[page i]

Thumbelina Came to Live with the Field-Mouse.

[page iii]

Childhood's Favorites

and Fairy Stories

Hamilton Wright Mabie
Edward Everett Hale
William Byron Forbush

Editors

Jennie Ellis Burdick

Assistant Editor

NEW YORK

THE UNIVERSITY SOCIETY

incorporated

1927

[page iv]

copyright, 1919, by
The University Society Inc.

copyright, 1909, 1917, by
The University Society Inc.

[page v]

EDITORS

HAMILTON WRIGHT MABIE, L.H.D., LL.D.
EDWARD EVERETT HALE, D.D., LL.D.
WILLIAM BYRON FORBUSH, Ph.D., Litt.D.

ASSISTANT EDITOR

Jennie Ellis Burdick

Partial List of Authors and Editors Represented in The
Young Folks Treasury by Selections from
Their Writings:

[page vii]

GENERAL INTRODUCTION

B

OOKS are as much a part of the furnishing of a house as tables and chairs, and in the making of a home they belong, not with the luxuries but with the necessities. A bookless house is not a home; for a home affords food and shelter for the mind as well as for the body. It is as great an offence against a child to starve his mind as to starve his body, and there is as much danger of reducing his vitality and putting him at a disadvantage in his lifework in the one as in the other form of deprivation. There was a time when it was felt that shelter, clothing, food and physical oversight comprised the whole duty of a charitable institution to dependent children; to-day no community would permit such an institution to exist unless it provided school privileges. An acute sense of responsibility toward children is one of the prime characteristics of American society, shown in the vast expenditures for public education in all forms, in the increasing attention paid to light, ventilation, and safety in school buildings, in the opening of play grounds in large cities, in physical supervision of children in schools, and the agitation against the employment of children in factories, and in other and less obvious ways.

Children are helpless to protect themselves and secure what they need for health of body and mind; they are exceedingly impressionable; and the future is always in their hands. The first and most imperative duty of parents is to give their children the best attainable preparation for life, no matter at what sacrifice to themselves. There are hosts of fathers and mothers who recognize this obligation but do not know how to discharge it; who are eager to give their children the most wholesome conditions, but do not know how to secure them; who are especially anxious that their children should start early and start right on that highway of education which is the open road to honorable success. There are many homes in which books [page viii] would find abundant room if the heads of the families knew what books to buy, or had the means to put into the hands of the growing child the reading matter it needs in the successive periods of its growth.

This condition of eagerness to give the best, and of ignorance of how or where to find the best is the justification for the publication of this set of books. The attempt has been made in a series of twelve volumes to bring together in convenient form the fairy stories, myths, and legends which have fed the children of many generations in the years when the imagination is awakening and craving stimulus and material to work upon;—that age of myth-making which is a prelude to the more scientific uses of the mind and of immense importance in an intensely practical age;—a group of tales of standard quality and an interest and value which have placed them among the permanent possessions of English literature; a careful selection of stories of animal life; a natural history, familiar in style and thoroughly trustworthy in fact; an account of those travels and adventures which have opened up the earth and made its resources available, and which constitute one of the most heroic chapters in the history of the long struggle of men to possess the earth and make it a home for the highest kind of civilization; a record of heroism taken from the annals of the patriots and of those brave men who, in all ages, ranks of society and occupations, have dared to face great dangers in the path of duty and science, with special attention to that everyday heroism in which the age is specially rich and of which so many good people are grossly ignorant; a survey of scientific achievement, with reports of recent discoveries in knowledge and adaptation of knowledge to human need; a group of biographies of the men and women—mostly Americans—who are the most stimulating companions for boys and girls; a volume on the Fine Arts dealing with music, painting, sculpture, architecture, in a way to instruct young readers and making accessible a large number of those songs which appeal in the best way to children in schools and homes; a collection of the best poetry for the youngest and oldest readers, chosen not only for excellence from the standpoint of art, but deep and abiding human interest; and a volume devoted to [page ix] the occupations and resources of the home, addressed to parents no less than to children, with practical suggestions about books and reading, games and amusements, exercise and health, and those kindred topics which have to do with making the home wholesome and attractive.

These twelve volumes aim, in brief, to make the home the most inspiring school and the most attractive place for pleasure, and to bring the best the world has to offer of adventure, heroism, achievement and beauty within its four walls.

