attained the age of eight; this may be considered precocious, but, when French was more the official language than English, it was necessary that all persons of any distinction should have a mastery of the polite tongue, even though they might remain not so well equipped in the language of learning.[17] Hawkins was therefore carefully exercised and the translation became a task in a twofold way. His uncle soon followed the first section of “Youth’s Behaviour” with a second part, intended for girls.

Poor starved souls of those young gentlewomen of the sixteenth century, who were recommended, for their entertainment in hours of recreation, to read “God’s Revenge against Murther; and the Arcadia of Sir Philip Sydney; Artemidorus, his Interpretation of Dreams. And for the business of their devotion, there is an excellent book entitled Taylor’s Holy Living and Dying; The Duty of Man in which the Duty to God and man are both comprehended.” Such guidance is not peculiar alone to this period. It was followed, in slightly simplified form, throughout the didactic school of writing.

Fortunately we are able, by means of our historical imagination, to fill up the interstices of this grave assemblage with something of a more entertaining character; we have a right to include the folk tales, the local legends and hero deeds which have descended to us through countless telling. Romance and interest still lie buried in annals which might be gathered together, dealing with the lives of those nurses who reared ancient kings. As a factor in the early period of children’s literature, the grandam is of vast meaning.

About the time of which we have just been speaking, as early as 1570, little folks began learning their letters from horn-books and “battle-dores.” Take an abacus frame and transfer the handle to one of its sides as a base. Within the frame insert a single leaf of thick cardboard, on one side of which place the alphabet, large and small, lettered heavily in black. Then, with the regularity of a regiment, string out three or four slender columns of monosyllables. Do we not here detect the faint glimmer of our college song, “b-a, ba; b-e, be; b-i, bi; babebi”? Should one side not hold all this, use both, although it is not preferable to do so. However, it is essential that ample room be left in any case for the inclusion of the Lord’s Prayer. When this is done, slip over the face of the cardboard a clear piece of diaphanous horn, in default of which isinglass will suffice. Through the handle bore a hole, into which run a string. Finally, attach your handiwork to a girdle or belt, and behold, you are transformed into a school child of the Middle Ages! Your abacus has become a horn-book, quite as much by reason of its horn surface, as because of its essential use. Should you be looking for historical accuracy, let the “Christ-cross” precede the alphabet, whence it will become apparent why our letters are often styled the Criss-cross row. Flourishing until some time during the reign of George II, these curiosities are now rare indeed. There is little of an attractive nature in such a “lesson-book,” but childhood had its compensations, for there is preserved the cheerful news that horn-books were often made of gingerbread. Were these the forebears of our animal crackers or our spiced alphabets?

A survey of chap-books[18] presents a picture of literature trying to be popular; we find all classes of people being catered to, young and old, rich and poor. The multitude of assorted pamphlets reflects the manners, the superstitions, the popular customs of rustics; the stories stretch from the humourous to the strictly religious type. There are many examples preserved, for not until well on in the nineteenth century were chap-books supplanted in favour. To-day, the largest collection that the world possesses, garnered by Professor Child, is to be found in the Harvard University Library; but the Bodleian and the British Museum claim to be richer in early examples, extending back to 1598.

Charles Gerring, calling the chap-books “uninviting, poor, starved things,” yet lays before readers not an unwholesome array of goods. He writes:

“For the lads, there were tales of action, of adventure, sometimes truculently sensational; for the girls were stories of a more domestic character; for the tradesmen, there was the ‘King and the Cobbler,’ or ‘Long Tom the Carrier’; for the soldier and the sailor, ‘Admiral Blake,’ ‘Johnny Armstrong,’ and ‘Chevy Chase’; for the lovers, ‘Patient Grissil’ and ‘Delights for Young Men and Maids’; for the serving-lad, ‘Tom Hickathrift’[19] and ‘Sir Richard Whittington’; while the serving-maid then, as now, would prefer ‘The Egyptian Fortune Teller,’ or ‘The Interpretation of Dreams and Moles.’”

Every phase of human nature was thus served up for a penny. In those days, people were more apt to want tales with heroes and heroines of their own rank and station; a certain appropriateness in this way was satisfied. Such correspondence was common as early as 1415, when a mystery play was presented by the crafts, and the Plasterers were given the “Creation of the World” to depict, while the Chandlers were assigned the “Lighting of the Star” upon the birth of Christ.

There were to be had primers, song-books, and joke-books; histories, stories, and hero tales. Printed in type to ruin eyes, pictured in wood-cuts to startle fancy and to shock taste—for they were not always suited to childhood—these pamphlets, 2½″ × 3½″, sometimes 5½″ × 4¼″ in size, and composed of from four to twenty-four pages, served a useful purpose. They placed literature within reach of all who could read. Queer dreams, piety of a pronounced nature, jests with a ribald meaning, and riddles comprised the content of many of them. A child who could not buy a horn-book turned to the “battle-dore” with his penny—a crude sheet of cardboard, bicoloured and folded either once or twice, with printing on both sides; the reading matter was never-failingly the same in these horn-books and “battle-dores,” although sometimes the wood-cuts varied. A horn-book is recorded with a picture of Charles I upon it.

