My Dafter gives her duty to Mr. Stroyhan and his Lady, and her compliments to Master Billy and all his brothers and Sisters....

Your humbel Servant DEBORAH FRANKLIN

Little Sally Franklin could not have needed eight dozen copies of Aesop's Fables, nor four Ainsworth's Dictionaries, so it is probable that Deborah Franklin's far from ready pen put down the book order for the spring, and that Sally herself was only to be supplied with the "Perceptor," the "Fables," and the "one good Quarto Bibel."

As far as it is now possible to judge, the people of the towns soon learned the value of Newbery's little nursery tales, and after seventeen hundred and fifty-five, when most of his books were written and published, they rapidly gained a place on the family book-shelves in America.

By seventeen hundred and sixty Hugh Gaine, printer, publisher, patent medicine seller, and employment agent for New York, was importing practically all the Englishman's juvenile publications then for sale. At the "Bible and Crown," where Gaine printed the "Weekly Mercury," could be bought, wholesale and retail, such books as, "Poems for Children Three Feet High," "Tommy Trapwit," "Trip's Book of Pictures," "The New Year's Gift," "The Christmas Box," etc.

Gaine himself was a prominent printer in New York in the latter half of the eighteenth century. Until the Revolution his shop was a favorite one and well patronized. But when the hostilities began, the condition of his pocket seems to have regulated his sympathies, and he was by turn Whig and Tory according to the possession of New York by so-called Rebels, or King's Servants. When the British army evacuated New York, Gaine, wishing to keep up his trade, dropped the "Crown" from his sign. Among the enthusiastic patriots this ruse had scant success. In Freneau's political satire of the bookseller, the first verse gives a strong suggestion of the ridicule to follow:

"And first, he was, in his own representation, A printer, once of good reputation. He dwelt in the street called Hanover-Square, (You'll know where it is if you ever was there Next door to the dwelling of Mr. Brownjohn, Who now to the drug-shop of Pluto is gone) But what do I say—who e'er came to town, And knew not Hugh Gaine at the Bible and Crown."

A contemporary of, and rival bookseller to, Gaine in seventeen hundred and sixty was James Rivington. Mr. Hildeburn has given Rivington a rather unenviable reputation; still, as he occasionally printed (?) a child's book, Mr. Hildeburn's remarks are quoted:

"Until the advent of Rivington it was generally possible to tell from an American Bookseller's advertisement in the current newspapers whether the work offered for sale was printed in America or England. But the books he received in every fresh invoice from London were 'just published by James Rivington' and this form was speedily adopted by other booksellers, so that after 1761 the advertisement of books is no longer a guide to the issues of the colonial press."

Although Rivington did not set up a press until about seventeen hundred and seventy-three,—according to Mr. Hildeburn,—he had a book-shop much earlier. Here he probably reprinted the title-page and then put an elaborate notice in the "Weekly Mercury" for November 17, 1760, as follows:

JAMES RIVINGTON

Bookseller and Stationer from London over against the Golden Key in Hanover Square.

This day is published, Price, seven Shillings, and sold by the said JAMES RIVINGTON, adorned with two hundred Pictures

THE FABLES OF AESOP

with a moral to each Fable in Verse, and an Application in Prose, intended for the Use of the youngest of readers, and proper to be put into the hands of Children, immediately after they have done with the Spelling-Book, it being adapted to their tender Capacities, the Fables are related in a short and lively Manner, and they are recommended to all those who are concerned in the education of Children. This is an entire new Work, elegantly printed and ornamented with much better Cuts than any other Edition of Aesop's Fables. Be pleased to ask for DRAPER'S AESOP.

From such records of parents' care as are given in Mrs. Charles Pinckney's letters to her husband's agent in London, and Josiah Quincy's reminiscences of his early training, it seems very evident that John Locke's advice in "Thoughts on Education" was read and followed at this time in the American colonies. Therefore, in accordance with the bachelor philosopher's theory as to reading-matter for little children, the bookseller recommended the "Fables" to "those concerned in the education of children." It is at least a happy coincidence that one of the earliest books (as far as is known to the writer), aside from school and religious books, issued as published in America for children, should have been the one Locke had so heartily recommended. This is what he had said many years previously: "When by these gentle ways he begins to read, some easy pleasant Book, suited to his capacities, should be put into his Hands, wherein the Entertainment that he finds might draw him on, and reward his Pains in Reading, and yet not such as will fill his head with perfectly useless Trumpery, or lay the Principles of Vice and Folly. To this Purpose, I think Aesop's Fables the best which being Stories apt to delight and entertain a child, may yet afford useful Reflections to a grown Man.... If his Aesop has pictures in it, it will entertain him much better and encourage him to read." The two hundred pictures in Rivington's edition made it, of course, high priced in comparison with Newbery's books: but New York then contained many families well able to afford this outlay to secure such an acquisition to the family library.

Hugh Gaine at this time, as a rule, received each year two shipments of books, among which were usually some for children, yet about 1762 he began to try his own hand at reprinting Newbery's now famous little duodecimos.

In that year we find an announcement through the "New York Mercury" that he had himself printed "Divers diverting books for infants." The following list gives some idea of their character:

Just published by Hugh Gaine

A pretty Book for Children; Or an Easy Guide to the English Tongue.

The private Tutor for little Masters and Misses.

Food for the Mind; or a new Riddle Book compiled for the use of little Good Boys and Girls in America. By Jack the Giant-Killer, Esq.

A Collection of Pretty Poems, by Tommy Tag, Esq.

Aesop's Fables in Verse, with the Conversation of Beasts and Birds, at their several Meetings. By Woglog the great Giant.

A Little pretty Book, intended for the Amusement of Little Master Tommy and pretty Miss Polly, with two Letters from Jack the Giant-Killer.

Be Merry and Wise: Or the Cream of the Jests. By Tommy Trapwit, Esq.

The title of "Food for the Mind" is of special importance, since in it Gaine made a clever alteration by inserting the words "Good Boys and Girls in America." The colonials were already beginning to feel a pride in the fact of belonging to the new country, America, and therefore Gaine shrewdly changed the English title to one more likely to induce people to purchase.

Gaine and Rivington alone have left records of printing children's story-books in the town of New York before the Revolution; but before they began to print, other booksellers advertised their invoices of books. In 1759 Garrat Noel, a Dutchman, had announced that he had "the very prettiest gilt Books for little Masters and Misses that ever were invented, full of wit and wisdom, at the surprising low Price of only one Shilling each finely bound and adorned with a number of curious Cuts." By 1762 Noel had increased his stock and placed a somewhat larger advertisement in the "Mercury" of December 27. The late arrival of his goods may have been responsible for the bargains he offered at this holiday sale.

GARRAT NOEL Begs Leave to Inform the Public, that according to his Annual Custom, he has provided a very large Assortment of Books for Entertainment and Improvement of Youth, in Reading, Writing, Cyphering, and Drawing, as Proper Presents at CHRISTMAS and New-Year.

The following Small, but improving Histories, are sold at Two Shillings, each, neatly bound in red, and adorn'd with Cuts.

[Symbol: hand]Those who buy Six, shall have a Seventh Gratis, and buying only Three, they shall have a present of a fine large Copper-Plate Christmas Piece: [List of histories follows.]

The following neat Gilt Books, very instructive and Amusing being full of Pictures, are sold at Eighteen Pence each.

Fables in Verse and Prose, with the Conversation of Birds & Beasts at their several meetings, Routs and Assemblies for the Improvement of Old and Young, etc.

To-day none of these gay little volumes sold in New York are to be seen. The inherent faculty of children for losing and destroying books, coupled with the perishable nature of these toy volumes, has rendered the children's treasures of seventeen hundred and sixty-two a great rarity. The Historical Society of Pennsylvania is the fortunate possessor of one much prized story-book printed in that year; but though it is at present in the Quaker City, a printer of Boston was responsible for its production.

In Isaiah Thomas's recollections of the early Boston printers, he described Zechariah Fowle, with whom he served his apprenticeship, and Samuel Draper, Fowle's partner. These men, about seventeen hundred and fifty-seven, took a house in Marlborough Street. Here, according to Thomas, "they printed and opened a shop. They kept a great supply of ballads, and small pamphlets for book pedlars, of whom there were many at that time. Fowle was bred to the business, but he was an indifferent hand at the press, and much worse at the case."

This description of the printer's ability is borne out by the "New-Gift for Children," printed by this firm. It is probably the oldest story-book bearing an American imprint now in existence, and for this reason merits description, although its contents can be seen in the picture of the title-page. Brown with age and like all chap-books without a cover—for it was Newbery who introduced this more durable and attractive feature—all sizes in type were used to print its fifteen stories. The stories in themselves were not new, as it is called the "Fourth edition." It is possible that they were taken from the Banbury chap-books, which also often copied Newbery's juvenile library, as the list of his publications compiled by Mr. Charles Welsh does not contain this title.

