Children's Books
Knowledgeable Books
SOME of the books we want our children to read nourish the imagination, and are of use to the child because they give delight and awaken intelligence. But some books possess a second quality, more attractive to some children than to others—they give information about the outside world. All the books in this collection fall under this second heading. Their reader emerges knowing something that he did not know before. All, that is, with one exception, Miss Rhoda Power's How It Happened (Cambridge University Press, 7s. 6d.), a book that floats free of time and space. She sets out to tell "why the fox has a white tip to his tail," or "why the mouse is small and grey," and the action of all her legends takes place most convincingly " long ago," and " beyond many mountains, forests and deserts." It is a most charming book and will make an admirable present for the child under ten. The woodcuts by Agnes Miller Parker are remarkably good.
Two " children's novels " give information, but also feed the imagination. One, The Mystery of World's End (Helen Berger ; Longman, Green and Co., 2 dollars) is a story of an original kind. The adventures all might happen, and have a picturesque setting, while the book is well written and the characters are interesting as people. English boys and girls will learn something from it of modern life in the South Seas. Sons of Want, by Lilian Dalton (Sheldon Press, 2s. ad.) has a very different setting. It is a story of coal mines and cotton mills in the 1830's, when children worked and died in them. The ideals of Christian Socialism run through it, and the Chartists are treated a little patronisingly. But even if we happen to disagree with the political and moral findings of the author, she is to be most heartily congratulated on her admirable choice of subject. Children will enjoy a story in which right and wrong are clearly distinguishable, and in which living issues are faced, discussed and dramatised.
No fewer than four of the books in this collection are by Mr. Gibbard Jackson, The Romance of Exploration, Triumphs and Wonders of Modern Engineering and British Railways— the Romance of their Achievement (Sampson Low, Os. each). They are all sound books, retelling stock stories, well illustrated and up to date, that on the Triumphs and Wonders of Modern Engineering having, for instance, a picture of `Do. X' in flight.
The Romance of a Modern Airway, by Mr. Harry Harper (Sampson Low, Cls.) is about commercial and passenger aviation, and is a very delightful book for the boy interested in flying. It does not seem to be primarily written for children, but might for that very reason be the more interesting to a boy, and the style is lucid and simple.
Another excellent boys' book is The Boy Electrician, by Alfred P. Morgan and J. W. Sims (Harrap, 7s. 6d.). This is a new and revised edition, and it is above the average in merit. The explanations are really explanatory, while it looks as though it might be possible for boys with less than the exactness and patience of archangels to carry out most of the experiments.
Pastimes, Hobbies and Sports for Boys, also by the ubiquitous Mr. Gibbard Jackson (Sampson Low, as.), is a sound book for the hoy of private school age, but it is typical of this sort of compilation that the writer of the chapter on architecture should make the common but erroneous assumption that this art ended with the Gothic, in about 1500. It purports, also, to explain the internal combustion engine (that complicated modern phenomenon), but, alas ! as usual, the explanation is far from clear. This is not the fault of the explainer, except perhaps in attempting the task within the space of a few pages.
Three little books, something of whose contents ought to be known to modern children, are How we Harness Electricity, How Photography Came About, and About Coal and Oil, all by Mr. Charles Gibson (Blackie, Is. 6d. each). The last is Particularly int.resting. But the best of all the books on modern inventions, except for the child who is a specialist, is the new volume in the beloved " Wonder Book " series, The Wonder Book of Inventions, by Professor A. M. Low, BSc. - (Ward, Lock, 6s.). This is better illustrated than most of the others, and its accounts of how a skating rink is made, how the District Railway station at St. James's Park is flood-lit, how escalators work, and what Robots can do, are admirable for the child who wants a general survey. They are not, however, so much the serious companion of the tool-shed experimenter as the book which only discusses one subject. A book which is remarkable value for Is. ad. is Seven Ages of Invention, by Mr. Cyril Hall (Blackie). Some- where between these books on invention and those on science come True Stories of Modern Explorers, by Mr. B. Webster Smith (Biocide, 3s. 6d.). The book is perhaps not a great work of literature, but glaciers, blizzards, snowstorms, crocodiles, poisoned arrows and whirlpools always delight English town children who are a little daunted by the tameness they see around them. They particularly enjoy modern stories of wild places.
In Books and Their History (Jack, 8s. 641., in the " Shown to the Children" series) Miss R. N. D. Wilson has done some- thing new and has written a delightful, well-illustrated little volume. Its theme is admirably dramatic, and it was an excellent idea to group the arts of writing, printing, and colour reproduction round that central hero, The Book. Miss Wilson will give a great deal of pleasure this Christmas.
There remain six books on science. Zoo Ways and Whys, by Mr. T. H. Gillespie (Herbert Jenkins, 8s. ad.), perhaps scarcely comes under that heading, yet an interest in living beasts is quite a good foundation on which to build biology.
Close-Ups from Nature, by Mr. F. Martin Duncan, F.R.M.S., F.R.P.S., F.Z.S. (Sampson Low, as.), is a decidedly entertain- ing book and contains chapters on the eel, the octopus, birds' nests, and bees. The chapter on the strange habits of robber and slave-raiding ants is among the most successful. It would make a very good introduction to zoology for a child from eight to eleven who had not hitherto been interested.
Its companion book on astronomy, The Romance of the Heavens, by Mr. Gerald Beavis (Sampson Low, 6s.), is dis- tinctly harder reading, while The Story of the Stars, by the President of the Royal Astronomical Society (Collins, 5s.), is a thorough rather than an easy book. The child who knew nothing of the subject would probably not enjoy it, but to one who was already interested it would be delightful and satis- fying. Some " popular " books of science promise much and tell little. This is an honest book and should give a great deal of pleasure where some knowledge already exists. Mr. A. Gowans Whyte's Our World and Us (Watts, Is. Od.) is an exceedingly entertaining little book, which begins with the structure of the human body and ends with asteroids. Perhaps the illustrations are a little too comic, but the book is emphatic, and Mr. Gowans Whyte has the admirable nrt of first awakening the curiosity that his book proposes to satisfy.
H.M.S. Beagle' in South America, one of "The World of Youth" series (Watts, Is. 6d.) will most certainly appeal to all children interested in adventure, islands, animals, birds, and insects. Mrs. Williams-Ellis has selected extracts from Darwin's and Captain FitzRoy's narratives of their famous surveying expedition, which make a delightful hook. Her notes explaining details and linking up the narrative have been very well done. There is no need to praise again Darwin's simple and enthrallingly interesting account of the expedition : a splendid book for Is. ad.
Previous page
