Many a boy, fascinated by the glamour of the circus, has run away with one. Still, this does not make the circus reprehensible nor would I, because of that circumstance, deny my boy the pleasure of attending it. On the contrary, I go with him to the circus and sit beside him. We munch peanuts joyously, but I warn him to beware of the red lemonade and tell him why it is sometimes unwholesome. He sees the show from start to finish--under my direction. And when he has seen it I reveal to him the reverse side of the picture--I give him a peep behind the scenes. I tell him of the hardships and privations of a showman’s life, the long night rides, the harsh discipline, the perils and dangers of it. This is exactly my attitude toward the boy’s early reading. I do not throw wide open the doors of the paper-cover library and push him into it. But if he shows a desire to explore it, I go with him. Wherever I can save him time and eyestrain by a friendly suggestion, I am there to make it. When I find him reading “Cut-Throat Charley, the Terror of the Spanish Main,” I do not pooh-pooh the book or make sport of the boy. I do tell him that the best pirate story ever written is Stevenson’s “Treasure Island” and tell him that if he wants a shipwreck story that will make his hair stand up he ought to read Poe’s “Arthur Gordon Pym” or Reade’s “Foul Play.” Once he has read either of these, you may depend upon it that “Cut-Throat Charley” will never ring true. When he takes up Mr. Nicholas Carter I suggest “The Mystery of the Rue Morgue,” “Les Misérables” and “Sherlock Holmes,” and other detective stories of the better class. My boy had been learning from other boys something of the exploits of Jesse James and asked me if I would get the book. I agreed to it, readily. Somewhat to my surprise I found that since my time the list of James books had been increased to thirty-six. Thirty-five of these were “pot-boilers”; “Jesse James’ Nemesis,” “Jesse James’ Revenge,” “Jesse James’ Long Chance,” “Jesse James’ Mistake,” and so on. I passed these over, of course, and invested fifteen cents in “The James Boys, Jesse and Frank,” which was the book I had read when I was a youngster. It was a plain record of the men’s exploits, compiled from newspaper clippings of that period. I explained to the boy that the others were largely imaginative--unreal. We read the book together. Then we read the story of Cole Younger and his brothers and later that of the criminal career of Harry Tracy, the infamous outlaw of the Northwest. Together we enjoyed the romance, such as there was, of their exploits; together we discussed the animal courage and moral cowardice of their careers; and together we followed them to the punishment which they so richly deserved.