And now just for a moment let us consider the kind of literature we are trying to interest the youngsters in. Being a radical it pleased me very much recently to come across the following passage in an interesting new book by Miss Rosalie V. Halsey, entitled "Forgotten books of the American nursery." Miss Halsey says: "Reading aloud was both a pastime and an education to families in those early days of the Republic. Although Mrs. Quincy made every effort to procure Miss Edgeworth's stories for her family, because, in her opinion, they were better for reading aloud than were the works of Hannah More, Mrs. Trimmer and Mrs. Chapone, she chose extracts from Shakespeare, Milton, Addison, and Goldsmith. Indeed, if it were possible to ask our great-grandparents what books they remembered reading in their childhood, I think we should find that beyond somewhat hazy recollections of Miss Edgeworth's books and Berquin's 'The looking glass for the mind' they would either mention 'Robinson Crusoe,' Newberry's 'Tales of Giles Gingerbread,' 'Little King Pippin,' and 'Goody Two-shoes' (written fifty years before their own childhood), or remember only the classic tales and sketches read to them by their parents." Now it seems to me that our great-grandparents were very lucky to have been so delightfully introduced to the great things in literature, and in these days when the art of reading aloud is almost a lost art how can we expect the modern child to turn with a natural appreciation to the best in literature when he is almost submerged by the mediocre and vulgar inside and outside the home, his appreciation undeveloped, not old enough in years or intelligence to comprehend the beauty we so delight in. We are disappointed when he does not respond, and wonder why. Is it not the result of forcing him to use these things before he is ready, and thus only fostering his distaste? Believing this to be so, I have gone to work to try to induce the boys and girls to read more widely, and cultivate appreciation, by using this old-fashioned method of reading aloud or telling a part of the story and reading here and there bits of the text, thus letting the author tell his own story, and as far as we have been able we have tried to give the children the KIND of story they wanted--WHEN they wanted it--but in the best form in which it could be found. For instance Poe's "The purloined letter" when a detective story is asked for, followed by a story from Stevenson's "New Arabian nights" or "Island nights' entertainments."