The sixteenth or seventeenth-century boy could own his “Jack and the Giants” and “Guy of Warwick,” his “Hector of Troy” and “Hercules of Greece”; he could even have the latest imported novelty. Some believe that because Shakespeare based many of his plays upon Continental legends, a demand was started for such chap-books as “Fortunatus,” “Titus Andronicus,” or “Valentine and Orson.” The printers of these crude booklets were on the alert for every form of writing having a popular appeal; there was rivalry among them as there is rivalry among publishers to-day. Not long after the appearance of the English translation of Perrault’s “Tales of Mother Goose,” each one of them, given a separate and attractive form—“Blue-beard” in awful ferocity, “Cinderella” in gorgeous apparel, and the others—was made into a chap-book. In Ashton, we find mention of an early catalogue “of Maps, Prints, Copy-books, Drawing-books, Histories, Old Ballads, Patters, Collections, etc., printed and sold by Cluer Dicey and Richard Marshall at the Printing-Office in Aldermary (4) Church Yard, London. Printed in the year MDCCLXIV.” These men appear to have been important chap-book publishers.

The hawkers, who went through the streets and who travelled the country-side, much as our pioneer traders were accustomed to do, were termed chapmen. They were eloquent in the manner of describing their display; they were zealous as to their line of trade. Imagine, if you will, the scene in some isolated village—the wild excitement when the good man arrived. He was known to Piers Plowman in 1362, he perhaps wandered not far away from the Canterbury Pilgrims; each of Chaucer’s Tales might well be fashioned as a chap-book. Along the dusty highway this old-time peddler travelled, with packet on his back and a stout staff in hand—such a character maybe as Dougal Grahame, hunch-backed and cross-eyed—by professions, a town crier and bellman, as well as a trader in literature. On his tongue’s tip he carried the latest gossip; he served as an instrument of cross-fertilisation, bringing London-town in touch with Edinburgh or Glasgow, and with small hamlets on the way.

“Do you wish to know, my lady,” he would ask, “how fares the weather on the morrow?” From the depths of his packet he would draw “The Shepherd’s Prognostication” (1673), wherein is told that “the blust’ring and noise of leaves and trees and woods, or other places is a token of foul weather.” “And prithee, mistress,” he would add, “I have a warning herein for you. A mole on the forehead denotes fair riches, but yonder brown spot on your eyebrow bids me tell you to refrain from marriage, for if he marry you, he shall have seven wives in his life-time!”

Many a modern reader would be interested in the detailed directions given for falling in love and for falling out again; for determining whom fate had decreed as the husband, or who was to be the wife. It is more wholesome in these days to name the four corners of a bedroom than to submit to the charm of a pared onion, wrapped in a kerchief and placed on the pillow; yet the two methods must be related.

For the little ones, there were picture-books in bright colours, smug in their anachronisms. The manufacturers of chap-books never hesitated to use the same wood-cuts over and over again; Queen Anne might figure in a history, but she served as well in the capacity of Sleeping Beauty; more appropriate in its historical application seems to have been the appearance of Henry VIII as Jack the Giant-Killer.

The subject of chap-books is alluring; the few elements here noted suggest how rich in local colour the material is. Undoubtedly the roots of juvenile literature are firmly twined about these penny sheets. Their circulation is a matter that brings the social student in touch with the middle-class life. Not only the chap-books and the horn-books, but the so-called Garlands, rudimentary anthologies of popular poems and spirited ballads, served to relieve the drudgery of commonplace lives, toned the sluggish mind by quickening the imagination. A curious part of the history of these Garlands is their sudden disappearance, brought about by two types of hawkers, known as the “Primers-up” and “Long-Song Sellers,” who peddled a new kind of ware.

The Primers-up are relatives of our city venders. They clung to corners, where dead walls gave them opportunity to pin their literature within sight of the public. Wherever there happened to be an unoccupied house, one of these fellows would be found with his songs, coarse, sentimental, and spirited, cut in slips a yard long—three yards for a penny. Thus displayed, he would next open a gaudy umbrella, upon the under side of which an art gallery of cheap prints was free to look upon. Conjure up for yourselves the apprentice peering beneath the large circumference of such a gingham tent.

Across the way, the Long-Song Sellers marched up and down, holding aloft stout poles, from which streamed varied ribbons of verse—rhythm fluttering in the breeze—and yelling, “Three yards a penny, songs, beautiful songs, nooest songs.”

It is apparent that much of the horn-book is incorporated in the “New England Primer,” although the development of the latter may be considered independently. The Primer is an indispensable part of Puritan history in America, despite the fact that its source extends as far back as the time of Henry VIII, when it was probably regarded more in the light of a devotional than of an educational book. The earliest mention of it in New England was that published in the Boston Almanac of 1691, when Benjamin Harris, bookseller and printer, called attention to its second impression.[20] Before that, in 1685, Samuel Green, a Boston printer, issued a primer which he called “The Protestant Teacher for Children,” and a copy of which may be seen in the library of the American Antiquarian Society of Worcester, Massachusetts. The title would indicate also that in America the primer for children at first served the same purpose as the morality play for adults in England; it was a vehicle for religious instruction.

The oldest existent copy of the New England Primer bears the imprint of Thomas Fleet, son-in-law of the famous Mrs. Goose, of whom we shall speak later. This was in 1737. Before then, in 1708, Benjamin Eliot of Boston, probably encouraged by earlier editions of primers, advertised “The First Book for Children; or, The Compleat School-Mistress”; and Timothy Green in 1715 announced “A Primer for the Colony of Connecticut; or, an Introduction to the True Reading of English. To which is added Milk for Babes.” This latter title suggests the name of the Reverend John Cotton, and, furthermore, the name of Cotton Mather, one of the austere writers, as the titles of his books alone bear witness.

