In the grades below the high school the following subjects are considered most important, viz.: reading, language, arithmetic, geography, history and nature study. At the first thought one would say that a set of books such as _Journeys_ can be of no use in the arithmetic class, and of course their usefulness in that direction would not justify their existence. However, there are selections in _Journeys_ that have a decided arithmetical flavor, such as, for instance, _Three Sundays in a Week_ (Volume VI, page 453) and _The Gold Bug_ (Volume IX, page 232). Even among the nursery rhymes is one that is purely arithmetical (Volume I, page 41). We may, however, disregard the arithmetic in _Journeys_, but we must not lose sight of the fact that the method of reading discussed under the title _Close Reading_ is exactly the method of study that every person must pursue if he is to make any success in mathematics. In no other branch is there a call for such close reading, and only he who can get all the meaning out of the statement of a problem can be certain of his solution. One of the reasons that so many children have trouble with the problems in their arithmetic classes is that they do not read intelligently. Many a good teacher of mathematics will tell you that a large part of her success is due to the fact that she has spent much of the time in the class in teaching her pupils to read understandingly. Many another could make a vast improvement in her methods of teaching if she would spend a part of the time of each recitation in teaching her pupils to read problems till they thoroughly understand them before beginning to work out the formulas. It follows then that every child who masters the art of close reading will be helped in a great measure in all his work in mathematics. The value of _Journeys_ in this connection is that it makes that method of study clear and leads a child to its mastery almost without the recognition of what he is doing. It will teach him to think before he acts and to acquire the habit of looking for the full meaning of everything he reads. In this and the two following chapters will be given studies of the most important subjects studied in the grades, showing the correlation of the _Journeys_ material. These subjects will be treated in the following order: Reading, Language, Nature Study, Geography and History. A. Reading