PREFACE.II occasionallymeet people who say to me, “I had many a pleasant hour, in my childhood, reading your Juvenile Miscellany; and now I am enjoying it over again, with my own little folks.”Such remarks remind me that I have been a long time in the world; but if a few acknowledge me as the household friend of two generations, it is a pleasant assurance that I have not lived altogether in vain.When I was myself near the fairy-land of childhood, I used my pen for the pleasure of children; and now that I am travelling down the hill I was then ascending, I would fain give some words of consolation and cheer to my companions on the way. If the rays of my morning have helped to germinate seeds that ripened into flowers and fruit, I am grateful toHim, from whom all light and warmth proceeds. And now I reverently ask His blessing on this attempt to imitate, in my humble way, the setting rays of that great luminary, which throws cheerful gleams into so many lonely old homes, which kindles golden fires on trees whose foliage is falling, and lights up the silvered heads on which it rests with a glory that reminds one of immortal crowns.L. MARIA CHILD.
PREFACE.
I occasionallymeet people who say to me, “I had many a pleasant hour, in my childhood, reading your Juvenile Miscellany; and now I am enjoying it over again, with my own little folks.”
Such remarks remind me that I have been a long time in the world; but if a few acknowledge me as the household friend of two generations, it is a pleasant assurance that I have not lived altogether in vain.
When I was myself near the fairy-land of childhood, I used my pen for the pleasure of children; and now that I am travelling down the hill I was then ascending, I would fain give some words of consolation and cheer to my companions on the way. If the rays of my morning have helped to germinate seeds that ripened into flowers and fruit, I am grateful toHim, from whom all light and warmth proceeds. And now I reverently ask His blessing on this attempt to imitate, in my humble way, the setting rays of that great luminary, which throws cheerful gleams into so many lonely old homes, which kindles golden fires on trees whose foliage is falling, and lights up the silvered heads on which it rests with a glory that reminds one of immortal crowns.
L. MARIA CHILD.