Six copies of the New England Primer lay before me, brown paper covers, dry with age; blue boards, worn with much handling; others in gray and green that have faded like the age which gave them birth. The boy who brought them to me wore a broad smile upon his face; perhaps he was wondering why I wished such toy books, no larger than 3¼″ × 2½″. He held them all in one hand so as to show his superior strength. Yet had he been taken into the dark corridor between the book stacks, and had he been shown the contents of those crinkly leaves, there might have crept over him some remnant of the feeling of awe which must have seized the Colonial boy and girl. What would he have thought of the dutiful child’s promises, or of the moral precepts, had they been read to him? Would he have shrunk backward at the description of the bad boy? Would he have beamed with youthful hope of salvation upon the picture of the good boy? It is doubtful whether the naughty girls, called “hussies,” ever reformed; it is doubtful whether they ever wanted to be the good girl of the verses. That smiling boy of the present would have turned grave over the cut of Mr. John Rogers in the flames, despite the placid expression of wonderful patience over the martyr’s face; his knees would have trembled at the sombre meaning of the lines:

“I in the burial place may see

Graves shorter far than I;

From death’s arrest no age is free,

Young children too may die.”

The New England Primers[21] were called pleasant guides; they taught that the longest life is a lingering death. There was the fear instead of the love of God in the text, and yet the type of manhood fostered by such teaching was no wavering type, no half-way spirit. The Puritan travelled the narrow road, but he faced it, however dark the consequences.

Sufficient has been said to give some idea of the part occupied by these early publications—whether horn-book, chap-book, or primer. They bore an intimate relation to the life of the child; they were, together with the Almanack, which is typified by that of “Poor Richard,” and with the Calendar, part of a development which may be traced, with equal profit, in England, Scotland, France, and Germany. Their full history is fraught with human significance.

II. La Fontaine and Perrault.

Folk-lore stretches into the Valhalla of the past; our heritage consists of an assemblage of the heroic through all ages. A history of distinctive books for children must enter into minute traceries of the golden thread of legend, fable, and belief, of romance and adventure; it must tell of the wanderings of rhyme and marvel, under varied disguises, from mouth to mouth, from country to country, naught of richness being taken away from them, much of new glory being added. But for our immediate purposes, we imagine all this to be so; we take it for granted that courtier and peasant have had their fancies. The tales told to warriors are told to children, and in turn by nurses to these children’s children. The knight makes his story by his own action in the dark forest, or in the king’s palace; he appears before the hut of the serf, and his horse is encircled by a magic light. The immortal hero is kept immortal by what is heroic in ourselves.

Jean de La Fontaine (1621–1695) was a product of court life; and the fable was the literary form introduced to amuse the corsaged ladies of Versailles. La Fontaine was the cynic in an age of hypocrisy and favouritism, and one cannot estimate his work fully, apart from the social conditions fostering it. He was steeped in French lore, and in a knowledge of the popular tales of the Middle Ages. He was licentious in some of his writing, and wild in his living; he was a friend of Fouquet, and he knew Molière, Racine, and Boileau. He was a brilliant, unpractical satirist, who had to be supported by his friends, and who was elected to the Academy because his monarch announced publicly that he had promised to behave. Toward the end of his life he atoned for his misdemeanours by a formal confession.

There was much of the child heart in La Fontaine, and this characteristic, together with the spleen which develops in every courtier, aided him in his composition of the Fables. Unclean his tales may be, likened to Boccaccio, but the true poet in him produced incomparable verses which have been saved for the present and will live far into the future because of the universality of their moral. The wolf and dog, the grasshopper and ant, all moved in silks and satins at the court of Louis XIV, and bowed for social rank, some trailing their pride in the dust, others raised to high position through the fortune of unworthy favour. So successfully did La Fontaine paint his pictures that the veiled allusions became lost in time beneath the distinct individuality of the courtiers’ animal prototypes. The universal in La Fontaine is like the universal in Molière and Shakespeare, but it has a wider appeal, for children relish it as their own.

Another figure was dominant at the court of Louis XIV—one equally as immortal as La Fontaine, though not so generally known—Charles Perrault (1628–1703). He was a brilliant genius, versatile in talent and genial in temper. He dabbled in law, he dabbled in architecture, and through it won the favour of Colbert. With an abiding love for children, he suggested and successfully carried the idea of keeping open the royal gardens for young Parisians. Through Colbert he became an Academician in 1671, and, with the energy which usually marked his actions, he set about influencing the rulings of that body. He was a man of progress, not an advocate of classical formalism. He battled long and hard with Boileau, who was foremost among the Classicists; his appeal was for the future rather than for the past. He was intellectually alert in all matters; probably, knowing that he possessed considerable hold upon the Academy, he purposely startled that august gathering by his statement that had Homer lived in the days of Louis XIV he would have made a better poet. But the declaration was like a burning torch set to dry wood; Boileau blazed forth, and the fight between himself and Perrault, lasting some time, became one of the most famous literary quarrels that mark the pages of history.

After Perrault retired to his home in the year 1686, and when he could have his children around him, he began the work which was destined to last. Lang calls him “a good man, a good father, a good Christian, and a good fellow.” It is in the capacity of father that we like to view him—taking an interest in the education of his children, listening to them tell their tales which they had first heard from their nurse; his heart became warmed by their frank, free camaraderie, and it is likely that these impromptu story hours awakened in him some dim memories of the same legends told him in his boyhood.