The loyalty of the Boston printers found expression on the third page by a very black cut of King George the Third, who appears rather puzzled and not a little unhappy; but it found favor with customers, for as yet the colonials thought their king "no man of blood." On turning the page Queen Charlotte looks out with goggle-eyes, curls, and a row of beads about the size of pebbles around her thick neck. The picture seems to be a copy from some miniature of the queen, as an oval frame with a crown surmounting it encircles the portrait. The stories are so much better than some that were written even after the nineteenth century, that extracts from them are worth reading. The third tale, called "The Generosity of Confessing a Fault," begins as follows:

"Miss Fanny Goodwill was one of the prettiest children that ever was seen; her temper was as sweet as her looks, and her behavior so genteel and obliging that everybody admir'd her; for nobody can help loving good children, any more than they can help being angry with those that are naughty. It is no wonder then that her papa and mama lov'd her dearly, they took a great deal of pains to improve her mind so that before she was seven years old, she could read, and talk, and work like a little woman. One day as her papa was sitting by the fire, he set her upon his knees, kiss'd her, and told her how very much he lov'd her; and then smiling, and taking hold of her hand, My dear Fanny, said he, take care never to tell a lye, and then I shall always love you as well as I do now. You or I may be guilty of a fault; but there is something noble and generous in owning our errors, and striving to mend them; but a lye more than doubles the fault, and when it is found out, makes the lyar appear mean and contemptible.... Thus, my dear, the lyar is a wretch, whom nobody trusts, nobody regards, nobody pities. Indeed papa, said Miss Fanny, I would not be such a creature for all the world. You are very good, my little charmer, said her papa and kiss'd her again."



The inevitable temptation came when Miss Fanny went on "a visit to a Miss in the neighborhood; her mama ordered her to be home at eight o'clock; but she was engag'd at play, and did not mind how the time pass'd, so that she stay'd till near ten; and then her mama sent for her." The child of course was frightened by the lateness of the hour, and the maid—who appears in the illustration with cocked hat and musket!—tried to calm her fears with the advice to "tell her mama that the Miss she went to see had taken her out." "No Mary, said Miss Fanny, wiping her pretty eyes, I am above a lye;" and she rehearsed for the benefit of the maid her father's admonition.

Story IX tells of the Good Girl and Pretty Girl. In this the pretty child had bright eyes and pretty plump cheeks and was much admired. She, however, was a meanly proud girl, and so naughty as not to want to grow wiser, but applied to those good people who happened to be less favored in looks such terms as "bandy-legs, crump, and all such naughty names." The good sister "could read before the pretty miss could tell a letter; and though her shape was not so genteel her behavior was a great deal more so. But alas! the pretty creature fell sick of the small-pox, and all her beauty vanished." Thus in the eighteenth century was the adage "Beauty is but skin deep" brought to bear upon conduct.

On the last page is a cut of "Louisburg demolished," which had served its time already upon almanacs, but the eight cuts were undoubtedly made especially for children. Moreover, since they do not altogether illustrate the various stories, they are good proof that similar chap-book tales were printed by Fowle and Draper for little ones before the War of Independence.

In the southern provinces the sea afforded better transportation facilities for household necessities and luxuries than the few post-lines from the north could offer. Bills of exchange could be drawn against London, to be paid by the profits of the tobacco crops, a safer method of payment than any that then existed between the northern and southern towns. In the regular orders sent by George Washington to Robert Carey in London, twice we find mention of the children's needs and wishes. In the very first invoice of goods to be shipped to Washington after his marriage with Mrs. Custis in seventeen hundred and fifty-nine, he ordered "10 Shillings worth of Toys, 6 little books for children beginning to read and a fashionable dressed baby to cost 10 Shillings;" and again later in ordering clothes, "Toys, Sugar, Images and Comfits" for his step-children he added: "Books according to the enclosed list to be charged equally to John Parke Custis and Martha Parke Custis."

But in Boston the people bought directly from the booksellers, of whom there were already many. One of these was John Mein, who played a part in the historic Non-Importation Agreement. In seventeen hundred and fifty this Englishman had opened in King Street a shop which he called the "London Book-Store." Here he sold many imported books, and in seventeen hundred and sixty-five, when the population of Boston numbered some twenty thousand, he started the "earliest circulating library, advertised to contain ten thousand volumes."[73-A] This shop was both famous and notorious: famous because of its "Very Grand Assortment of the most modern Books;" notorious because of the accusations made against its owner when the colonials, aroused by the action of Parliament, passed the Non-Importation Agreement.

Before the excitement had culminated in this "Agreement," John Mein's lists of importations show that the children's pleasure had not been forgotten, and after it their books singularly enough were connected with this historic action.

In 1766, in the "Boston Evening Post," we find Mein's announcement that "Little Books with Pictures for Children" could be purchased at the London Book-Store; in December, 1767, he advertised through the columns of the "Boston Chronicle," among other books, "in every branch of polite literature," a "Great Variety of entertaining Books for CHILDREN, proper for presents at Christmas or New-year's day—Prices from Two Coppers to Two Shillings." In August of the following year Mein gave the names of seven of Newbery's famous gilt volumes, as "to be sold" at his shop. These "pretty little entertaining and instructive Books" were "Giles Gingerbread," the "Adventures of little TOMMY TRIP with his dog JOULER," "Tommy Trip's Select Fables," and "an excellent Pastoral Hymn," "The Famous Tommy Thumb's Little Story-Book," "Leo, the Great Giant," and "URAX, or the Fair Wanderer—price eight pence lawful money. A very interesting tale in which the protection of the Almighty is proved to be the first and chief support of the FEMALE SEX." Number seven in the list was the story of the "Cruel Giant Barbarico," and it is one of this edition that is now among the rare Americana of the Boston Public Library. The imprint upon its title-page coincides with Isaiah Thomas's statement that though "Fleming was not concerned with Mein in book-selling, several books were printed at their house for Mein." Its date, 1768, would indicate that Mein had reproduced one of his importations to which allusion has already been made. The book in marbled covers, time-worn and faded now, was sold for only "six-pence lawful" when new, possibly because it lacked illustrations.



One year later, when the Non-Importation Agreement had passed and was rigorously enforced in the port of Boston, these same little books were advertised again in the "Chronicle" of December 4-7 under the large caption, PRINTED IN AMERICA AND TO BE SOLD BY JOHN MEIN. Times had so changed within one year's space that even a child's six-penny book was unpopular, if known to have been imported.

Mein was among those accused of violating the "Agreement;" he was charged with the importation of materials for book-making. In a November number of the "Chronicle" of seventeen hundred and sixty-nine, Mein published an article entitled "A State of the Importation from Great Britain into the Port of BOSTON with the advertisement of a set of Men, who assume to themselves THE TITLE of ALL the Well Disposed Merchants." In this letter the London Book-Store proprietor vigorously defended himself, and protested that the quantity of his work necessitated some importations not procurable in Boston. He also made sarcastic references to other men whom he thought the cap fitted better with less excuse. It was in the following December that he tried to keep this trade in children's books by his apparently patriotic announcement regarding them. His protests were useless. Already in disfavor with some because he was supposed to print books in America but used a London imprint, his popularity waned; he was marked as a loyalist, and there was little of the spirit of tolerance for such in that hot-bed of patriotism. The air was so full of the growing differences between the colonials and the king's government, that in seventeen hundred and seventy Mein closed out his stock and returned to England.

On the other hand, the patriotic booksellers did not fail to take note of the crystallization of public opinion. Robert Bell in Philadelphia appended a note to his catalogue of books, stating that "The Lovers and Practisers of Patriotism are requested to note that all the Books in this Catalogue are either of American manufacture, or imported before the Non-Importation Agreement."

The supply of home-made paper was of course limited. So much was needed to circulate among the colonies pamphlets dealing with the injustice of the king's government toward his American subjects, that it seems remarkable that any juvenile books should have been printed in those stirring days before the war began. It is rather to be expected that, with the serious turn that events had taken and the consequent questions that had arisen, the publications of the American press should have received the shadow of the forthcoming trouble—a shadow sufficient to discourage any attempt at humor for adult or child. Evidence, however, points to the fact that humor and amusement were not totally lacking in the issues of the press of at least one printer in Boston, John Boyle. The humorous satire produced by his press in seventeen hundred and seventy-five, called "The First Book of the American Chronicles of the Times," purported to set forth the state of political affairs during the troubles "wherein all our calamities are seen to flow from the fact that the king had set up for our worship the god of the heathen—The Tea Chest." This pamphlet has been one to keep the name of John Boyle among the prominent printers of pre-Revolutionary days. Additional interest accrues for this reason to a play-book printed by Boyle—the only one extant of this decade known to the writer.

