2. Stories of adventure, courage, and the defence of the helpless appeal very strongly to young children. Even the cruelties and crudities of _Bluebeard_, _Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves_, and _Aladdin and his Wonderful Lamp_ do not alarm or repel children very much, owing to their lack of experience in these matters. Stories based on the love of the sexes are unsuitable for children of this age, although it constitutes the chief element in stories for older people. 3. The child is also interested in stories of simple games, of animals and birds, and of the material world on which so much of his happiness depends. These stories are corrective of the desire which characterizes some children for too many fairy stories. The fairy story and the nature story should be alternated, so that the child's interests may be imaginative without becoming visionary, and practical without becoming prosaic. 4. Most children have a keen sense of the musical qualities of verse. The child of two years of age will give his attention to the rhythm of the nursery rhyme when the prose story will not interest him. The consideration and analysis of these musical qualities should be deferred for years; but it is probable that the foundation for a future appreciation of poetry is often laid by an acquaintance with the rhymes of childhood. 5. The element of repetition appeals strongly to children. In this lies the attractiveness of the "cumulative story", in which the same incident, or feature, or form of expression is repeated again and again with some slight modification; for example, the story of _Henny Penny_, _The Gingerbread Boy_, and _The Little Red Hen_. The choruses and the refrains of songs are pleasant for this reason. _Silverlocks and the Three Bears_ is an example of a story that has many attractive features. Silverlocks is an interesting girl, because she is mischievous and adventurous. The pupils know a good deal about bears and wild animals from picture books, stories, and perhaps the travelling menageries. The bears have all proper names--Rough Bruin, Mammy Muff, and Tiny; this gives an air of reality to the story. The bears speak in short, characteristic sentences. Silverlocks runs away from home, goes into the woods, and finds a lonely house which is the home of the bears. They are not at home, so she enters. These actions suggest mystery and adventure. The construction of the story shows two chief divisions, with three subdivisions. The second division begins with the return of the bears. They find the soup has been tasted, the chairs disturbed, and the beds rumpled; their conversation is interesting, and their tones characteristic. Tiny, the little bear, suffers most; he enlists the sympathy of the children, as he has lost his dinner and his chair is broken. He discovers Silverlocks, but she escapes and "never runs away from home any more". SENIOR FORMS (BOOKS III AND IV)