There is interesting speculation associated with his writing of the “Contes de ma Mère l’Oye.” They were published in 1697, although previously they had appeared singly in Moetjen’s Magazine at the Hague. An early letter from Madame de Sévigné mentions the wide-spread delight taken by the nobles of the court in all “contes”; this was some twenty years before Perrault penned his. But despite their popularity among the worldly wise, the Academician was too much of an Academician to confess openly that he was the author of the “contes.” Instead, he ascribed them to his son, Perrault Darmancour. This has raised considerable doubt among scholars as to whether the boy should really be held responsible for the authorship of the book. Mr. Lang wisely infers that there is much evidence throughout the tales of the mature feeling and art of Perrault; but he also is content to hold to the theory that will blend the effort of old age and youth, of father and son.

The fact remains that, were it not for Perrault, the world might have been less rich by such immortal pieces as “The Three Wishes,” “The Sleeping Beauty,” “Red Riding Hood,” “Blue Beard,” “Puss in Boots,” and “Cinderella,” as they are known to us to-day. They might have reached us from other countries in modified form, but the inimitable pattern belongs to Perrault.

Another monument preserves his name, the discussion of which requires a section by itself. But consideration must be paid in passing to the “fées” of Marie Catherine Jumelle de Berneville, Comtesse D’Anois (Aulnoy) [1650 or 51–1705], who is responsible for such tales as “Finetta, the Cinder-Girl.”[22] Fortunately, to the charm of her fairy stories, which are written in no mean imitation of Perrault, there have clung none of the qualities which made her one of the most intriguing women of her period. She herself possessed a magnetic personality and a bright wit. Her married life began at the age of sixteen, and through her career lovers flocked to her standard; because of the ardour of one, she came near losing her head. But despite the fact that only two out of five of her children could claim legitimacy, they seem to have developed in the Comtesse d’Aulnoy an unmistakable maternal instinct, and an unerring judgment in the narration of stories. She is familiar to-day because of her tales, although recently an attractive edition of her “Spanish Impressions” was issued—a book which once received the warm commendation of Taine.

III. Mother Goose.

There has been a sentimental desire on the part of many students to trace the origin of Mother Goose to this country; but despite all effort to the contrary, and a false identification of Thomas Fleet’s mother-in-law, Mrs. Goose, or Vergoose, with the famous old woman, the origin is indubitably French. William H. Whitmore[23] sums up his evidence in the matter as follows:

“According to my present knowledge, I feel sure that the original name is merely a translation from the French; that the collection was first made for and by John Newbery of London, about A.D. 1760; and that the great popularity of the book is due to the Boston editions of Munroe and Francis, A.D. 1824–1860.”

It appears that, in 1870, William A. Wheeler edited an edition of “Mother Goose,” wherein he averred that Elizabeth, widow of one Isaac Vergoose, was the sole originator of the jingles. This statement was based upon the assurances of a descendant, John Fleet Eliot. But there is much stronger evidence in Perrault’s favour than mere hearsay; even the statement that a 1719 volume of the melodies was printed by Fleet himself has so far failed of verification.

The name, Mother Goose, is first heard of in the seventeenth century. During 1697, Perrault published his “Histoires ou Contes du Tems Passé avec des Moralitez,” with a frontispiece of an old woman telling stories to an interested group. Upon a placard by her side was lettered the significant title already quoted:

CONTES

DE MA

MERE

LOYE

There is no doubt, therefore, that the name was not of Boston origin; some would even go further back and mingle French legend with history; they would claim that the mother of Charlemagne, with the title of Queen Goose-foot (Reine Pédance), was the only true source.[24]

Mr. Austin Dobson has called Mr. Lang’s attention to the fact that in the Monthly Chronicle for March, 1729, an English version of Perrault’s “Tales” was mentioned, done by Mr. Robert Samber, and printed by J. Pote; another English edition appeared at The Hague in 1745. This seems to be the first introduction into England of the “Mother Goose Fairy Tales.” It was probably their popularity, due not only to their intrinsic interest, but partly to the speculation as to Mother Goose’s identification, that made John Newbery, the famous London publisher, conceive the brilliant plan of gathering together those little songs familiar to the nursery, and of laying them to the credit of Mother Goose herself. In so doing, he solicited the assistance of Oliver Goldsmith (1728–1774). Mr. Whitmore writes:

“If, as seems most probable, the first edition of ‘Mother Goose’s Melody’ was issued prior to John Newbery’s death in 1767, there is an interesting question as to who prepared the collection for the press. The rhymes are avowedly the favourites of the nursery, but the preface and the foot-notes are an evident burlesque upon more pretentious works.”

There are two small pieces of evidence indicating clearly Goldsmith’s editorship. On January 29, 1768, he produced his “Good Natur’d Man,” and with his friends dined beforehand in gala fashion at an inn. Subject to extremes of humour, on this occasion he was most noisy, and he sang his favourite song, we are told, which was nothing more than “An old woman tossed in a blanket, seventeen times as high as the moon.” As it happens, this ditty is mentioned in the preface to Newbery’s collection of rhymes, without any more apparent reason than that it was a favourite with the editor, who wished to introduce it in some way, however irrelevant. Again, we are assured that Miss Hawkins once exclaimed, “I little thought what I should have to boast, when Goldsmith taught me to play Jack and Jill, by two bits of paper on his fingers.”

Thus, though the tasks performed by Goldsmith for Newbery are generally accounted specimens of hack work, which he had to do in order to eke out a livelihood, there is satisfaction in claiming for him two immortal strokes, his tale of “Goody Two Shoes,” and his share in the establishment of the Mother Goose Melodies.[25] Many a time he was dependent upon the beneficence of his publisher, many a time rescued by him from the hands of the bailiff. The Newbery accounts are dotted with entries of various loans; even the proceeds of the first performances of the “Good Natur’d Man” were handed over to Newbery to satisfy one of his claims.