This quaint little chap-book, three by four inches in size, was issued in seventeen hundred and seventy-one, soon after Boyle had set up his printing establishment and four years before the publication of the famous pamphlet. It represents fully the standard for children's literature in the days when Newbery's tiny classics were making their way to America, and was indeed advertised by Mein in seventeen hundred and sixty-eight among the list of books "Printed in America." Its title, "The Famous Tommy Thumb's Little Story-Book: Containing his Life and Adventures," has rather a familiar sound, but its contents would not now be allowed upon any nursery table. Since the days of the Anglo-Saxons, Tom Thumb's adventures have been told and retold; each generation has given to the rising generation the version thought proper for the ears of children. In Boyle's edition this method resulted in realism pushed to the extreme; but it is not to be denied that the yellowed pages contain the wondrous adventures and hairbreadth escapes so dear to the small boy of all time. The thrilling incidents were further enlivened, moreover, by cuts called by the printer "curious" in the sense of very fine: and curious they are to-day because of the crudeness of their execution and the coarseness of their design. Nevertheless, the grotesque character of the illustrations was altogether effective in impressing upon the reader the doughty deeds of his old friend, Tom Thumb. The book itself shows marks of its popularity, and of the hard usage to which it was subjected by its happy owner, who was not critical of the editor's freedom of speech.

The coarseness permitted in a nursery favorite makes it sufficiently clear that the standard for the ideal toy-book of the eighteenth century is no gauge for that of the twentieth. Child-life differed in many particulars, as Mr. Julian Hawthorne pointed out some years ago, when he wrote that the children of the eighteenth century "were urged to grow up almost before they were short-coated." We must bear this in mind in turning to another class of books popular with adult and child alike in both England and America before and for some years after the Revolution.

This was the period when the novel in the hands of Richardson, Fielding, and Smollett was assuming hitherto unsuspected possibilities. Allusion must be made to some of the characteristics of their work, since their style undoubtedly affected juvenile reading and the tales written for children.

Taking for the sake of convenience the novels of the earliest of this group of men, Samuel Richardson, as a starting-point, we find in Pamela and Mr. Lovelace types of character that merge from the Puritanical concrete examples of virtue and vice into a psychological attempt to depict the emotion and feeling preceding every act of heroine and villain. Through every stage of the story the author still clings to the long-established precedent of giving moral and religious instruction. Afterwards, when Fielding attempted to parody "Pamela," he developed the novel of adventure in high and low life, and produced "Joseph Andrews." He then followed this with the character-study represented by "Tom Jones, Foundling." Richardson in "Pamela" had aimed to emphasize virtue as in the end prospering; Fielding's characters rather embody the principle of virtue being its own reward and of vice bringing its own punishment. Smollett in "Humphrey Clinker's Adventures" brought forth fun from English surroundings instead of seeking for the hero thrilling and daring deeds in foreign countries. He also added to the list of character-studies "Roderick Random," a tale of the sea, the mystery of which has never palled since "Robinson Crusoe" saw light.

There was also the novel of letters. In the age of the first great novelists letter-writing was among the polite arts. It was therefore counted a great but natural achievement when the epistolary method of revealing the plot was introduced. "Clarissa Harlowe" and "Sir Charles Grandison" were the results of this style of writing; they comprehended the "most Important Concerns of private life"—"concerns" which moved with lingering and emotional persistency towards the inevitable catastrophe in "Clarissa," and the happy issue out of the misunderstandings and misadventures which resulted in Miss Byron's alliance with Sir Charles.

Until after the next (nineteenth) century had passed its first decade these tales were read in full or abridged forms by many children among the fashionable and literary sets in England and America. Indeed, the art of writing for children was so unknown that often attempts to produce child-like "histories" for them resulted in little other than novels upon an abridged scale.

But before even abridged novels found their way into juvenile favor, it was "customary in Richardson's time to read his novels aloud in the family circle. When some pathetic passage was reached the members of the family would retire to separate apartments to weep; and after composing themselves, they would return to the fireside to have the reading proceed. It was reported to Richardson, that, on one of these occasions, 'an amiable little boy sobbed as if his sides would burst and resolved to mind his books that he might be able to read Pamela through without stopping.' That there might be something in the family novel expressly for children, Richardson sometimes stepped aside from the main narrative to tell them a moral tale."[80-A]

Mr. Cross gives an example of this which, shorn of its decoration, was the tale of two little boys and two little girls, who never told fibs, who were never rude and noisy, mischievous or quarrelsome; who always said their prayers when going to bed, and therefore became fine ladies and gentlemen.

To make the tales less difficult for amiable children to read, an abridgment of their contents was undertaken; and Goldsmith is said to have done much of the "cutting" in "Pamela," "Clarissa Harlowe," "Sir Charles Grandison," and others. These books were included in the lists of those sent to America for juvenile reading. In Boston, Cox and Berry inserted in the "Boston Gazette and Country Journal" a notice that they had the "following little Books for all good Boys and Girls:

The Brother's Gift, or the Naughty Girl Reformed. The Sister's Gift, or the Naughty Boy Reformed. The Hobby Horse, or Christmas Companion. The Cries of London as Exhibited in the Streets. The Puzzling Cap. The History of Tom Jones. The History of Joseph Andrews. Abridg'd from the works of H. Fielding The History of Pamela. abridg'd from the works of Samuel Richardson, Esq. The History of Grandison. The History of Clarissa."

Up to this time the story has been rather of the books read by the Puritan and Quaker population of the colonies. There had arisen during the first half of the eighteenth century, however, a merchant class which owed its prosperity to its own ability. Such men sought for their families the material results of wealth which only a place like Boston could bestow. Many children, therefore, were sent to this town to acquire suitable education in books, accomplishments, and deportment. A highly interesting record of a child of well-to-do parents has been left by Anna Green Winslow, who came to Boston to stay with an aunt for the winters of 1771 and 1772. Her diary gives delightful glimpses of children's tea-parties, fashions, and schools, all put down with a childish disregard of importance or connection. It is in these jottings of daily occurrences that proof is found that so young a girl read, quite as a matter of course, the abridged works of Fielding and Richardson.

On January 1, 1772, she wrote in her diary, "a Happy New Year, I have bestowed no new year's gifts, as yet. But have received one very handsome one, Viz, the History of Joseph Andrews abreviated. In nice Guilt and Flowers covers." Again, she put down an account of a day's work, which she called "a piecemeal for in the first place I sew'd on the bosom of unkle's shirt, and mended two pairs of gloves, mended for the wash two handkerch'fs, (one cambrick) sewed on half a border of a lawn apron of aunt's, read part of the xxist chapter of Exodous, & a story in the Mother's Gift." Later she jotted in her book the loan of "3 of Cousin Charles' books to read, viz.—The puzzling Cap, the female Orators & the history of Gaffer Two Shoes." Little Miss Winslow, though only eleven years of age, was a typical child of the educated class in Boston, and, according to her journal, also followed the English custom of reading aloud "with Miss Winslow, the Generous Inconstant and Sir Charles Grandison." It is to be regretted that her diary gives no information as to how she liked such tales. We must anticipate some years to find a comment in the Commonplace Book of a Connecticut girl. Lucy Sheldon lived in Litchfield, a thriving town in eighteen hundred, and did much reading for a child in those days. Upon "Sir Charles Grandison" she confided to her book this offhand note: "Read in little Grandison, which shows that, virtue always meets its reward and vice is punished." The item is very suggestive of Goldsmith's success in producing an abridgment that left the moral where it could not be overlooked.

To discuss in detail this class of writings is not necessary, but a glance at the story of "Clarissa" gives an instructive impression of what old-fashioned children found zestful.

"Clarissa Harlowe" in its abridged form was first published by Newbery, Senior. The book that lies before the writer was printed in seventeen hundred and seventy-two by his son, Francis Newbery. In size five by three and one-half inches, it is decked in once gay parti-colored heavy Dutch paper, with a delicate gold tracery over all. This paper binding, called by Anna Winslow "Flowery Guilt," can no longer be found in Holland, the place of its manufacture; with sarsinet and other fascinating materials it has vanished so completely that it exists only on the faded bindings of such small books as "Clarissa."

The narrative itself is compressed from the original seven volumes into one volume of one hundred and seventy-six closely printed pages, with several full-page copper-plate illustrations. The plot, however, gains rather than loses in this condensed form. The principal distressing situations follow so fast one upon the other that the intensity of the various episodes in the affecting history is increased by the total absence of all the "moving" letters found in the original work. The "lordly husband and father," "the imperious son," "the proud ambitious sister, Arabella," all combined to force the universally beloved and unassuming Clarissa to marry the wealthy Mr. Somers, who was to be the means of "the aggrandisement of the family." Clarissa, in this perplexing situation, yielded in a desperate mood to "the earnest entreaties of the artful Lovelace to accept the protection of the Ladies of his family." Who these ladies were, to whom the designing Lovelace conducted the agitated heroine, is set forth in unmistakable language; and thereafter follow the treacherous behaviour exhibited by Lovelace, the various attempts to escape by the unhappy beauty, and her final exhaustion and death. An example of the style may be given in this description of the death-scene:

"Clarissa had before remarked that all would be most conveniently over in bed: The solemn, the most important moment approached, but her soul ardently aspiring after immorality [immortality was of course the author's intention], she imagined the time moved slowly; and with great presence of mind, she gave orders in relation to her body, directing her nurse and the maid of the house, as soon as she was cold, to put her into her coffin. The Colonel [her cousin], after paying her another visit, wrote to her uncle, Mr. John Harlowe, that they might save themselves the trouble of having any further debates about reconciliation; for before they could resolve, his dear cousin would probably be no more....