Special attention has been given to the youngest children whose interests are often neglected because they are thought to be too immature to receive serious impressions from what is read to them. Psychology is beginning to make us understand that no greater mistake can be made in the education of children than underrating the importance of the years when the soil receives the seed most quickly. For education of the deepest sort—the planting of those formative ideas which give final direction and quality to the intellectual life—there is no period so important as the years between three and six, and none so fruitful. To put in the seed at that time is, as a rule, to decide the kind of harvest the child will reap later; whether he shall be a shrewd, keen, clever, ambitious man, with a hard, mechanical mind, bent on getting the best of the world; or a generous, fruitful, open-minded man, intent on living the fullest life in mind and heart. No apology is offered for giving large space to myths, legends, fairy stories, tales of all sorts, and to poetry; for in these expressions of the creative mind is to be found the material on which the imagination has fed in every age and which is, for the most part, conspicuously absent from our educational programmes.

America has at present greater facility in producing "smart" men than in producing able men; the alert, quick-witted, money-maker abounds, but the men who live with ideas, who care for the principles of things, and who make life rich in resource and interest are comparatively few. America needs poetry more than it needs industrial training; though the two ought never to be separated. The time to awaken the imagination, which is the creative faculty, is early childhood; and the most accessible [page x] material for this education is the literature which the race created in its childhood. The creative man, whether in the arts or in practical affairs, in poetry, in engineering or in business, is always the man of imagination.

In this library for young people the attempt has been made not only to give the child what it needs but in the form which is most easily understood. For this reason some well-known stories have been retold in simpler English than their classic forms present. This is especially true of many tales for any young children reprinted by special arrangement from recent English sources. In some cases, where the substance has seemed of more importance to the child than the form, simpler words and forms of expression have been substituted for more complex or abstract phrases, and passages of minor importance have been condensed or omitted.

The aim in making the selections in this set of books has been to interest the child and give it what it needs for normal growth; the material has been taken from many sources old and new; much of the reading matter presented has been familiar in one form or another, to generations of children; much has appeared for the first time within the last ten years; a considerable part has been prepared especially for the Treasury and a large part has been selected from the best writing in the various fields.

It is the hope of the Editor that this "Treasury" or "Library" will justify its title by its real and fundamental service to children and parents alike.

Hamilton W. Mabie

[page xi]

INTRODUCTION

S

INCE this series of books is intended for all young people from one to one hundred, it opens with about eighty of the old Mother Goose Rhymes. Nothing better was ever invented to tell to little folks who are young enough for lullabies. Their rhythm, their humor, and their pith will always cause us to prize them as the Babies' Classics.

Next come a score of the most famous Nursery Tales, the kind that children cry for and love to hear fifty times over. And since, just as soon as little folks like stories they love to hear them in rhyme, here are forty Children's Favorite Poems.

What would young life be without "Puss in Boots" and "Little Red Riding Hood" and "The Sleeping Beauty"? Our Treasury would indeed be poor without them, so these Favorite Stories come next, yoked with some Old-Fashioned Poems in story-form, as "The Night before Christmas," "The Wonderful World," and "Little Orphant Annie." All who love pets and animals have always liked Fables, so here are the noted parables of Æsop, and the lesser-known but even more jolly tales from East Indian sources.

The fairy-tale age is supposed to come from four to nine, but the editors are sure it lasts much longer than that. However this may be, the better half of our first volume is given up to Fairy Tales and Laughter Stories from all over the world.

It ends with Tales for Tiny Tots, the kind that mother reads beside the fire at bedtime, some of them old, like the "Little Red Hen" and "Peter Rabbit," and some of them newer, like "The Greedy Brownie" and "The Birthday Honors of the Fairy Queen."

William Byron Forbush.

[page xii]

[page xiii]

CONTENTS

NURSERY RHYMES

NURSERY TALES

CHILDREN'S FAVORITE POEMS

CHILDREN'S FAVORITE STORIES

OLD FASHIONED POEMS

FABLES

FABLES FROM ÆSOP

FABLES OF INDIA

Adapted by P. V. Ramaswami Raju

FAIRY TALES AND LAUGHTER STORIES

SCANDINAVIAN STORIES

GERMAN STORIES

FRENCH STORIES

ENGLISH STORIES

CELTIC STORIES

ITALIAN STORIES

JAPANESE STORIES

EAST INDIAN STORIES

AMERICAN INDIAN STORIES

ARABIAN STORIES

CHINESE STORIES

RUSSIAN STORIES

[page xx]

TALES FOR TINY TOTS

FANCIFUL STORIES

[page xxi]

ILLUSTRATIONS

(Many of the illustrations in this volume are reproduced by special permission of E. P. Dutton & Company, owners of the American rights.)

[page 1]

CHILDHOOD'S FAVORITES

AND

FAIRY STORIES

NURSERY RHYMES

Rock-a-bye, baby, thy cradle is green;

Father's a nobleman, mother's a Queen;

Betty's a lady, and wears a gold ring;

And Johnny's a drummer, and drums for the King.