The notes accompanying the melodies, and which have no bearing upon the child-interest in the collection, show a wit that might very well belong to Goldsmith. He was perhaps amusing himself at the expense of his lexicographer friend, Johnson. For instance, to the jingle, “See saw, Margery Daw,” is appended this, taken seemingly from “Grotius”: “It is a mean and scandalous Practice in Authors to put Notes to Things that deserve no Notice.” And to the edifying and logical song, “I wou’d, if I cou’d, If I cou’dn’t, how cou’d I? I cou’dn’t, without I cou’d, cou’d I?” is attached the evident explanation from “Sanderson”: “This is a new Way of handling an old Argument, said to be invented by a famous Senator; but it has something in it of Gothick Construction.” Assuredly the names of those learned authors, “Mope,” credited with the “Geography of the Mind,” and “Huggleford,” writing on “Hunger,” were intended for ridicule.

By 1777, “Mother Goose” had passed into its seventh edition, but, though its success was largely assured, there are still to be noted rival publications. For instance, John Marshall,[26] who later became the publisher of Mrs. Trimmer’s works, issued some rhymes, conflicting with the book of Melodies which Carnan, Newbery’s stepson, had copyrighted in 1780, and had graced with a subtitle, “Sonnets for the Cradle.” During 1842, J. O. Halliwell edited for the Percy Society, “The Nursery Rhymes of England, collected principally from Oral Tradition,” and he mentioned an octavo volume printed in London, 1797, and containing some of our well-known verses. These it seems had been first collected by the scholar, Joseph Ritson,[27] and called “Gammer Gurton’s Garland.” The 1797 book was called “Infant Institutes,” semi-satirical in its general plan, and was ascribed to the Reverend Baptist Noel Turner, M.A.,[28] rector of Denton. If this was intended to supplant Newbery’s collection, it failed in its object. However, it is to be noted and emphasised that so varied did the editions become, that the fate of “Mother Goose” would not have been at all fortunate in the end, had not Monroe and Francis in Boston insisted upon the original collection as the authentic version, circa 1824. Its rights were thus established in America.

The melodies have a circuitous literary history. In roundabout fashion, the ditties have come out of the obscure past and have been fixed at various times by editors of zealous nature. For the folk-lore student, such investigation has its fascination; but the original rhymes are not all pure food for the nursery. In the course of time, the juvenile volumes have lost the jingles with a tang of common wit. They come to us now, gay with coloured print, rippling with merriment, with a rhythm that must be kept time to by a tap of the foot upon the floor or by some bodily motion. Claim for them, as you will, an educational value; they are the child’s first entrance into storyland; they train his ear, they awaken his mind, they develop his sense of play. It is a joyous garden of incongruity we are bequeathed in “Mother Goose.”

IV. John Newbery, Oliver Goldsmith, and Isaiah Thomas.

Wherever you wander in the land of children’s books, ramifications, with the vein of hidden gold, invite investigation,—rich gold for the student and for the critic, but less so for the general reader. Yet upon the general reader a book’s immortality depends. No librarian, no historian, need be crowded out; there are points still to be settled, not in the mere dry discussion of dates, but in the estimates of individual effect. The development of children’s books is consecutive, carried forward because of social reasons; each name mentioned has a story of its own. Two publishers at the outset attract our regard; except for them, much would have been lost to English and American children.

As early as Elizabeth’s time, Rafe Newberie, Master of Stationer’s Company, published Hakluyt’s “Voyages.” From him, John Newbery (1713–1767) was descended. Given an ordinary schooling, he was apprenticed to the printer, William Carnan, who, dying in 1737, divided his worldly goods between his brother Charles, and his assistant John. The latter, in order to cement his claim still further, married his employer’s widow, by whom he had three children, Francis, his successor in the publishing business, being born on July 6, 1743.

Newbery was endowed with much common sense. He travelled somewhat extensively before settling in London, and, during his wanderings, he jotted down rough notes, relating especially to his future book trade; the remarks are worthy of a keen critic. During this time it is hard to keep Newbery, the publisher, quite free from the picturesque career of Newbery, the druggist; on the one hand Goldsmith might call him “the philanthropic publisher of St. Paul’s Churchyard,” as he did in the “Vicar of Wakefield,” which was first printed by Newbery and Benjamin Collins, of Salisbury; on the other hand, in 1743, one might just as well have praised him for the efficacy of the pills and powders he bartered. Now we find him a shopkeeper, catering to the captains of ships from his warehouse, and adding every new concoction to his stock of homeopathic deceptions. Even Goldsmith could not refrain from having a slap at his friend in “Quacks Ridiculed.”

He made money, however, and he associated with a literary set among whom gold was much coveted and universally scarce. The portly Dr. Johnson ofttimes borrowed a much-needed guinea, an unfortunate privilege, for he had a habit of never working so long as he could feel money in his pocket. This generosity on the part of Newbery did not deter Johnson from showing his disapproval over many of the former’s publications. We can well imagine the implied sarcasm in his declaration that Newbery was an extraordinary man, “for I know not whether he has read, or written most books.” Between 1744 and 1802, records indicate that Newbery and his successors printed some three hundred volumes, two hundred of which were juvenile; small wonder he needed the editorial assistance of such persons as Dr. Johnson and Oliver Goldsmith.

