Part 8 (1/2)

But they must be presented as nonsense, so that the children may use them for what they are intended as--pure relaxation Such a story is that of ”The Wolf and the Kids,” which I present in my own version at the end of the book I have had serious objections offered to this story by several educational people, because of the revenge taken by the goat on the wolf, but I am inclined to think that if the story is to be taken as anything but sheer nonsense, it is surely sentimental to extend our sympathy toward a caller who has devoured six of his hostess'

children With regard to the wolf being cut open, there is not the slightest need to accentuate the physical side Children accept the deed as they accept the cutting off of a giant's head, because they do not associate it with pain, especially if the deed is presented half humorously The moment in the story where their sy of the kids, because the children do realize the possibility of being disposed of in the mother's absence (Needless to say, I never point out thethe door) I have always noticed a rown-up audience when the wolf ss the kids, and that the recovery of theether” is quite as much appreciated by the adult audience as by the children, and is worth the tremor caused by the wolf's summary action

I have not always been able to impress upon the teachers the fact that this story _ student ca of this story and said in an awe- struck voice: ”Do you cor-relate?” Having recovered from the effect of this word, which she carefully explained, I said that, as a rule, I preferred to keep the story quite apart from the other lessons, just an undivided whole, because it had effects of its ohich were best brought about by not being connected with other lessons She frowned her disapproval and said: ”I aht I would take the Goat for my nature study lesson and then tell your story at the end” I thought of the terrible struggle in the child's mind between his conscientious wish to be accurate and his draoat ent out with scissors, needle and thread; but I have been most careful since to repudiate any connection with nature study in this and a few other stories in ht occasionally introduce one of Edward Lear's ”Nonsense Rhymes” For instance:

There was an Old Man of Cape Horn Who wished he had never been born

So he sat in a chair Till he died of despair, That dolorous Old Man of Cape Horn

Now, except in case of very young children, this could not possibly be taken seriously The least observant nornize the hollowness of the pessimism that prevents an old man from at least an atte I have chosen as repeated with intense appreciation and or by a little boy just five years old:

There was an oldbird in that bush”

When they said: ”Is it small?”

He replied, ”Not at all

It is four tie as the bush”[29]

One of the most desirable of all elees kinshi+p with ani those early years when the ination enables the of animals Andersen has an illustration of this point in his ”Ice Maiden”:

”Children who cannot talk yet can understand the language of fowls and ducks quite well, and cats and dogs speak to them quite as plainly as Father and Mother; but that is only when the children are very small, and then even Grandpapa's stick will becoh and, in their eyes, is furnished with legs and a tail

With some children this period ends later than with others, and of such we are accustomed to say that they are very backward, and that they have re tis”

Felix Adler says:

”Perhaps the chief attraction of fairy tales is due to their representing the child as living in brotherly friendshi+p with nature and all creatures Trees, flowers, animals, wild and tame, even the stars are represented as couise is an axiom in the fairy tales Animals are humanized, that is, the kinshi+p between animal and human life is still keenly felt, and this reminds us of those early animistic interpretations of nature which subsequently led to doctrines of metempsychosis”[30]

I think that beyond question the finest animal stories are to be found in the Indian collections, of which I furnish a list in the last chapter

With regard to the develop of stories, we are confronted with a great difficulty in the elementary schools because so many of the children have never been out of the towns, have never seen a daisy, a blade of grass and scarcely a tree, so that in giving, in the form of a story, a beautiful description of scenery, you can ination, and only the rarely gifted child well be able toto a style which is beyond his everyday use

Nevertheless, once in a while, when the children are in a quiet ive theive the in praise of Nature, such as the following, taken from ”The Divine Adventure,” by Fiona Macleod:

Then he remembered the ancient wisdom of the Gael and came out of the Forest Chapel and went into the woods He put his lip to the earth, and lifted a green leaf to his brow, and held a branch to his ear; and because he was no longer heavy with the sweet clay of h yet of human clan, he heard that which we do not hear, and saw that which we do not see, and knew that which we do not know All the green life was his In that neorld he saw the lives of trees, now pale green, nooodsray lives of stone; breaths of the grass and reed, creatures of the air, delicate and wild as fawns, or swift and fierce and terrible tigers of that undiscovered wilderness, with birds als, and opalescent crests

The value of this particular passage is thethe whole picture, which fors I think it of the highest importance for the children to realize that the best and e and that they must content themselves with a flash here and there of the beauty which may come later One does not enhance the beauty of the s; one does not increase the ile drops of water But at a reverent distance one gets a clear impression of the whole, and can afford to leave the details in the shadow