The very first selections, about animals and birds and growing things, take you there where you will find friends old and new. Do you wish to go on a long journey back to King Arthur's time and meet the knights of the Round Table? The power is yours for the asking. Or if you prefer songs and stories of the sea, here is a ballad that has been sung for centuries, or you may have ballads about battles in the war that ended the other day. And no one knew the secrets of the Enchanted Forest better than William Shakespeare-here is a story that he loved.

At some other time your book will take you back to the olden days when heroes were giving their lives in Greece or in Switzerland or, later, in our own America, to win for themselves and their children the precious gift of freedom. And, last of all, there are stories of life in our America-old legends, and tales that will make you smile, and stories of workers and their work. When you have finished the last section you will be happier and a better citizen, ready to do your share at every opportunity.

One word more. You know that in order to work enchantment people have had to do certain things. There was some charm like "open sesame," or the wonderful lamp that had to be rubbed. Now to use this book rightly, you must not think of it as a lesson book, containing tasks. If you do that, it will be no Aladdin's lamp at all but just a dull old smoky lamp that would not even guide you to the cellar. You must do these things: First, get that chair or that corner and make yourself comfortable. Second, look at the program. What is that? Why, the "Table of Contents," of course. You must know where you are going and what you are to see. In this book everything is arranged in such a way as to help the charm to work. Third, you will find questions and notes every now and then, and a Glossary, guide-posts to help you find your way. And, last of all, you are to try to see the book as a whole and not as a sort of scrapbook about all sorts of things. For it all deals, in one way or another, with the Enchanted Forest and the Castle of Life.

PART I

THE WORLD OF NATURE

"Go forth, under the open sky, and list

To Nature's teachings."

-William Cullen Bryant.

Men in all ages have felt the influence of Nature, sometimes cause they could not understand her mysteries, sometimes beuse they were conscious of a kinship between animal life and eir own, or again, because they were thrilled by the beauty of e world that lay about them.

Nature brings adventures to those who love her and try to rn her secrets. These adventures may be like other advenes, interesting because they bring unusual experiences. Such the adventures of men hunting wild animals or exploring ange lands; or of one shut in by a great snowstorm, snownd on a train or in a New England farmhouse. But often iliar or common things bring adventures when our eyes are ned to what they have for us. A man named Gilbert White e lived in the English village of Selborne. Nothing ever hap ed in the village, most people thought, but Gilbert White won e because through many years he watched the habits of ts and the shy animals of the countryside and wrote down he saw. Henry Thoreau, an American poet and essayist, for years on the shore of a New England lake, lived , in the roughest way, but his observations, set forth in ook called Walden, have become a precious part of Amerliterature. And the poets of all times and countries have of birds and bees and flowers, of the changing seasons, of s and stars, of the ocean with its many moods, and of ains and what they teach of beauty and strength to men. you read the stories and poems of this group, you will that the great writers who deal with the outdoor world to you two quite different kinds of secrets.

, some of them show you the many hidden charms of that you may see with your own eyes, if you will only

observe closely your neighbors, the animals and birds, or the wonders of the changing seasons. For example, Parkman and Roosevelt and Kipling will picture for you the habits of buffalo, grizzly bears, and elephants so clearly that you will gain a new feeling of your kinship with the animal world. And Hamlin Garland will teach you to see new wonders in the majestic power that grips the world when the icy blizzard holds the land in its all-embracing grasp. All around you lie many hidden beauties of Nature that will enrich your life when once you have learned their secrets. And it is through the writings of keen observers the naturalists-that you will gain this power.

Second, other writers, chiefly the poets, will still further enrich your appreciation of Nature by awakening your powers of imagination and fancy. These men and women interpret for you the deeper meaning of the life about you-things that the eye alone, no matter how keen, can never reveal. In "The Three Joys of Reading," page 14, you saw how the poet Burns pictured the kinship between his own life and the fate of a common daisy that he had plowed up by chance one day. Many of the poems you are about to read will touch your fancy with similar thoughts of beauty. Celia Thaxter teaches us the lesson of faith and courage she learned while watching a little sandpiper; and James Russell Lowell gives us a beautiful fancy of humbleness as he thinks of the lowly dandelion.

We treasure the songs of these poets, not alone for their rich fancies but also for their musical rhythm and the charm of their language. For example, in Wordsworth's "The Daffodils" you will notice the rime and rhythm, which give an easy swing or movement to the lines. As you read other poems in Part I, see which seem most musical.

While reading the selections of this group, you will learn many lessons about the two kinds of secrets that were mentioned. And whenever you go through the woods and fields, see if these writers the wise observers and the interpreters of Nature-have given you a new vision of life in the outdoor world.