One of the first pieces the latter let Newbery have, was an article for the Literary Magazine of January, 1758. Then there came into existence The Universal Chronicle, or Weekly Gazette in April, 1758, for which Johnson wrote “The Idler.” In 1759, The British Magazine or Monthly Repository for Gentlemen and Ladies, by T. Smollett, M.D., and others was announced, Smollett then taking a rest cure in jail. As though magazines could be launched in a few hours without sinking, a daily sheet called the Public Ledger was brought into existence on January 12, 1760, for which Goldsmith wrote his “Chinese Letters.” Between this date and 1767, Goldsmith resided in a room on the upper floor of Newbery’s house at Islington, and the publisher’s son declares that while there Goldsmith read to him odd parts of “The Traveller” and the “Vicar of Wakefield.” This has not so much evidence to support it as the fact that bills presented at the front door for Goldsmith, usually found their way to Newbery for settlement.

How much actual suggestion Goldsmith gave to his publisher-employer, how far he influenced the character of the books to be printed, cannot be determined; he and Griffith and Giles Jones assuredly encouraged the juvenile picture stories. An advertisement of 1765 calls attention to the following: “The Renowned History of Giles Gingerbread, a little boy who lived upon learning” [the combination is very appropriate in its compensating qualities of knowledge and “sweets”]; “The Whitsuntide Gift, or the Way to be Happy”; “The Valentine Gift, or how to behave with honour, integrity and humanity”; and “The History of Little Goody Two Shoes, otherwise called Margery Two Shoes.”

Though he could not wholly escape the charge of catering to the moral craze of the time, Newbery at least infused into his little books something of imagination and something of heroic adventure; not sufficient however to please Dr. Johnson, who once said: “Babies do not want to hear about babies; they like to be told of giants and castles, and of somewhat which can stretch and stimulate their little minds.” A thrust at the ignorance of grown people, regarding what children like, is further seen in Johnson’s remark that parents buy, but girls and boys seldom read what is calculated for them.

There are many to praise Newbery’s prints; they were more or less oddities, even in their own time. Their usefulness was typified in such books as the “Circle of Sciences,” a compendium of universal knowledge; their attractiveness was dependent not only upon the beauty of their make, but also upon the queerness of their format; for example, such volumes as were called the snuff-box series, or ready references for waistcoat pockets. Then there was the combination plan, indicated in the announcement: “A Little Pretty Pocket-Book, intended for the Instruction and Amusement of Little Master Tommy and Pretty Miss Polly, with an agreeable letter to read from Jack-the-Giant-Killer, as also a Ball and Pincushion, the use of which will infallibly make Tommy a Good Boy, and Polly a Good Girl.... Price of the Book alone, 6d., with a Ball or Pincushion, 8d.”

The variety of Newbery’s ideas resulted in every species of book-publishing, from a children’s magazine (The Lilliputian), with Goldsmith as the reputed editor, to a child’s grammar. Interested one moment in a machine for the colouring of silks and cloths, at another he would be extolling the fever powders of Dr. James, a whilom schoolfellow of Johnson. He was untiring in his business activity. His firm changed name many times, but always Newbery remained the dominant figure. After his death, the business continued for some while to be identified with its founder, and for a long period his original policy was continued. Francis Newbery, the son, left an autobiography of historic value.

Newbery’s real genius consisted in his trading ability. Modern advertising is not more clever than that practised by this shrewd man of the eighteenth century. Not only was he in the habit of soliciting puffs, and of making some of the characters in his stories proclaim the excellencies of his books, but the personal note and the friendly feeling displayed in his newspaper items were uncommonly intimate. Witness the London Chronicle for December 19–January 1, 1765:

“The Philosophers, Politicians, Necromancers, and the learned in every faculty are desired to observe that on the first of January, being New Year’s day (oh, that we all may lead new lives!), Mr. Newbery intends to publish the following important volumes, bound and gilt, and hereby invites all his little friends who are good to call for them at the Bible and Sun, in St. Paul’s Churchyard, but those who are naughty to have none.”

Thomas in later years adopted the same method of advertising.

The most thorough piece of research work done by Mr. Charles Welsh is his “A Bookseller of the Last Century.” Had he aimed at nothing more than preserving the catalogue of Newbery’s books, he would have rendered a great service to the library student. But he has in addition written a very complete life of Newbery. When it is noted that this printer was brought into business relations with Robert Raikes, and was further connected with him by the union of Newbery’s son with Raikes’ sister, it is safe to believe that some of the piousness which crept into the publisher’s wares was encouraged by the zealous spirit of the founder of Sunday-schools. Raikes will be dealt with in his proper place.

Newbery was what may be termed an enthusiastic publisher, a careful manufacturer of books of the flower-and-gilt species. As a friend he has been pictured nothing loath to help the needy, but always with generous security and heavy interest attached; he was a business man above all else, and that betokens keenness for a bargain, a keenness akin to cleverness rather than to graciousness. In his “Life of Goldsmith,” Washington Irving is inclined to be severe in his estimate; he writes:

“The poet [Goldsmith] has celebrated him as the friend of all mankind; he certainly lost nothing by his friendship. He coined the brains of authors in the times of their exigency, and made them pay dear for the plank put out to keep them from drowning. It is not likely his death caused much lamentation among the scribbling tribe.”

One difficulty Newbery had to contend with was the piracy of his books; there was no adequate protection afforded by the copyright system, and we read of Goldsmith and Johnson bewailing the literary thievery of the day. By some it was regarded as a custom to be accepted; by others as a deplorable condition beyond control. Early American authorship suffered from the same evil, and Irving and Cooper were the two prominent victims.

