Project Gutenberg's Cautionary Tales for Children, by Hilaire Belloc

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Title: Cautionary Tales for Children

Author: Hilaire Belloc

Illustrator: Basil T. Blackwood

Release Date: December 5, 2008 [EBook #27424]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

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CAUTIONARY TALES FOR CHILDREN

CAUTIONARY TALES FOR
CHILDREN

_Designed for the Admonition of Children between the ages
of eight and fourteen years_

Verses by
H. BELLOC

Pictures by
B. T. B.

[Illustration]

DUCKWORTH
3 HENRIETTA STREET, LONDON, W.C.

First published by Eveleigh Nash, 1907
First published by Gerald Duckworth & Co. Ltd., 1918
Thirteenth Impression, 1957

_All rights reserved_

_Made and Printed in Great Britain by_
_Thomas Nelson and Sons Ltd_
_London and Edinburgh_

DEDICATED
TO
BOBBY, JOHNNY, AND EDDIE
SOMERSET

INTRODUCTION

Upon being asked by a Reader whether the verses contained in this book
were true.

[Illustration]

And is it True? It is not True.
And if it were it wouldn't do,
For people such as me and you
Who pretty nearly all day long
Are doing something rather wrong.
Because if things were really so,
You would have perished long ago,
And I would not have lived to write
The noble lines that meet your sight,
Nor B. T. B. survived to draw
The nicest things you ever saw.
H. B.

* * * * *

JIM,

_Who ran away from his Nurse, and was eaten by a Lion._

[Illustration]

There was a Boy whose name was Jim;
His Friends were very good to him.
They gave him Tea, and Cakes, and Jam,
And slices of delicious Ham,
And Chocolate with pink inside,
And little Tricycles to ride,
And

[Illustration]

read him Stories through and through,
And even took him to the Zoo--
But there it was the dreadful Fate
Befell him, wh