From Instruction to Delight

List of Illustrations
Preface
Acknowledgements
1. Early Lessons at Home and School
Aelfric: From The Colloquy (c. 1000)
Bartholomew the Englishman: From On the Properties of Things (c. 1200)
Author Unknown: From The Owl and the Nightingale (after 1250)
Geoffrey Chaucer: From The Treatise on the Astrolabe (1391
Anonymous: The ABC of Aristotle (c. 1430)
Francis Seager: From The Schoole of Vertue and Booke of Good Nurture (1557)
Hugh Rhodes: From The Boke of Nurture, or Schoole of Good Manners (1577)
Hugh Plat: From A Jewell House of Art and Nature (1594)
Hugh Plat: The Hornbook
Hugh Plat: The Battledore
Domestic Writing: Juvenilia
William Paget: 'A new yeres gift' (1581)
George Berkeley: 'George Bercklay to his grandfather' (1610) and 'George to Mrs Cave his mothers wayting woman' (c. 1613)
Mary Downing: Letter to her Father: Mary Downing to Emmanuel Downing (1635)
Mothers' Advice and Grief
Elizabeth Grymeston: From Miscelanea, Meditations, Memoratives (1604)
Dorothy Leigh: From The Mothers Blessing (1616)
Elizabeth Joscelin: From The Mothers Legacie to her Unborne Childe (1624)
Elizabeth Richardson: From A Ladies Legacie to her Daughters (1645)
Katherine Philips: 'On the death of my first and dearest childe' (1655)
Lady Mary Chudleigh: 'On the Death of my dear Daughter' (1703)
Writing of Clergymen and Schoolmasters
Edward Topsell: From The Historie of Four-Footed Beastes (1607)
Johan Amos Comenius: From Orbis Sensualium Pictus (1659)
2. Puritan 'Hell-Fire': Warnings and Warmth
John Cotton: From Milk for Babes (1646)
Anne Bradstreet: 'Upon my Son Samuel' (1657) and 'In reference to her Children' (1659)
James Janeway: From A Token for Children (1672)
Benjamin Keach: From War with the Devil (1673)
Benjamin Keach: From The New England Primer (1683-1830)
John Bunyan: From A Book for Boys and Girls (1686)
3. Lyrical Instruction: Isaac Watts and His Comtemporaries
Isaac Watts: From Divine Songs (1715) and Moral Songs (1740)
John Gay: From Fables (1727)
Mary Barber: From Poems on Several Occasions (1734)
4. Chapbooks and Penny Histories
An Elegy on the Death and Burial of Cock Robin (1744)
The Interesting Story of the Children in the Wood
From The Life and Death of Tom Thumb
From The Pleasant History of Thomas Hickathrift
Nurse Dandlem's Little Repository of Great Instruction (c. 1784)
From The Riddle Book
5. Boreman, Cooper, and Newbery: 'Instruction With Delight'
Thomas Boreman: From The Gigantick History (1741)
John Newbery: From A Little Pretty Pocket-Book (1744)
John Newbery: From Nurse Truelove's New Year's Gift (1755)
John Newbery: From The History of Little Goody Two-Shoes (1765)
6. Rational Moralists
Sarah Fielding: From The Governess (1749)
Mary Ann Kilner: From The Adventures of a Pincushion (c. 1780)
Jane Cave: From Poems on Various Subjects (1783)
Anne 'Nancy' Shippen Livingston: From Her Journal Book (1783)
Thomas Day: From The History of Sandford and Merton (1783)
Lady Eleanor Fenn: From Cobwebs to Catch Flies (c. 1783)
Mary Wollstonecraft: From Original Stories (1788)
Priscilla Wakefield: From Mental Improvement (1794)
Dorothy Kilner: From The Village School (c. 1795)
Maria Edgeworth: 'The Purple Jar' from Early Lessons (1801)
Maria Edgeworth: From First Book for Children (1823)
Catherine Parr Traill: From The Young Emigrants (1826)
Henry Sharpe Horsley: From The Affectionate Parent's Gift (1828)
Henry Sharpe Horsley: From Nouvel Alphabet pour les Commençans (1830)
