Of course, there are pretty things in _Hiawatha._ Some of the passages about the forest and the waters, the making of the canoe, the conquest of Mondanim, the picture-writing, may most profitably be interwoven with other things. It is instructive both as to literature and as to fact to put the making of Robinson Crusoe's boat beside the building of Hiawatha's canoe. But there are objections to a long and exclusive course in this poem. The mythical side of it is baffling and discouraging. Once more let me say that a _class_ is an extremely acute and inquiring personality; after a few days it "wants to know." And it is puzzled and dismayed, and finally frightened off, by the fact that everything means something else. Furthermore, the details both of Indian life and of Indian belief are so chosen and sifted and beautified as to be most misleading, if we are emphasizing that side of the poem. Lastly, it is not good for the young children to have a long-continued and constantly renewed experience in the alien and wearing meter, and the unmusical rhythm of _Hiawatha;_ and the verse-form dictates certain trying peculiarities of style, in especial the slightly varied iteration of detail: Ah, my brother from the North land, From the kingdom of Wabasso, From the land of the White Rabbit, You have stolen the maiden from me, You have laid your hand upon her, You have wooed and won my maiden. This redundancy and repetition do not constitute the direct, forward-moving style we should like to impress on the children. All these considerations are offered to justify the judgment, held in great modesty, that _Hiawatha_ should not be given in its entirety nor should the children be kept at it for any long drill, but, if at all, in chosen episodes and from time to time. Of course, any teacher may see fit to draw out from Hiawatha the story of any episode and treat it as a story, for dramatization, or as illuminating some phase of the children's interest and activity. And students old enough to interpret the mythical meaning of the poem may profitably read it. Occasionally, and as something apart from their regular lessons, the children should hear beautifully read passages of the incomparable music of some of the great masters, regardless of their understanding of the content--the first sixteen lines of _Paradise Lost_; some especially musical sonnet of Shakespeare's, or some passage of lofty eloquence from the plays; some vague and haunting bit of music from Shelly, or Poe, or Keats; some fanfare of trumpets from Byron, or Macaulay, or Kipling. Every teacher will realize that all the titles and authors and kinds mentioned in this study cannot be put into the children's lessons. It is to be hoped that he will realize that they are mentioned as concrete examples, or suggestive instances of things that are good, and to support the principles under discussion.