"A day or two after, Mr. Belford [a friend] was sent for, and immediately came; at his entrance he saw the Colonel kneeling by her bed-side with the ladies right hand in both his, which his face covered bathing it with tears, though she had just been endeavoring to comfort him, in noble and elevated strains. On the opposite side of the bed was seated Mrs. Lovick, who leaning against the bed's-head in a most disconsolate manner, turned to him as soon as she saw him, crying, O Mr. Belford, the dear lady! a heavy sigh not permitting her to say more. Mrs. Smith [the landlady] was kneeling at the bed's feet with clasped fingers and uplifted eyes, with tears trickling in large drops from her cheeks, as if imploring help from the source of all comfort.

"The excellent lady had been silent a few minutes, and was thought speechless, she moving her lips without uttering a word; but when Mrs. Lovick, on Mr. Belford's approach, pronounced his name, O Mr. Belford! cried she, in a faint inward voice, Now!—now!—I bless God, all will soon be over—a few minutes will end this strife—and I shall be happy," etc. Her speech was long, although broken by dashes, and again she resumed, "in a more faint and broken accent," the blessing and directions. "She then sunk her head upon the pillow; and fainting away, drew from them her hands." Once more she returned to consciousness, "when waving her hand to him [Mr. Belford] and to her cousin, and bowing her head to every one present, not omitting the nurse and maid servant, with a faltering and inward voice, she added Bless—Bless—you all!—"

The illustrations, in comparison with others of the time, are very well engraved, although the choice of subjects is somewhat singular. The last one represents Clarissa's friend, "Miss Howe" (the loyal friend to whom all the absent letters were addressed), "lamenting over the corpse of Clarissa," who lies in the coffin ordered by the heroine "to be covered with fine black cloth, and lined with white satin."

As one lays aside this faded duodecimo, the conviction is strong that the texture of the life of an old-fashioned child was of coarser weave than is pleasant to contemplate. How else could elders and guardians have placed without scruple such books in the hands of children? The one explanation is to be found in such diaries as that of Anna Winslow, who quaintly put down in her book facts and occurrences denoting the maturity already reached by a little miss of eleven.

FOOTNOTES:

[73-A] Winsor, Memorial History of Boston, vol. ii, p. xix.

[80-A] Cross, Development of the English Novel, pp. 38, 39.



CHAPTER IV

1776-1790



The British King Lost States thirteen. The New England Primer, Philadelphia, 1797

The good little boy That will not tell a lie, Shall have a plum-pudding Or hot apple-pye. Jacky Dandy's Delight, Worcester, 1786



CHAPTER IV

1776-1790

Patriotic Printers and the American Newbery

When John Mein was forced to close his London Book-Store in Boston and to return to England in 1770, the children of that vicinity had need to cherish their six-penny books with increased care. The shadow of impending conflict was already deep upon the country when Mein departed; and the events of the decade following seventeen hundred and seventy-three—the year of the Boston Tea-Party—were too absorbing and distressing for such trifling publications as toy-books to be more than occasionally printed. Indeed, the history of the American Revolution is so interwoven with tales of privation of the necessities of life that it is astonishing that any printer was able to find ink or paper to produce even the nursery classic "Goody Two-Shoes," printed by Robert Bell of Philadelphia in seventeen hundred and seventy-six.

In New York the conditions were different. The Loyalists, as long as the town was held by the British, continued to receive importations of goods of all descriptions. Among the booksellers, Valentine Nutter from time to time advertised children's as well as adults' books. Hugh Gaine apparently continued to reprint Newbery's duodecimos; and, in a rather newer shop, Roger and Berry's, in Hanover Square, near Gaine's, could be had "Gilt Books, together with Stationary, Jewelry, a Collection of the most books, bibles, prayer-books and patent medicines warranted genuine."

Elsewhere in the colonies, as in Boston, the children went without new books, although very occasionally such notices as the following were inserted in the newspapers:

Just imported and to be Sold by Thomas Bradford

At his Book-Store in Market-Street, adjoining the Coffee-house

The following Books ...

Little Histories for Children,

Among which are, Book of Knowledge, Joe Miller's Jests, Jenny Twitchells' ditto, the Linnet, The Lark (being collections of best Songs), Robin Redbreast, Choice Spirits, Argalus & Parthenia, Valentine and Orson, Seven Wise Masters, Seven Wise Mistresses, Russell's seven Sermons, Death of Abel, French Convert, Art's Treasury, Complete Letter-Writer, Winter Evening Entertainment, Stories and Tales, Triumphs of Love, being a Collection of Short Stories, Joseph Andrews, Aesop's Fables, Scotch Rogue, Moll Flanders, Lives of Highwaymen, Lives of Pirates, Buccaneers of America, Robinson Crusoe, Twelve Caesars.

Such was the assortment of penny-dreadfuls and religious tracts offered in seventeen hundred and eighty-one to the Philadelphia public for juvenile reading. It is typical of the chapmen's library peddled about the colonies long after they had become states. "Valentine and Orson," "The Seven Wise Masters," "The Seven Wise Mistresses," and "Winter Evening Entertainment" are found in publishers' lists for many years, and, in spite of frequent vulgarities, there was often no discrimination between them and Newbery's far superior stories; but by eighteen hundred and thirty almost all of these undesirable reprints had disappeared, being buried under the quantities of Sunday-school tales held in high favor at that date.

Meanwhile, the six years of struggle for liberty had rendered the necessaries of life in many cases luxuries. As early as seventeen hundred and seventy-five, during the siege of Boston, provisions and articles of dress had reached such prices that we find thrifty Mrs. John Adams, in Braintree, Massachusetts, foreseeing a worse condition, writing her husband, who was one of the Council assembled in Philadelphia, to send her, if possible, six thousand pins, even if they should cost five pounds. Prices continued to rise and currency to depreciate. In seventeen hundred and seventy-nine Mrs. Adams reported in her letters to her husband that potatoes were ten dollars a bushel, and writing-paper brought the same price per pound.

Yet family life went on in spite of these increasing difficulties. The diaries and letters of such remarkable women as the patriotic Abigail Adams, the Quakeress, Mrs. Eliza Drinker, the letters of the Loyalist and exile, James Murray, the correspondence of Eliza Pinckney of Charleston, and the reminiscences of a Whig family who were obliged to leave New York upon the occupation of the town by British forces, abound in those details of domestic life that give a many sided picture. Joys derived from good news of dear ones, and family reunions; anxieties occasioned by illness, or the armies' depredations; courageous efforts on the part of mothers not to allow their children's education and occupations to suffer unnecessarily; tragedies of death and ruined homes—all are recorded with a "particularity" for which we are now grateful to the writers.

It is through these writings, also, that we are allowed glimpses of the enthusiasm for the cause of Liberty, or King, which was imbibed from the parents by the smallest children. On the Whig side, patriotic mothers in New England filled their sons with zeal for the cause of freedom and with hatred of the tyranny of the Crown; while in the more southern colonies the partisanship of the little ones was no less intense. "From the constant topic of the present conversation," wrote the Rev. John J. Zubly (a Swiss clergyman settled in South Carolina and Georgia), in an address to the Earl of Dartmouth in seventeen hundred and seventy-five,—"from the constant topic of the present conversation, every child unborn will be impressed with the notion—it is slavery to be bound at the will of another 'in all things whatsoever.' Every mother's milk will convey a detestation of this maxim. Were your lordship in America, you might see little ones acquainted with the word of command before they can distinctly speak, and shouldering of a gun before they are well able to walk."[92-A]

The children of the Tories had also their part in the struggle. To some the property of parents was made over, to save it from confiscation in the event of the success of the American cause. To others came the bitterness of separation from parents, when they were sent across the sea to unknown relatives; while again some faint manuscript record tells of a motherless child brought from a comfortable home, no longer tenable, to whatever quarters could be found within the British lines. Fortunately, children usually adapt themselves easily to changed conditions, and in the novelty and excitement of the life around them, it is probable they soon forgot the luxuries of dolls and hobby-horses, toy-books and drums, of former days.

