HARVARD 047*172 Copyright, 1883, BY HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN & CO. All rights reserved. The Riverside Press, Cambridge: PREFACE. THE Compiler of this little book has often heard inquiries by teachers of schools, for selections suitable for reading and recitations by their scholars, in which the duty of kindness to animals should be distinctly taught. To meet such calls, three successive pamphlets were published, and a fourth consisting of selections from the Poems of Mr. Longfellow. All were received with marked favor by the teachers to whom they became known. This led to their collection afterwards in one volume for private circulation, and now the volume is republished for public sale, with a few omissions and additions. All who desire our children to be awakened in their schools to the claims of the humbler creatures are invited to see that copies are put in school libraries, that they may be within the reach of all teachers. And this, not for the sake of the creatures only. As Pope has said, "Nothing stands alone; the chain holds on, and where it ends, unknown." Many readers may be surprised to find how many of the great poets have been touched by the sufferings of the "innocent animals," and how loftily they have pleaded their cause. The poems in the collection are not all complete, because of their length in some cases, and, in others, because a part only of each was suited to the end in view. A very few, however, like "Geist's Grave" and "Don," could not be divided satisfactorily. To all who have aided in this humble undertaking, heartiest thanks are given, and especially to its publishers who have accorded to it their coveted approval and the benefit of their large facilities for making the volume widely known. May the lessons of kindness and dependence here taught with so much poetical beauty and with such mingled justice, pathos and humor, find a permanent lodgment in the hearts of all who may read them! A. F. BOSTON, MASS., U. S. A., June, 1883. |