Bye, baby bunting,

Daddy's gone a-hunting,

To get a little rabbit-skin,

To wrap his baby bunting in.

Hush thee, my babby,

Lie still with thy daddy,

Thy mammy has gone to the mill,

To grind thee some wheat

To make thee some meat,

And so, my dear babby, lie still.

[page 2]

Sleep, baby, sleep!

Thy father watches the sheep;

Thy mother is shaking the dream-land tree,

And down falls a little dream on thee:

Sleep, baby, sleep!

Sleep, baby, sleep.

The large stars are the sheep,

The wee stars are the lambs, I guess,

The fair moon is the shepherdess:

Sleep, baby, sleep!

This little pig went to market;

This little pig stayed at home;

This little pig had roast beef;

This little pig had none;

This little pig said, "Wee, wee!

I can't find my way home."

Brow bender,

Eye peeper,

Nose smeller,

Mouth eater,

Chin chopper.

Knock at the door—peep in

Lift up the latch—walk in

Eye winker,

Tom Tinker,

Nose smeller,

Mouth eater,

Chin chopper.

Chin chopper.

[page 3]

Here sits the Lord Mayor,

Here sit his two men,

Here sits the cock,

And here sits the hen;

Here sit the chickens,

And here they go in,

Chippety, chippety, chippety chin.

Pat-a-cake, pat-a-cake, baker's man!

So I do, master, as fast as I can:

Pat it, and prick it, and mark it with T,

Put it in the oven for Tommy and me.

Pat it, kiss it,

Stroke it, bless it;

Three days' sunshine, three days' rain,

Little hand all well again.

Baa, baa, black sheep,

Have you any wool?

Yes, marry, have I,

Three bags full:

One for my master,

One for my dame,

And one for the little boy

Who lives in the lane.

Pussy-cat, pussy-cat,

Where have you been?

I've been to London

To look at the Queen

Pussy-cat, pussy-cat,

What did you there?

I frightened a little mouse

Under her chair.

Ride a cock-horse to Banbury Cross,

To see an old lady upon a white horse,

Rings on her fingers, and bells on her toes,

She shall have music wherever she goes.

Bobby Shaftoe's gone to sea,

Silver buckles on his knee;

He'll come back and marry me,

Pretty Bobby Shaftoe.

Bobby Shaftoe's fat and fair,

Combing down his yellow hair;

He's my love for evermair,

Pretty Bobby Shaftoe.

Tom, he was a piper's son,

He learned to play when he was young,

And all the tune that he could play

Was, "Over the hills and far away,"

Over the hills, and a great way off,

The wind will blow my top-knot off.

Now, Tom with his pipe made such a noise

That he well pleased both the girls and boys,

And they always stopped to hear him play

"Over the hills and far away."

[page 5]

Lady-bird, lady-bird, fly away home,

Thy house is on fire, thy children all gone:

All but one whose name is Ann,

And she crept under the pudding-pan.

The north wind doth blow,

And we shall have snow,

And what will the robin do then,

Poor thing?

He'll sit in a barn,

And keep himself warm,

And hide his head under his wing,

Poor thing!

I had a little pony,

His name was Dapple-gray,

I lent him to a lady,

To ride a mile away;

She whipped him, she lashed him,

She rode him through the mire;

I would not lend my pony now

For all the lady's hire.

I had a little doggy that used to sit and beg;

But Doggy tumbled down the stairs and broke his little leg.

Oh! Doggy, I will nurse you, and try to make you well,

And you shall have a collar with a little silver bell.

[page 6]

Simple Simon Went a-Fishing.

Simple Simon met a pieman,

Going to the fair;

Says Simple Simon to the pieman,

"Let me taste your ware."

Says the pieman to Simple Simon,

"Show me first your penny."

Says Simple Simon to the pieman,

"Indeed I have not any."

Simple Simon went a-fishing

For to catch a whale;

But all the water he could find

Was in his mother's pail!

Jack and Jill went up the hill,

To fetch a pail of water;

Jack fell down, and broke his crown

And Jill came tumbling after.

Up Jack got and home did trot

As fast as he could caper;

Went to bed to mend his head

With vinegar and brown paper.

Jill came in and she did grin,

To see his paper plaster,

Mother, vexed, did whip her next,

For causing Jack's disaster.

Little Boy Blue, come blow your horn,

The sheep's in the meadow, the cow's in the corn,

Where's the boy that looks after the sheep?

He's under the haycock, fast asleep.

[page 7]

Old Mother Goose, when

She wanted to wander,