In the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania the sentiment of the period was expressed in two or three editions of "The New England Primer." Already in 1770 one had appeared containing as frontispiece a poor wood-cut of John Hancock. In 1775 the enthusiasm over the appointment of George Washington as commander-in-chief brought out another edition of the A B C book with the same picture labelled "General Washington." The custom of making one cut do duty in several representations was so well understood that this method of introducing George Washington to the infant reader naturally escaped remark.

Another primer appeared four years later, which was advertised by Walters and Norman in the "Pennsylvania Evening Post" as "adorned with a beautiful head of George Washington and other copper-plates." According to Mr. Hildeburn, this small book had the honor of containing the first portrait of Washington engraved in America. While such facts are of trifling importance, they are, nevertheless, indications of the state of intense feeling that existed at the time, and point the way by which the children's books became nationalized.

In New England the very games of children centred in the events which thrilled the country. Josiah Quincy remembered very well in after life, how "at the age of five or six, astride my grandfather's cane and with my little whip, I performed prodigies of valor, and more than once came to my mother's knees declaring that I had driven the British out of Boston." Afterwards at Phillips Academy, in Andover, between seventeen hundred and seventy-eight and seventeen hundred and eighty-six, Josiah and his schoolfellows "established it as a principle that every hoop, sled, etc., should in some way bear Thirteen marks as evidence of the political character of the owner,—if which were wanting the articles became fair prize and were condemned and forfeited without judge, jury, or decree of admiralty."[94-A]

Other boys, such as John Quincy Adams, had tutors at home as a less expensive means of education than the wartime price of forty dollars a week for each child that good boarding-schools demanded. But at their homes the children had plenty of opportunity to show their intense enthusiasm for the cause of liberty. Years later, Mr. Adams wrote to a Quaker friend:

"For the space of twelve months my mother with her infant children dwelt, liable every hour of the day and of the night to be butchered in cold blood, or taken and carried to Boston as hostages. My mother lived in uninterrupted danger of being consumed with them all in a conflagration kindled by a torch in the same hands which on the Seventeenth of June [1775] lighted the fires of Charlestown."[94-B]

He was, of course, only one of many boys who saw from some height near their homes the signs of battle, the fires of the enemy's camps, the smoke rising from some farm fired by the British, or burned by its owner to prevent their occupation of it. With hearts made to beat quickly by the news that filtered through the lines, and heads made old by the responsibility thrust upon them,—in the absence of fathers and older brothers,—such boys as John Quincy Adams saw active service in the capacity of post-riders bearing in their several districts the anxiously awaited tidings from Congress or battlefield.

Fortunate indeed were the families whose homes were not disturbed by the military operations. From Boston, New York, and Philadelphia, families were sent hastily to the country until the progress of the war made it possible to return to such comforts as had not been destroyed by the British soldiers. The "Memoirs of Eliza Morton," afterward Mrs. Josiah Quincy, but a child eight years of age in seventeen hundred and seventy-six, gives a realistic account of the life of such Whig refugees. Upon the occupation of New York by the British, her father, a merchant of wealth, as riches were then reckoned, was obliged to burn his warehouse to save it from English hands. Mr. Morton then gathered together in the little country village of Basking Ridge, seven miles from Morristown, New Jersey, such of his possessions as could be hastily transported from the city. Among the books saved in this way were the works of Thurston, Thomson, Lyttleton, and Goldsmith, and for the children's benefit, "Dodsley's Collection of Poems," and "Pilgrim's Progress." "This," wrote Mrs. Quincy, "was a great favorite; Mr. Greatheart was in my opinion a hero, well able to help us all on our way." During the exile from New York, as Eliza Morton grew up, she read all these books, and years afterward told her grandchildren that while she admired the works of Thurston, Thomson, and Lyttleton, "those of Goldsmith were my chief delight. When my reading became afterward more extensive I instinctively disliked the extravagant fiction which often injures the youthful mind."

The war, however, was not allowed to interfere with the children's education in this family. In company with other little exiles, they were taught by a venerable old man until the evacuation of Philadelphia made it possible to send the older children to Germantown, where a Mr. Leslie had what was considered a fine school. The schoolroom walls were hung with lists of texts of Scripture beginning with the same letter, and for globes were substituted the schoolmaster's snuffbox and balls of yarn. If these failed to impress a child with the correct notions concerning the solar system, the children themselves were made to whirl around the teacher.

In Basking Ridge the children had much excitement with the passing of soldiers to Washington's headquarters in Morristown, and with watching for "The Post" who carried the news between Philadelphia, Princeton, and Morristown. "'The Post,' Mr. Martin," wrote Mrs. Quincy, "was an old man who carried the mail, ... he was our constant medium of communication; and always stopped at our house to refresh himself and horse, tell the news, and bring packets. He used to wear a blue coat with yellow buttons, a scarlet waistcoat, leathern small-clothes, blue yarn stockings, and a red wig and cocked hat, which gave him a sort of military appearance. He usually traveled in a sulky, but sometimes in a chaise, or on horseback.... Mr. Martin also contrived to employ himself in knitting coarse yarn stockings while driving or rather jogging along the road, or when seated on his saddle-bags on horseback. He certainly did not ride post, according to the present [1821] meaning of that term."

Deprived like many other children of Newbery's peaceful biographies and stories, the little Mortons' lives were too full of an intense daily interest to feel the lack of new literature of this sort. Tales of the campaigns told in letters to friends and neighbors were reechoed in the ballads and songs that formed part of the literary warfare waged by Whig or Loyal partisans. Children of to-day sing so zestfully the popular tunes of the moment, that it requires very little imagination to picture the schoolboy of Revolutionary days shouting lustily verses from "The Battle of the Kegs," and other rhymed stories of military incidents. Such a ballad was "A Song for the Red Coats," written after the successful campaign against Burgoyne, and beginning:

"Come unto me, ye heroes, Whose hearts are true and bold, Who value more your honor, Than others do their gold! Give ear unto my story, And I the truth will tell, Concerning many a soldier, Who for his country fell."

Children, it has been said, are good haters. To the patriot boy and girl, the opportunity to execrate Benedict Arnold was found in these lines of a patriotic "ditty" concerning the fate of Major Andre:

"When he was executed He looked both meek and mild; He looked upon the people, And pleasantly he smiled. It moved each eye to pity, Caused every heart to bleed; And every one wished him released— And Arnold in his stead."[98-A]

Loyalist children had an almost equal supply of satirical verse to fling back at neighbors' families, where in country districts some farms were still occupied by sympathizers with Great Britain. A vigorous example of this style of warfare is quoted by Mr. Tyler in his "Literature of the American Revolution," and which, written in seventeen hundred and seventy-six, is entitled "The Congress." It begins:

"These hardy knaves and stupid fools, Some apish and pragmatic mules, Some servile acquiescing tools,— These, these compose the Congress!"[98-B]

Or, again, such taunts over the general poverty of the land and character of the army as were made in a ballad called "The Rebels" by a Loyalist officer:

"With loud peals of laughter, your sides, Sirs, would crack, To see General Convict and Colonel Shoe-black, With their hunting-shirts and rifle-guns, See Cobblers and quacks, rebel priests and the like, Pettifoggers and barbers, with sword and with pike."

Those Loyalists who lived through this exciting period in America's history bore their full share in the heavy personal misfortunes of their political party. The hatred felt toward such colonials as were true to the king has until recently hardly subsided sufficiently to permit any sympathy with the hardships they suffered. Driven from their homes, crowded together in those places occupied by the English, or exiled to England or Halifax, these faithful subjects had also to undergo separation of families perhaps never again united.

Such a Loyalist was James Murray. Forced to leave his daughter and grandchildren in Boston with a sister, he took ship for Halifax to seek a living. There, amid the pressing anxieties occasioned by this separation, he strove to reestablish himself, and sent from time to time such articles as he felt were necessary for their welfare. Thus he writes a memorandum of articles sent in seventeen hundred and eighty by "Mr. Bean's Cartel to Miss Betsy Murray:—viz: Everlasting 4 yards; binding 1 piece, Nankeen 4-7/8 yards. Of Gingham 2 gown patterns; 2 pairs red shoes from A.E.C. for boys, Jack and Ralph, a parcel—to Mrs. Brigden, 1 pair silk shoes and some flowers—Arthur's Geographical Grammar,—Locke on Education,—5 children's books," etc. And in return he is informed that "Charlotte goes to dancing and writing school, improves apace and grows tall. Betsy and Charles are much better but not well. The rest of the children are in good health, desiring their duty to their Uncle and Aunt Inman, and thanks for their cake and gloves."

To such families the end of the war meant either the necessity for making permanent their residence in the British dominion, or of bearing both outspoken and silent scorn in the new Republic.

For the Americans the peace of Yorktown brought joy, but new beginnings had also to be made. Farms had been laid waste, or had suffered from lack of men to cultivate them; industries were almost at a standstill from want of material and laborers. Still the people had the splendid compensation of freedom with victory, and men went sturdily back to their homes to take up as far as possible their various occupations.

