Thackeray’s only book for children, “The Rose and the Ring,” has given him a place among writers for children that is the equal of that which he enjoys as one of the world’s greatest novelists. His fondness for children was proverbial and it appears over and over again in his writings.

This story was written of Christmas time in the year 1854 while the author was living at Rome. Thackeray wrote it to entertain a little young friend, a girl who had been ill. As he finished a chapter to read to her he would illustrate it with these droll pictures hastily sketched with his pen.