Happy and Gay Marching Away — Author Unknown

Proofed and corrected from the original edition for enjoyable reading. (Worth every penny spent!)***Too little attention is paid, as a rule, to the form and appearance of the books we would have children read. The cover, the pictures, the very look of the page, influence a child in his choice of a book. What is the use of a book without pictures and conversations? thought Alice in Wonderland, and many other Alices have thought the same thing. Any teacher may easily try the experiment of selecting two different editions of the same book for a classroom library. The little dull unillustrated, small type Robinson Crusoe with a text-book air, will stand alone untouched, while the edition with a bright cover, large type and plenty of pictures will be snapped up at once as a desirable prize. Children's librarians will tell you of the little used book, that on returning from the bindery in a fresh red cover, starts out on a career of popularity. Cover and pictures alone will not make a book popular, but a dull looking, unpictured version will certainly cause many a treasure to lie undiscovered.Adults who frequently read a novel will scarcely a glance at the illustrations, and forget how much pictures mean to the child. Good illustrations are one of the few means at our command today, to cultivate something of artistic appreciation in the great mass of children. The fine, largely illustrated editions, such as this one, are not expensive while others are very costly, but we cannot afford to have classics for children in an unillustrated form. Illustrated books for the young should be in every classroom library and child's bookshelf or even their ebook reader. All children should have an opportunity to know what a fine and beautiful experience reading may be.