An example of the way in which business undertaken before the war was rapidly resumed, or increased, is afforded by the revival of prosperity for the booksellers in Boston, New York, and Philadelphia. Renewals of orders to London agents were speedily made, for the Americans still looked to England for their intellectual needs. In Philadelphia—a town of forty thousand inhabitants in seventeen hundred and eighty-three—among the principal booksellers and printers were Thomas Bradford, Mr. Woodhouse, Mr. Oswald, Mr. Pritchard,—who had established a circulating library,—Robert Aitkin, Mr. Liddon, Mr. Dunlap, Mr. Rice, William and David Hall, Benjamin Bache, J. Crukshank, and Robert Bell. Bell had undoubtedly the largest bookstore, but seems not to have been altogether popular, if an allusion in "The Philadelphiad" is to be credited. This "New Picture of the City" was anonymously published in seventeen hundred and eighty-four, and described, among other well-known places, Robert Bell's book-shop:

BELL'S BOOK STORE

Just by St. Paul's where dry divines rehearse, Bell keeps his store for vending prose and verse, And books that's neither ... for no age nor clime, Lame languid prose begot on hobb'ling rhyme. Here authors meet who ne'er a spring have got, The poet, player, doctor, wit and sot, Smart politicians wrangling here are seen, Condemning Jeffries or indulging spleen.

In 1776 Bell's facilities for printing had enabled him to produce an edition of "Little Goody Two-Shoes," which seems likely to have been the only story-book printed during the troubled years of the Revolution. Besides this, Bell printed in 1777 "Aesop's Fables," as did also Robert Aitkin; and J. Crukshank had issued during the war an A B C book, written by the old schoolmaster, A. Benezet, who had drilled many a Philadelphian in his letters. After the Revolution Benjamin Bache apparently printed children's books in considerable quantities, and orders were sent by other firms to England for juvenile reading-matter.

New England also has records of the sale of these small books in several towns soon after peace was established. John Carter, "at Shakespeare's Head," in Providence, announced by a broadside issued in November, seventeen hundred and eighty-three, that he had a large assortment of stationers' wares, and included in his list "Gilt Books for Children," among which were most of Newbery's publications. In Hartford, Connecticut, where there had been a good press since seventeen hundred and sixty-four, "The Children's Magazine" was reprinted in seventeen hundred and eighty-nine. Its preposterous titles are noteworthy, since it is probable that this was the first attempt at periodical literature made for young people in America. One number contains:

An easy Introduction to Geography. The Schoolboy addressed to the Editors. Moral Tales continued. Tale VIII. The Jealous Wife. The Affectionate Sisters. Familiar Letters on Various Subjects,—Continued.... Letter V from Phillis Flowerdale to Miss Truelove. Letter VI from Miss Truelove to Phillis Flowerdale. Poetry.—The Sweets of May. The Cottage Retirement. Advice to the Fair. The Contented Cottager. The Tear. The Honest Heart.

The autograph of Eben Holt makes the contents of the magazine ludicrous as subjects of interest to a boy But having nothing better, Eben most surely read it from cover to cover.

In Charleston, South Carolina, Robert Wells imported the books read by the members of the various branches of the Ravenel, Pinckney, Prioleau, Drayton, and other families. Boston supplied the juvenile public largely through E. Battelle and Thomas Andrews, who were the agents for Isaiah Thomas, the American Newbery.

An account of the work of this remarkable printer of Worcester, Massachusetts, has been given in Dr. Charles L. Nichols's "Bibliography of Worcester." Thomas's publications ranked as among the very best of the last quarter of the eighteenth century, and were sought by book-dealers in the various states. At one time he had sixteen presses, seven of which were in Worcester. He had also four bookstores in various towns of Massachusetts, one in Concord, New Hampshire, one in Baltimore, and one in Albany.

In 1761, at the age of ten, Thomas had set up as his "'Prentice's Token," a primer issued by A. Barclay in Cornhill, Boston, entitled "Tom Thumb's Play-Book, To Teach Children their letters as soon as they can speak." Although this primer was issued by Barclay, Thomas had already served four years in a printer's office, for according to his own statement he had been sent at the age of six to learn his trade of Zechariah Fowle. Here, as 'prentice, he may have helped to set up the stories of the "Holy Jesus" and the "New Gift," and upon the cutting of their rude illustrations perhaps took his first lessons in engraving. For we know that by seventeen hundred and sixty-four he did fairly good work upon the "Book of Knowledge" from the press of the old printer. Upon the fly-leaf of a copy of this owned by the American Antiquarian Society, founded by Thomas, is the statement in the Worcester printer's handwriting, "Printed and cuts engraved by I. Thomas then 13 years of age for Z. Fowle when I.T. was his Apprentice: bad as the cuts are executed, there was not at that time an artist in Boston who could have done them much better. Some time before, and soon after there were better engravers in Boston." These cuts, especially the frontispiece representing a boy with a spy-glass and globe, and with a sextant at his feet, are far from poor work for a lad of thirteen. "The battered dictionary," says Dr. Nichols, "and the ink-stained Bible which he found in Fowle's office started him in his career, and the printing-press, together with an invincible determination to excel in his calling, carried him onward, until he stands to-day with Franklin and Baskerville, a type of the man who with few educational advantages succeeds because he loves his art for his art's sake."

In supplying to American children a home-made library, Thomas, although he did no really original work for children, such as his English prototype, Newbery, had accomplished, yet had a motive which was not altogether selfish and pecuniary. The prejudice against anything of British manufacture was especially strong in the vicinity of Boston; and it was an altogether natural expression of this spirit that impelled the Worcester printer, as soon as his business was well established, to begin to reprint the various little histories. These reprints were all pirated from Newbery and his successors, Newbery and Carnan; but they compare most favorably with them, and so far surpassed the work of any other American printer of children's books (except possibly those of Bache in Philadelphia) that his work demands more than a passing mention.

Beginning, like most printers, with the production of a primer in seventeen hundred and eighty-four, by seventeen hundred and eighty-six Thomas was well under way in his work for children. In that year at least eleven little books bore his imprint and were sent to his Boston agents to be sold. In the "Worcester Magazine" for June, 1786, Thomas addressed an "Advertisement to Booksellers," as follows: "A large assortment of all the various sizes of CHILDREN'S Books, known by the name of Newbery's Little Books for Children, are now republished by I. Thomas in Worcester, Massachusetts. They are all done excellently in his English Method, and it is supposed the paper, printing, cuts, and binding are in every way equal to those imported from England. As the Subscriber has been at great expense to carry on this particular branch of Printing extensively, he hopes to meet with encouragement from the Booksellers in the United States."

Evidently he did meet with great encouragement from parents as well as booksellers; and it is suspected that the best printed books bearing imprints of other booksellers were often printed in Worcester and bound according to the taste and facilities of the dealer. That this practice of reprinting the title-page and rebinding was customary, a letter from Franklin to his nephew in Boston gives indisputable evidence:

Philada. Nov. 26, 1788.

LOVING COUSIN:

I have lately set up one of my grand-children, Benja. F. Bache, as a Printer here, and he has printed some very pretty little Books for Children. By the Sloop Friendship, Capt. Stutson, I have sent a Box address'd to you, containing 150 of each volume, in Sheets, which I request you would, according to your wonted Goodness, put in a way of being dispos'd of for the Benefit of my dear Sister. They are sold here, bound in marbled Paper at 1 S. a Volume; but I should suppose it best, if it may be done, to sell the whole to some Stationer, at once, unbound as they are; in which case I imagine that half a Dollar a Quire may be thought a reasonable Price, allowing usual Credit if necessary.

My Love to your Family, & believe me ever,

Your affectionate Uncle B. FRANKLIN.

JONA. WILLIAMS, ESQ.

Franklin's reference to the Philadelphia manner of binding toy-books in marbled paper indicates that this home-made product was already displacing the attractive imported gilt embossed and parti-colored covers used by Thomas, who seems never to have adopted this ugly dress for his juvenile publications. As the demand for his wares increased, Thomas set up other volumes from Newbery's stock, until by seventeen hundred and eighty-seven he had reproduced practically every item for his increasing trade. It was his custom to include in many of these books a Catalogue of the various tales for sale, and in "The Picture Exhibition" we find a list of fifty-two stories to be sold for prices varying from six pence to a shilling and a half.

These books may be divided into several classes, all imitations of the English adult literature then in vogue. The alphabets and primers, such as the "Little Lottery Book," "Christmas Box," and "Tom Thumb's Play-thing," are outside the limits of the present subject, since they were written primarily to instruct; and while it is often difficult to draw the line where amusement begins and instruction sinks to the background, the title-pages can usually be taken as evidence at least of the author's intention. These other books, however, fall naturally under the heads of jest and puzzle books, nature stories, fables, rhymes, novels, and stories—all prototypes of the nursery literature of to-day.

