back, is no reason why a boy should have such a story when he should be learning his catechism. Before venturing on a list of books that will serve the boy fairly well as he passes through the primary and the grammar grades of school, a few of the superior books that have stood the test of time must be noticed. They are fundamental in school and in general reading. The arguments of literary critics as to what constitutes this good literature have no place in a work of this nature that aims to aid teachers and parents in selecting books for their children. It is enough to know that the verdict of time has been rendered in favour of such books as "The Arabian Nights' Entertainments," "Robinson Crusoe," and "Gulliver's Travels." A knowledge of such books is fundamental to any one who is ambitious to master the elements of English literature. And the mere fact that he knows them well will give him a conscious strength and pardonable feeling of superiority that the unlettered youth cannot have. After this he can be trusted to browse pretty much as he chooses. He may occasionally find the bars down, or maybe later go over the fences; but he has learned to judge of what is worth while, and will surely return to the books that gave him happy hours, whatever other tasks were laid on him. In selecting this list for schoolboys there is a temptation to take works too mature for school age. This may come from that lingering instinct that supposes every one, no matter what the age, to be interested in the same things in which you are interested. The very best things for manhood are to be reserved for that time of life. Grammar school boys cannot appreciate the playful humour of Lamb, the prophetic scolding of Carlyle, or Thackeray's keen analysis of human weaknesses and foibles; neither can a high school boy do it, and it is foolish to insist that it be done. Schoolboys are not men, and they might be told to reserve the greater part of Carlyle and Thackeray until two or three years after they have cast their first vote. Neither author is adapted to a beardless youth. But then we have that wonderful pair of story-tellers, Scott and Stevenson! What boy can resist them or would ever think of trying to do so? If Margaret Ogilvy would not lay down a book of "that Stevenson man" until she had found out how the laddie got out of the barrel, do you suppose that a boy with adventurous blood in his veins could do so? Though the best test for a child's book is the fact that it has charms for the grown-up, he would certainly be foolish who would insist that the great books for mature men and women be read in youth. It is after all school days are ended and the boy has become a man well started in the actual affairs of life that he can read and appreciate "Vanity Fair," "Adam Bede," "Tess of the D'Urbervilles," or "Anna Karénina." The tendency to take great books for mature readers, abridge and overedit them, and then present them to adventurous boys by