The book list of Isaiah Thomas (1749–1831), the Worcester, Massachusetts printer, shows how freely he drew from the London bookseller. Called by many the Didot of America, founder of the American Antiquarian Society, author of one of the most authentic histories of early printing in this country, he is the pioneer of children’s books for America. He scattered his presses and stores over a region embracing Worcester and Boston, Mass.; Concord, N. H.; Baltimore, Md.; and Albany, N. Y. Books were kept by him, so he vouched, specially for the instruction and amusement of children, to make them safe and happy. In his “Memoirs” there is found abundant material to satisfy one as to the nature of reading for young folks in New England, previous to the Revolution.

Emerson writes in his “Spiritual Laws” regarding “theological problems”; he calls them “the soul’s mumps and measles and whooping-cough.” Already the sombre sternness of Colonial literature for children has been typified in the “New England Primer.” The benefits of divine songs and praises; the reiteration of the joy to parents, consequent upon the behaviour of godly children; the mandates, the terrible finger of retribution, the warning to all sinners lurking in the throat disease which was prevalent at one time—all these ogres rise up in the Thomas book to crush juvenile exuberance. Does it take much description to get at the miserable heart of the early piety displayed by the heroines of Cotton Mather’s volumes, those stone images of unthinkable children who passed away early, who were reclaimed from disobedience, “children in whom the fear of God was remarkably budding before they died”? Writers never fail to say, in speaking of Thomas White’s “Little Book for Children” (reprint of 1702), that its immortality, in the face of all its theology, is centred in one famous untheological line, “A was an archer who shot at a frog.”

What Thomas did, when he began taking from Newbery, was to change colloquial English terms to fit new environment; the coach no longer belongs to the Lord Mayor, but to the Governor instead.[29] The text is only slightly altered. We recognise the same little boys who would become great masters; the same ear-marks stigmatise the heroines of “The Juvenile Biographer,” insufferable apostles of surname-meaning, Mistresses Allgood, Careful, and Lovebook, together with Mr. Badenough. Oh, Betsey and Nancy and Amelia and Billy, did you know what it was to romp and play?

The evident desire on the part of Miss Hewins, in her discussion of early juvenile books, to emphasise the playful, in her quotations from Thomas’ stories, only indicates that there was little levity to deal with. Those were the days of gilded “Gifts” and “Delights”; the pleasures of childhood were strangely considered; goodness was inculcated by making the hair stand on end in fright, by picturing to the naughty boy what animal he was soon to turn into, and what foul beast’s disposition was akin to that of the fractious girl. Intentions, both of an educational and religious nature, were excellent, no doubt; but, when all is estimated, the residue presents a miserable, lifeless ash.[30]

So far no distinctive writer for children has arisen. The volumes issued by Newbery represent a conscious attempt to appeal through form to the juvenile eye. If the books were addressed intentionally to children, their amusement consisted in some extraneous novelty; it was rarely contained in the story. Action rather than motive is the redeeming feature of “Goody Two Shoes.” As for religious training, it was administered to the child with no regard for his individual needs. He represented a theological stage of sin; the world was a long dark road, through the maze of which, by his birth, he was doomed to fight his little way. Life was a probationary period.

It is now necessary to leave the New England book, and to return to it through another channel. The viewpoint shifts slightly; a new element is to be added: a self-conscious recognition of education for children. The sternness of the “New England Primer” possessed strength. The didactic school, retaining the moral factor,—several points removed from theology—sentimentalised it; for many a day it was to exist in juvenile literature rampant. And, overflowing its borders, it was to influence later chap-books, and some of the later publications of Thomas and Newbery. Through Hannah More, it was to grip Peter Parley, and finally to die out on American shores. For “Queechy” and “The Wide, Wide World” represent the final flowering of this style. In order to retain a clear connection, it is necessary to watch both streams, educational and moral, one at first blending with the other, and flourishing in this country through a long list of New England authors, until, in the end, the educational, increasing in volume, conquered altogether.

Bibliographical Note

The Babees Book—Ed. Frederick J. Furnivall, M.A. Published for the Early English Text Society. London, Trübner, 1868.

In the foreword, note the following:

Education in early England:

1. In Nobles’ Houses; 2. At Home and at Private Tutors’; 3. At English Universities; 4. At Foreign Universities; 5. At Monastic and Cathedral Schools; 6. At Grammar Schools. Vide the several other prefaces.

This collection contains:

1. The Babees Book, or a ‘Lytyl Reporte’ of How Young People Should Behave (circa 1475 A.D.); 2. The A B C of Aristotle (1430 A.D.); 3. The Book of Curteisie That is Clepid Stans Puer ad Mensam (1430 A.D.); 4. The boke of Nurture, or Schoole of good maners: For Men, Servants, and children (1577); 5. The Schoole of Vertue, and booke of good Nourture for chyldren and youth to learne theyr dutie by (1557).

Vide Vol. iv, Percy Society, London, 1841:1. The Boke of Curtasye, ed. J. O. Halliwell. 2. Specimens of Old Christmas Carols, ed. T. Wright. 3. The Nursery Rhymes of England, ed. J. O. Halliwell, 1842: a. Historical; b. Tales; c. Jingles; d. Riddles; e. Proverbs; f. Lullabies; g. Charms; h. Games; i. Literal; j. Paradoxes; k. Scholastic; l. Customs; m. Songs; n. Fragments.

