1Yirot       fitioo

  The following stanza is copied from page 61 of the
edition of 1844 to illustrate the method of presenting
words:
             I like to see a lit-tle dog,
             And pat him on the head;
             So pret-ti-ly he wags his tail
             When-ev-er he is fed.

  The First Reader was mostly in words of one
syllable. In this book we find the story of the lame
dog that, when cured, brought another lame dog to
be doctored- of the kind boy who freed his caged
bird; of the cruel boy who drowned the cat and
pulled wings and legs from flies; of Peter Pindar
the story teller, and the "snow dog" of Mount St.
Bernard; of Mr. Post who adopted and reared Mary;
of the boy who told a lie and repented after he was
found out; of the chimney sweep who was tempted
to steal a gold watch but put it back and was there-
after educated by its owner; of the whisky boy;
and of the mischievous boy who played ghost and
made another boy insane. Nearly every lesson has
a moral clearly stated in formal didactic words at
its close.
  In the Second Reader we find the story of the
idle boy who talked with the bees, dogs, and horses,
and having found them all busy, reformed himself;
of the kind girl who shared her cake with a dog
and an old man; of the mischievous boys who tied
the grass across the path and thus upset not only the
milk-maid but the messenger running for a doctor
                       [6]