The selections from Thomas Bailey Aldrich, James T. Fields, Ralph
Waldo Emerson, Horace E. Scudder, Phoebe Cary, Bjornstjerne Björnson,
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Joel Chandler Harris, Sarah Orne Jewett,
and Oliver Wendell Holmes are from the authorized copyrighted editions of
Houghton Mifflin Company.

B

PREFACE

THIS is the first volume of a unique series of readers for the grammar schools. As the purpose of this series is quite different from that of most readers, we ask the indulgence of those who may read this introductory note to explain the aims that have controlled the editors in making the series.

There has been a growing tendency during the past decade away from the brief, "scrappy "selections that have been offered to school children in school readers. Professor Huey, in his book, The Psychology and Pedagogy of Reading, says most aptly: "Care should be taken to give the children the very best [literature], and from the start. The tons of trash that are annually sold, on the theory that it does n't matter what the young child reads, are robbing the children of the chastening influence of real child classics; which after all he himself prefers even in the start, and which do much to lay in him the foundations of correct literary taste as well as of right ideals of life and conduct." With the aim of giving the children of the grammar grades in our elementary schools a carefully made selection from the best literature, the editors naturally turned to the Riverside Literature Series as the source of material. From this source, made up of over two hundred volumes, the selections that have been found by long experience to have the greatest value for each of the grammar grades were brought together, carefully edited, and arranged for oral reading in schools. There