Jane Marcet: From Mary's Grammar (1835)
Jacob Abbott: From Rollo at School (1839)
Barbara Hofland: 'Janetta and her Jujubes' from Farewell Tales (1840)
Samuel Griswold Goodrich / Peter Parley (pseudonym): From Make the Best of It (1843)
7. Sunday School Moralists
George Burder: From Early Piety (1777)
Anna Letitia Barbauld: From Hymns in Prose for Children (1781) and Lessons for Children: Part IV (1788)
Sarah Trimmer: From Fabulous Histories (1786) and The Charity School Spelling Book (c. 1798)
Rowland Hill: From Divine Hymns (1790) and Instructions for Children (1794)
Hannah More: Black Giles, the Poacher: Part II (1796)
Mary martha Sherwood: From The History of the Fairchild Family (1818)
Favell Lee Mortimer: From The Peep of Day (1833)
Lucy Leman Rede: From Flowers That Never Fade (1838)
Mrs. Dalby: From Dutch Tiles (1842)
8. Harbingers of the Golden Age
Christopher Smart: From Hymns for the Amusement of Children (1772) and 'My Cat Jeoffry' from Jubilate Agno
William Blake: From Songs of Innocence and of Experience (1794)
John Marshall: From The Infant's Library (c. 1800)
Ann Taylor Gilbert and Jane Taylor: From Original Poems for Infant Minds (1804-5) and Rhymes for the Nursery (1806)
Elizabeth Turner: From The Daisy (1807)
William Roscoe: The Butterfly's Ball and the Grasshopper's Feast (1807)
Catherine Ann Dorset: The Peacock 'At Home' (1807)
Felicia Dorothea Browne: From Poems (1808)
Richard Scrafton Sharpe: Puss in Boots (1808)
Charles Lamb: Beauty and the Beast (1811)
Charles Lamb: From Peter Piper's Practical Principles of Plain and Perfect Pronunciation (1813)
Clement Clarke Moore: 'A Visit from Saint Nicholas' (1823)
Sarah Josepha Hale: From Poems for Our Children (1830)
Eleanor Mure: The Story of the Three Bears (1831)
Mary Botham Howitt: From Sketches of Natural History (1834)
Catherine Sinclair: From Holiday House: A Series of Tales (1839)
Eliza Lee Follen: From New Nursery Songs for All Good Children (1843)
Edward Lear: From The Book of Nonsense (1846)
Heinrich Hoffmann: From The English Struwwelpeter (1848)
Jane Cotton Boucher de Montizambert: The Sad Tale of Mrs Mole and Mrs Mouse (c. 1849)
Bibliography
Index

Companion Website

Patricia Demers, Professor of English at the University of Alberta, has written extensively about children's literature; her recent publications include Women's Writing in English; Early Modern England and an edition of Hannah More's Coelebs in Search of a Wife.

Special Features

• Comprehensive. The only text that provides students with information on the earliest period of children's literature, dating back to c.1000 A.D. The text traces the development of children's literature from earnest texts designed for moral instruction to stories intended primarily to entertain.
• Includes illustrations. Original illustrations accompany many of the selections to contextualize the text and help show how it would have been originally presented to its young readers.
• Diverse content. Complete works, short stories, prose, and poetry forge an exciting blend of content, keeping students engaged and interested.
• Thematic organization. Division of chronological content into specific themes allows students to more easily grasp the material and forge meaningful connections between various selections.
• NEW! A selection of Chaucer's writings for children.
• NEW! More early Canadiana.
• NEW! The full text of Sharpe's Puss in Boots with its original illustrations
• NEW! Revised and expanded headnotes.