The jest and joke books published by Thomas numbered, as far as is known to the writer, only five. Their titles seem to offer a feast of fun unfulfilled by the contents. "Be Merry & Wise, or the Cream of the Jests and the Marrow of Maxims," by Tommy Trapwit, contained concentrated extracts of wisdom, and jokes such as were current among adults. The children for whom they were meant were accustomed to nothing more facetious than the following jest: "An arch wag said, Taylors were like Woodcocks for they got their substance by their long bills." Perhaps they understood also the point in this: "A certain lord had a termagant wife, and at the same time a chaplain that was a tolerable poet, whom his lordship desired to write a copy of verses upon a shrew. I can't imagine, said the chaplain, why your lordship should want a copy, who has so good an original." Other witticisms are not quotable.



Conundrums played their part in the eighteenth century juvenile life, much as they do to-day. These were to be found in "A Bag of Nuts ready Cracked," and "The Big and Little Puzzling Caps." "Food for the Mind" was the solemn title of another riddle-book, whose conundrums are very serious matters. Riddle XIV of the "Puzzling Cap" is typical of its rather dreary contents:

"There was a man bespoke a thing, Which when the maker home did bring, This same maker did refuse it; He who bespoke it did not use it And he who had it did not know Whether he had it, yea or no."

This was a nut also "ready cracked" by the answer reproduced in the illustration.

Nature stories were attempted under the titles of "The Natural History of Four Footed Beasts," "Jacky Dandy's Delight; or the History of Birds and Beasts in Verse and Prose," "Mr. Telltruth's Natural History of Birds," and "Tommy Trip's History of Beasts and Birds." All these were written after Oliver Goldsmith's "Animated Nature" had won its way into great popularity. As a consequence of the favorable impression this book had made, Goldsmith is supposed to have been asked by Newbery to try his hand upon a juvenile natural history.

Possibly it was as a result of Newbery's request that we have the anonymous "Jacky Dandy's Delight" and "Tommy Trip's History of Beasts and Birds." The former appears to be a good example of Goldsmith's facility for amusing himself when doing hack-work for Newbery. How like Goldsmith's manner is this description of a monkey:

"The monkey mischievous Like a naughty boy looks; Who plagues all his friends, And regards not his books.

"He is an active, pert, busy animal, who mimicks human actions so well that some think him rational. The Indians say, he can speak if he pleases, but will not lest he should be set to work. Herein he resembles those naughty little boys who will not learn A, lest they should be obliged to learn B, too. He is a native of warm countries, and a useless beast in this part of the world; so I shall leave him to speak of another that is more bulky, and comes from cold countries: I mean the Bear."

To poke fun in an offhand manner at little boys and girls seemed to have been the only conception of humor to be found in the children's books of the period, if we except the "Jests" and the attempts made in a ponderous manner on the title-pages. The title of "The Picture Exhibition; containing the Original Drawings of Eighteen Disciples.... Published under the Inspection of Mr. Peter Paul Rubens,..." is evidently one of Newbery's efforts to be facetious. To the author, the pretence that the pictures were by "Disciples of Peter Paul Rubens" evidently conveyed the same idea of wit that "Punch" has at times represented to others of a later century.

Fables have always been a mine of interest to young folks, and were interspersed liberally with all moral tales, but "Entertaining Fables" bears upon its title-page a suggestion that the children's old friend, "Aesop," appeared in a new dress.

Another series of books contained the much abridged novels written for the older people. "Peregrine Pickle" and "Roderick Random" were both reprinted by Isaiah Thomas as early as seventeen hundred and eighty-eight. These tales of adventure seem to have had their small reflections in such stories as "The Adventures of a Pincushion," and "The Adventures of a Peg-top," by Dorothy Kilner, an Englishwoman. Mention has already been made of "Pamela" and "Clarissa" in condensed form. These were books of over two hundred pages; but most of the toy-books were limited to less than one hundred. A remarkable instance of the pith of a long plot put into small compass was "The History of Tom Jones." A dog-eared copy of such an edition of "Tom Jones" is still in existence. Its flowery Dutch binding covers only thirty-one pages, four inches long, with a frontispiece and five wood-cut illustrations. In so small a space no detailed account of the life of the hero is to be expected; nevertheless, the first paragraph introduces Tom as no ordinary foundling. Mr. Allworthy finds the infant in his bed one evening and rings up his housekeeper Mrs. Deborah Wilkins. "She being a strict observer of decency was exceedingly alarmed, on entering her master's room, to find him undressed, but more so on his presenting her with the child, which he ordered immediately to be taken care of." The story proceeds—with little punctuation to enable the reader to take breath—to tell how the infant is named, and how Mr. Allworthy's nephew, Master Bilfil, is also brought under that generous and respectable gentleman's protection. Tommy turned out "good," as Mr. Allworthy had hoped when he assumed charge of him; and therefore eventually inherited riches and gained the hand of Miss Sophia Western, with whom he rode about the country in their "Coach and Six."

Of the stories in this juvenile library, the names, at least, of "Giles Gingerbread," "Little King Pippin," and "Goody Two-Shoes" have been handed down through various generations. One hundred years ago every child knew that "Little King Pippin" attained his glorious end by attention to his books in the beginning of his career; that "Giles Gingerbread" first learned his alphabet from gingerbread letters, and later obtained the patronage of a fine gentleman by spelling "apple-pye" correctly. Thus did his digestion prove of material assistance in mental gymnastics.



But the nursery favorite was undoubtedly "Margery, or Little Goody Two-Shoes." She was introduced to the reader in her "state of rags and care," from which she gradually emerged in the chapters entitled, "How and about Little Margery and her Brother;" "How Little Margery obtained the name of Goody Two-Shoes;" "How she became a Tutoress" to the farmers' families in which she taught spelling by a game; and how they all sang the "Cuz's Chorus" in the intervals between the spelling lesson and the composition of sentences like this: "I pray God to bless the whole country, and all our friends and all our enemies." Like the usual heroine of eighteenth century fiction, she married a title, and as Lady Jones was the Lady Bountiful of the district. From these tales it is clear that piety as the chief end of the story-book child has been succeeded by learning as the desideratum; yet morality is still pushed into evidence, and the American mother undoubtedly translated the ethical sign-boards along the progress of the tale into Biblical admonitions.

All the books were didactic in the extreme. A series of four, called "The Mother's," "Father's," "Sister's," and "Brother's Gifts," is a good example of this didactic method of story-telling. "The Father's Gift" has lessons in spelling preceded by these lines:

"Let me not join with those in Play, Who fibs and stories tell, I with my Book will spend the Day, And not with such Boys dwell. For one rude Boy will spoil a score As I have oft been told; And one bad sheep, in Time, is sure To injure all the Fold."

"The Mother's Gift" was confined largely to the same instructive field, but had one or two stories which conformed to the sentiment of the author of "The Adventures of a Pincushion," who stated her motive to be "That of providing the young reader with a few pages which should be innocent of corrupting if they did not amuse."

"The Brother's" and "Sister's Gifts," however, adopt a different plan of instruction. In "The Brother's Gift" we find a brother solicitous concerning his sister's education: "Miss Kitty Bland was apt, forward and headstrong; and had it not been for the care of her brother, Billy, would have probably witnessed all the disadvantages of a modern education"! Upon Kitty's return from boarding-school, "she could neither read, nor sew, nor write grammatically, dancing stiff and awkward, her musick inelegant, and everything she did bordered strongly on affectation." Here was a large field for reformation for Billy to effect. He had no doubts as to what method to pursue. She was desired to make him twelve shirts, and when the first one was presented to him, "he was astonished to find her lacking in so useful a female accomplishment." Exemplary conversation produced such results that the rest of the garments were satisfactory to the critical Billy, who, "as a mark of approbation made her a present of a fine pair of stays."

"The Sister's Gift" presents an opposite picture. In this case it is Master Courtley who, a "youth of Folly and Idleness," received large doses of advice from his sister. This counsel was so efficient with Billy's sensitive nature that before the story ends, "he wept bitterly, and declared to his sister that she had painted the enormity of his vices in such striking colors, that they shocked him in the greatest degree; and promised ever after to be as remarkable for generosity, compassion and every other virtue as he had hitherto been for cruelty, forwardness and ill-nature." Virtue in this instance was its own reward, as Billy received no gift in recognition of his changed habits.

To the modern lover of children such tales seem strangely ill-suited to the childish mind, losing, as they do, all tenderness in the effort of the authors (so often confided to parents in the preface) "to express their sentiments with propriety." Such criticism of the style and matter of these early attempts to write for little people was probably not made by either infant or adult readers of that old-time public. The children read what was placed before them as intellectual food, plain and sweetened, as unconcernedly as they ate the food upon their plates at meal-time. That their own language was the formal one of the period is shown by such letters as the following one from Mary Wilder, who had just read "The Mother's Gift:"

Lancaster, October 9th, 1789.

