At the present time we do not often see a child wrapped in a large man's doublet of a book; even more seldom do we see a father careless if it fit or no. What we plainly behold is that doublet, cut down, and most painstakingly fitted to the child's little mind. Unquestionably the children lose something by this. The great books of the world do not lend themselves well to making over. "Tales from Shakespeare" are apt to leave out Shakespeare's genius, and "Stories from Homer" are not Homer. In cutting the doublet to fit, the most precious part of the fabric is in danger of being sacrificed. But whatever the children lose when they are small, they find again when they come to a larger growth. Most significant of all, when they find it, they recognize it. A little girl who is a friend of mine had read Lambs' "Tales." The book had been given to her when she was eight years old. She is nine now. One day, not long ago, she was lingering before my bookcases, taking out and glancing through various volumes. Suddenly she came running to me, a copy of "As You Like It" in her hand. "This story is in one of my books!" she cried. "Yes," I said; "your book was written from this book, and some of those other little red books there with it in the bookcase." The child went back to the bookcase. She took down all the other volumes of Shakespeare, and, sitting on the rug with them, she spent an utterly absorbed hour in turning over their leaves. Finally she scrambled to her feet and set the books back in their places. "I've found which stories in these books are in my book, too," she remarked. "Mine are easier to read," she added; "but yours have lovely talk in them!" Had she not read Lambs' "Tales" at eight I am not certain she would have ventured into the wide realms of Shakespeare at nine, and tarried there long enough to discover that in those realms there is "lovely talk." Occasionally, to be sure, the children insist upon books being easy to read, and refuse to find "lovely talk" in them if they are not. It was only a short time ago that I read to a little boy Browning's "Pied Piper of Hamelin." When I had finished there was a silence. "Do you like it?" I inquired. "Ye-es," replied my small friend; "it's a nice story, but it's nicer in my book than in yours. I'll bring it next time I come, so you can read it." He did. The story was told in prose. It began, "There was once a town, named Hamelin, and there were so many rats in it that the people did not know what to do." Certainly this is "easier to read" than the forty-two lines which the poem uses to make an identical statement regarding the town named Hamelin. My little friend is only six. I hope that by the time he is twelve he will think the poem is as "nice" as, if not "nicer" than, the story in his book. At least he may be impelled by the memory of his pleasure in his book to turn to my book and compare the two versions of the tale.