INTKODUCTION. 



It is seldom that I find a book so far above chil- 

 ilren that I cannot share its best thought with them. 

 So when I first took up one of John Burroughs's es- 

 says, I at once foresaw many a ramble with my pupils 

 through the enchanted country that is found within 

 its breezy pages. To read John Burroughs is to live 

 in the woods and fields, and to associate intimately 

 with all their little timid inhabitants ; to learn that — ■ 



" God made all the creatures and gave them our love and our fear, 

 To give sign, we and they are his children, one family here." 



When I came to use Pepacton in my class of the 

 sixth grade, I soon found, not only that the children 

 read better but that they came rapidly to a better ap- 

 preciation of the finer bits of literature in their reg- 

 ular readers, while their interest in their new author 

 grew quickly to an enthusiasm. Never was a little 

 brother or sister more real to them than was " Peggy 

 Mel" as she rushed into the hive laden with stolen 

 honey, while her neighbors gossiped about it, or the 

 stately elm that played sly tricks, or the log which 

 proved to be a good bedfellow because it did not grum- 

 ble. Burroughs's way of investing beasts, birds, in- 

 sects, and inanimate things with human motives is 

 very pleasing to children. They like to trace analo- 

 gies between the human and the irrational, to think 



