One of the benefits of good reading is that it fills the mind with beautiful pictures of places that we cannot visit or that live only in the eyes of the imagination. A powerful descriptive writer takes his reader with him, and by graphic words makes visible and almost real the scenes among which they wander. One may sit in the light of his study lamp during a black northern winter and read himself away from the chill and dreariness into some warm, sunny clime where flowers of new and rare forms flaunt their gorgeous colors and perfume the air with strange delicious odors; great trees with tufts of far-reaching leaves cast their welcome shade, and long vines trail gracefully from their living supports. Wonderful birds with brilliant plumage flit about, as through the openings in the trees glimpses are given of long waves rolling gently upon the glistening beach. It is only necessary to give free rein to the imagination and to visualize the scenes that the skilful writer describes. There are people of such literal minds that descriptive writing fails to appeal to them. It is their misfortune. To others every word brings a picture that appears almost as vivid and as full of detail as those upon which the material eye gazes. Like any other power of the mind, this may be cultivated, even among the mature. Children are highly gifted with this power, to begin with, and only a little training is necessary to make them use the faculty freely for their own delight. Suggest to them the outlines of a picture, and see how rapidly they will fill in the details. No two can see precisely the same imaginary picture; in fact, no two people looking at the same landscape will see precisely the same things, and if they are asked to describe what they see, it will appear that things which are most vivid to one may have made little impression upon the other. It is not to be expected, then, that two children reading a description of some scene will get the same picture of it. Each will color his own from the previous impressions and experiences he has had. Yet to each the picture may be very real and very pleasing. Good teachers of reading spend much time and effort in teaching the young to visualize the scenes of which they read, not only because of the pleasure it will afford the young when they are mature, but because the power to see vividly is of greatest assistance in every department of study.