pace to myths,
legends, fairy stories, tales of all sorts, and to poetry; for in
these expressions of the creative mind is to be found the material on
which the imagination has fed in every age and which is, for the most
part, conspicuously absent from our educational programmes.

America has at present greater facility in producing "smart" men than
in producing able men; the alert, quick-witted, money-maker abounds,
but the men who live with ideas, who care for the principles
of things, and who make life rich in resource and interest are
comparatively few. America needs poetry more than it needs industrial
training; though the two ought never to be separated. The time to
awaken the imagination, which is the creative faculty, is early
childhood; and the most accessible material for this education is the
literature which the race created in its childhood. The creative man,
whether in the arts or in practical affairs, in poetry, in engineering
or in business, is always the man of imagination.

In this library for young people the attempt has been made not only
to give the child what it needs but in the form which is most easily
understood. For this reason some well-known stories have been
retold in simpler English than their classic forms present. This is
especially true of many tales for any young children reprinted by
special arrangement from recent English sources. In some cases, where
the substance has seemed of more importance to the child than the
form, simpler words and forms of expression have been substituted for
more complex or abstract phrases, and passages of minor importance
have been condensed or omitted.

The aim in making the selections in this set of books has been to
interest the child and give it what it needs for normal growth; the
material has been taken from many sources old and new; much of the
reading matter presented has been familiar in one form or another, to
generations of children; much has appeared for the first time within
the last ten years; a considerable part has been prepared especially
for the Treasury and a large part has been selected from the best
writing in the various fields.

It is the hope of the Editor that this "Treasury" or "Library" will
justify its title by its real and fundamental service to children and
parents alike.

HAMILTON W. MABIE

INTRODUCTION

Since this series of books is intended for all young people from one
to one hundred, it opens with about