In those intervals of rest which the serious cares and labors of life imperiously demand, a man may find the best amusement for himself in efforts for the amusement of children. This little work and its predecessor, “Rollo Learning to Talk,” have been written on this principle.

Parents find it very difficult to employ little children. “Mother, what shall I do?” and sometimes even, “Mother, what shall I do after I have done this?” are heard so often that they sometimes exhaust even maternal patience. These little volumes will, we hope, in some cases, provide an answer to the questions. The writer has endeavored to make them such that children would take an interest in reading them to themselves, and to their younger brothers and sisters, and in repeating them to one another.

The difficulty with most books intended for children just learning to read, is that the writers make so much effort to confine themselves to words of one syllable, that the style is quaint and uninteresting, and often far more unintelligible than the usual language would be. The author’s design here has been, first to interest the little reader, hoping, by this interest, to allure him on to the encounter of the difficulties in the language, and to the conquest of them. Hence, the more difficult words and phrases, in common use, are not avoided, for the very object of such a reading book should be to teach the use of them. They are freely introduced and rendered intelligible by being placed in striking connections, and familiar, by being frequently repeated. By a wonderful provision in the structure of the mind, children thirst for repetition,—the very thing essential to give security and permanence to the knowledge they acquire.

The subjects of the articles, accordingly, and the method of treating them, are in the highest degree juvenile. But the language is mature. For it is language which we wish to teach them, and consequently we must keep, in language, a little above them, advancing continually ourselves, as they advance.

J. A.