HOND. MADM:

Your goodness to me I cannot express. My mind is continually crowded with your kindness. If your goodness could be rewarded, I hope God will repay you. If you remember, some time ago I read a story in "The Mother's Gift," but I hope I shall never resemble Miss Gonson. O Dear! What a thing it is to disobey one's parents. I have one of the best Masters. He gave me a sheet of paper this morning. I hope Uncle Flagg will come up. I am quite tired of looking for Betsy, but I hope she will come. When school is done keeping, I shall come to Sudbury. What a fine book Mrs. Chapone's Letters is: My time grows short and I must make my letter short.

Your dutiful daughter, P.W.

Nursery rhymes and jingles of these present days have all descended from song-books of the eighteenth century, entitled "Little Robin Red Breast," "A Poetical Description of Song Birds," "Tommy Thumb's Song-Book," and the famous "Melodies of Mother Goose," whose name is happily not yet relegated to the days of long ago. Two extracts from the "Poetical Description of Song Birds" will be sufficient to show how foreign to the birds familiar to American children were the descriptions:

THE BULLFINCH

This lovely bird is charming to the sight: The back is glossy blue, the belly white, A jetty black shines on his neck and head; His breast is flaming with a beauteous red.

THE TWITE

Green like the Linnet it appears to sight, And like the Linnet sings from morn till night. A reddish spot upon his rump is seen, Short is his bill, his feathers always clean: When other singing birds are dull or nice, To sing again the merry Twites entice.

Reflections of the prevailing taste of grown people for biography are suggested in three little books, of two of which the author was Mrs. Pilkington, who had already written several successful stories for young ladies. Her "Biography for Girls" contains various novelettes, in each of which the heroine lives the conventional life and dies the conventional death of the period, and receives a laudatory epitaph. They are remarkable only as being devoid of any interest. Her "Biography for Boys" does not appear to have attained the same popularity as that for girls. A third book, "The Juvenile Biographers," containing the "Lives of Little Masters and Misses," is representative of the changes made in many books by the printer to cater to that pride in the young Republic so manifest in all local literary productions. In one biography we note a Representative to the Massachusetts Assembly:

"As Master Sammy had always been a very sober and careful child, and very attentive to his Books, it is no wonder that he proved, in the End, to be an excellent Scholar.

"Accordingly, when he had reached the age of fourteen, Mr. William Goodall, a wealthy merchant in the city of Boston, took him into his counting house, in order to bring him up in the merchantile Way, and thereby make his Fortune.

"This was a sad Stroke to his poor Sister Nancy, who having lost both her Papa and Mama, was now likely to lose her Brother likewise; but Sammy did all he could to appease her, and assured her, that he would spend all his leisure Time with her. This he most punctually performed, and never were Brother and Sister as happy in each other's company as they were.

"Mr. William Goodall was highly satisfied with Sammy's Behaviour, and dying much about the Time that Miss Nancy was married to the Gentleman, he left all his business to Sammy, together with a large Capital to carry it on. So much is Mr. Careful esteemed (for we must now no longer call him Master Sammy) that he was chosen in the late General Election, Representative in the General Court, for one of the first Towns in New England, without the least expense to himself. We here see what are the Effects of Good Behaviour."

This adaptation of the English tale to the surroundings of the American child is often found in Thomas's reprints, and naturally, owing to his enthusiasm over the recent change in the form of government, is made wholly by political references. Therefore while the lark and the linnet still sang in songs and the cowslips were scattered throughout the nature descriptions, Master Friendly no longer rode in the Lord Mayor's coach, but was seated as a Congressman in a sedan chair, "and he looked—he looked—I do not know what he looked like, but everybody was in love with him." The engraver as well as the biographer of the recently made Representative was evidently at a loss as to his appearance, as the four dots indicating the young gentleman's features give but a blank look perhaps intended to denote amazement at his election.

The illustrations of Thomas's toy reprints should not be overlooked. The Worcester printer seems to have rewritten the "Introduction" to "Goody Two-Shoes," and at the end he affixed a "Letter from the Printer which he desires may be inserted.

SIR: I have come with your copy, and so you may return it to the Vatican, if you please; and pray tell Mr. Angelo to brush up his cuts; that in the next edition they may give us a good impression."

This apology for the character of the illustrations serves as an introduction to a most interesting subject of conjecture as to the making of the cuts, and particularly as to the engraving of the frontispiece in "Goody Two-Shoes."



It will be remembered that Isaiah Thomas in his advertisement to booksellers had expressly mentioned the great expense he had incurred in bringing out the juvenile books in "the English method." But Mr. Edwin Pearson, in his delightful discussion of "Banbury Chap-Books," has also stated that the wood-cut frontispiece in the first American edition of "Goody Two-Shoes," printed by Thomas, was engraved by Bewick, the famous English illustrator. A comparison of the reproduction of the Bewick engraving in Mr. Pearson's book with the frontispiece in Thomas's edition shows so much difference that it is a matter of regret that Mr. Pearson withheld his authority for attributing to Bewick the representation of Margery Two-Shoes. Besides the inference from Thomas's letter that the poor cuts would be improved before another edition should be printed, there are several points to be observed in comparing the cuts. In the first place, the execution in the Thomas cut suggests a different hand in the use of the tools; again, the reversed position of the figure of "Goody" indicates a copy of the English original. Also the expression of Thomas's heroine, although slightly mincing, is less distressed than the British dame's, to say nothing of the variation in the fashion of the gowns. And such details as the replacing of the English landscape by the spire of a meeting-house in the distance seem to confirm the impression that the drawing was made after, but not by Bewick. In the cuts scattered throughout the text the same difference in execution and portrayal of the little schoolmistress is noticeable. Margery, upon her rounds to teach the farmers' children to spell such words as "plumb-pudding" "(and who can suppose a better?)," presents her full face in the Newbery edition, and but a three-quarter view to her American admirers.

These facts, together with the knowledge that Isaiah Thomas was a fair engraver himself, make it possible that his apology for the first impression of the tiny classic was for his own engraving, which he thought to better.

Thomas not only copied and pirated Newbery's juvenile histories, but he adopted his method of advertising by insertions in the text of these tales. For example, in "The Travels of Robinson Crusoe, Written by Himself," the little reader was told, "If you learn this Book well and are good, you can buy a larger and more complete History of Mr. Crusoe at your friend the Bookseller's in Worcester near the Court House." In "The Mother's Gift," there is described well-brought-up Miss Nugent displaying to ill-bred Miss Jones, "a pretty large collection of books neatly bound and nicely kept," all to be had of Mr. Thomas; and again Mr. Careful, in "Virtue and Vice," "presented at Christmas time to the sons and daughters of his friends, little Gilt Books to read, such as are sold at Mr. Thomas' near the Court House in Worcester."

Thomas and his son continued to send out these toy-books until their gay bindings faded away before the novelty of the printed paper covers of the nineteenth century.

FOOTNOTES:

[92-A] Tyler, Literary History of the American Revolution, vol. i, p. 485.

[94-A] Life of Josiah Quincy, p. 27. Boston, 1866.

[94-B] Earle, Child Life in Colonial Days, p. 171.

[98-A] Tyler, Literature of the American Revolution, vol. ii, p. 182.

[98-B] Ibid., p. 156.



CHAPTER V

1790-1800



By Washington Great deeds were done. The New England Primer, New York, 1794

Line after line their wisdom flows Page after page repeating. T.G. HAKE



CHAPTER V

1790-1800

The Child and his Book at the End of the Century

Any attempt to trace the slow development of the American child's story of the nineteenth century must inevitably be made through the school-books written during the previous one. Before this, English books had been adapted to the American trade. But now the continued interest in education produced text-books pervaded with the American spirit. They cannot, therefore, be ignored as sporadically in the springtime of the young Republic, they, like crocuses, thrust forward in the different states their blue and yellow covers.

Next to clergymen, schoolmasters received the veneration of the people, for learning and godliness went hand in hand. It was the schoolmaster who reinforced the efforts of the parents to make good Americans of the young folks, by compiling text-books which outsold the English ones hitherto used. In the new editions of the old "New England Primer," laudatory verse about General Washington replaced the alphabet rhyme:

"Whales in the Sea God's Voice obey."

Proud parents thereafter heard their infants lisp:

"By Washington Great deeds were done."

For older pupils Noah Webster's speller almost superseded Dilworth's, and his "Little Readers' Assistant" became the First Reader of many children. Webster as schoolmaster in a country district prepared this book for his own scholars. It was printed in Hartford in seventeen hundred and ninety, and contained a list of subjects suitable for farmers' children:

I. A number of Stories mostly taken from the history of America, and adorned with Cuts.

II. Rudiments of English Grammar.

III. The Federal Catechism, being a short and easy explanation of the Constitution of the United States.