Fables and Tales: Second and Third Reader Grades

Abstract

This small reader, 7 x 5¼, contains eighty pieces overall with an AI at the beginning. Pages v-vi between the AI and the first fable are missing, as are 49-50, 65-66, and 113-14. I had thought that this very fragile book was a duplicate of a copy, listed under 1898?, which is in much better condition. But it turns out that many illustrations are different, even though they follow the same motifs and are placed in exactly the same places in both editions. The cover of this edition is dark cloth, with remnants of orange or tan ink showing a frog on the cover. As far as I can tell, the text portions of the plates are exactly the same. Since the date on this copy is legible and is clearly 1899, I resort to guessing that the other copy, also done in the 1890's, was previous to this. The book starts with twenty pages of simple stories, often featuring named children. Fables run from 25 through 70. In the first fable, the country mouse goes off to live with the city mouse; the version seems to be based on Jacobs'. Only a hunter is after the hart in The Hart and the Hunter (38, usually called something like The Stag and Its Reflection). The dog in DW is tied at night but free during the day (40). In BW the neighbors laugh the first time (45); the wolf ends up killing the boy. The eagle is taking the tortoise to his nest because the latter has wanted to live with the birds. On the way, the crow mentions to the eagle that tortoise meat is good (46). In CW Venus sends the mouse into the dining room (61). In MM, the maid will toss her head before Mollie Wood and the other girls; there is a funny pail in transit illustration on 62, in this copy as in the other, even though the illustrations are different. The Thief and His Mother, completed on 67, has the bitten mother complaining to the priest, who says that her son is right. This book is an excellent example of several things about education a century ago: the role fables played, how fables were presented, and which fables were selected.