Vide Vol. xxix, Percy Society, London, 1849. Notices of Fugitive Tracts and Chap-books printed at Aldermary Churchyard, Bow Churchyard, etc., ed. J. O. Halliwell.

Ashton, John—Chap-books of the 18th Century.

Ashton, John—Social Life in the Time of Queen Anne.

Bergengren, R.—Boswell’s Chap-books and Others. Lamp, 28:39–44 (Feb., 1904).

Chambers, W.—Historical Sketch of Popular Literature and Its Influence on Society, 1863.

Cunningham, R. H.—Amusing Prose Chap-books. Glasgow, 1889.

Faxon, Frederick Winthrop—A Bibliography of the Modern Chap-books and their Imitators (Bulletin of Bibl. Pamphl. No. 11), Boston Book Co., 1903. [A “freak” movement, beginning with the publication of Chap-book, at Cambridge, May 15, 1894.]

Ferguson, Chancellor—On the Chap-books in the Bibliotheca Jacksoniana in Tullie House, Carlisle. Archaeolog. Jour., 52:292 (1895).

Fraser, John—Scottish Chap-books. (2 pts.) New York, Hinton, 1873.

Gerring, Charles—Notes on Printers and Booksellers, with a Chapter on Chap-books. London, 1900.

Halliwell, James Orchard—A Catalogue of Chap-books, Garlands, and Popular Histories in the Possession of Halliwell. London, 1849.

Harvard College Library—Catalogue of English and American Chap-books and Broadside Ballads in 1905 (Bibl. contrib. No. 56).

Nisard, Marie Léonard Charles—Histoire des Livres Populaires ou de la Littérature du Colportage, depuis l’origine de l’imprimerie jusqu’ à l’établissement de la Commission d’examen des livres du Colportage (30 Nov., 1852) [2 vols.]. Paris, Dentu, 1864.

Pearson, Edwin—Banbury Chap-books and Nursery Toy Book Literature of the 18th and Early 19th Centuries. London, 1890.

Pyle, Howard—Chap-book Heroes. Harper’s Monthly Magazine, 81:123 (1890).

Sieveking, S. Giberne—The Mediæval Chap-book as an Educational Factor in the Past. The Reliquary and Illus. Archaeolog., 9:241 (1903).

The student is referred to the following invaluable reference for matter relating to New England literature: Catalogue of the American Library of the Late Mr. George Brinley of Hartford, Conn. (5 pts.) Hartford: Press of the Case, Lockwood, and Brainard Co., 1878–97. Not completed. Comprising a list of Books printed at Cambridge and Boston, 1640–1709.

Pt. I.—The Bay Psalm Book, No. 847; Almanacs, 1646–1707; The Mathers, Special Chapter of References.

Pt. III.—Bibles, 146; Catechisms and Primers, New England Primer, 158; Music and Psalmody, 163; Psalms and Hymns, 172.

Pt. IV.—Continuation of Psalms and Hymns; Bibl. Ref. to Denominational Churches, Law, Government, Political Economy, Sciences, etc.; Popular Literature: Jest Books, Anecdotes, 131; Chap-books, 135; Books for Children, 139; Mother Goose, 140; Primers and Catechisms, 141; Educational, 143; Almanacs, 163; Theology, 177.

Pt. V.—Newspapers and Periodicals, 137.

Ford, Paul Leicester—The New England Primer (ed.). N. Y., Dodd, Mead, 1897. (Edition limited.) [Vide excellent bibliography.]

The New England Primer. Bookman, 4:122–131 (Oct., 1896).

Johnson, Clifton—The New England Primer. New England Mag., n.s. 28:323. (May, 1903.) [Some essential data, but written superficially.]

Marble, Annie Russell—Early New England Almanacs. New England Mag., n.s. 19:548. (Jan., 1899.) [Vide also Griswold’s Curiosities of American Literature; Tyler’s History of American Literature; Thomas’s History of Printing. A collection of Almanacs is owned by the Am. Antiq. Soc., Worcester, Mass.]

Collin de Plancy—Memories of Perrault.

Dillaye, Frédéric—Les Contes de Perrault (ed.). Paris, 1880.

Lang, Andrew—Perrault’s Popular Tales; edited from the original editions, with an introduction by. Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1888. [A concise and agreeable introduction to the study of folk-lore in general, and of a few noted tales in particular.]

Old-Fashioned Fairy Tales—Madame D’Aulnoy, Charles Perrault, etc. Little, Brown, $1.00.

Old French Fairy Tales—C. Perrault, Madame D’Aulnoy. Little, Brown, $1.00.

D’Anois, Countess—Fairy Tales, Translated from the French of. (2 vols.) London, 1817.

D’Aulnoy, Comtesse—Mémoires de la. [Vide Collection pour les jeunes filles.]

Hale, Edward Everett—Reprint of the Monroe and Francis Mother Goose.

Green, P. B.—History of Nursery Rhymes. London, 1899.

Headland, J. T.—Chinese Mother Goose. Chicago, 1900.

Halliwell, J. O.—Nursery Rhymes of England; collected principally from oral tradition. London, 1842. [The Percy Society, Early English Poetry.]

Popular Rhymes and Nursery Tales. A Sequel to Nursery Rhymes. London, 1849.

Ritson, Joseph—Gammer Gurton’s Garland; or, The Nursery Parnassus. London, 1810; reprint 1866.

Welsh, Charles—An Appeal for Nursery Rhymes and Jingles. Dial (Chicago), 27:230 (1 Oct., 1899).

Father of Children’s Books—Current Literature, 27:110.