LELAND STANFORD JK. UNIVERSITY.
A44927

NATIONAL AND INDEPENDENT READERS.

COMPLETE IN TWO INDEPENDENT PARTS.

Independent Child's Speller, in Script. Independent Youth's Speller, in Script. Independent Spelling Book, 160 pp.

These READERS constitute two complete and distinct Series, either of which is adequate to every want of schools. The SPELLERS may accompany any Series.

Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1871, by
J. MADISON WATSON,

In the Office of the Libra:ian of Congress, at Washington.

PREFACE.

A

COMPREHENSIVE reading-book of moderate size, for advanced classes, presenting elocution in its entirety both as a science and an art, is an urgent need which this work is designed to supply. Its purpose, also, is to serve as a companionbook to the many excellent works on grammar, rhetoric, and English composition, affording numerous and apposite illustrative examples, and, above all, to present such a course of readings, with the requisite annotations, as shall give to the great mass of students, who do not aspire to belles-lettres, a love for the pure, beautiful, and invigorating elements in literature, which, while elevating the soul, promote healthful mental growth.

Part First exhibits in logical order and with scientific precision the elocutionary principles of recognized importance which are now employed by our ablest instructors. The rules are stated in language so succinct, perspicuous, and comprehensive, that the necessity for exceptions is avoided. A novel feature, and one of the most valuable for class instruction, is the introduction of a series of blackboard diagrams, presenting in due order all the divisions of the treatise and their relations to each other. The examples for illustration and class drill are the most valuable of an extensive collection which has been made during a period of twenty years, chiefly devoted to elocution and literature.

Part Second contains one hundred and five selections of surpassing worth, of every variety of style and subject, and specially adapted to illustrate the principles of rhetorical delivery. Believing that the essentiality of a good reading, either in prose or verse, calls for a profound and enduring, as well as a

brilliant or vivid effect—a result never secured by undue brevity -special efforts have been made to present selections of suitable length, and of a character that will not permit the interest to flag. They are chiefly new, and derived from the most reliable sources, many of them with such important and original adaptations as retain the gist of the matter, and, at the same time, bring them within the prescribed limits.

The readings are graded in a systematic manner, the simplest appearing first in order, and their classification is more thorough than that ever before attempted in a corresponding work. They are divided into formal sections, in each of which only one leading subject is treated, or a single element of elocution rendered prominent. The introduction of full-page wood-cuts of the highest degree of merit-not only faithfully illustrating the text, but serving as incentives and accessories to æsthetic studies -it is to be hoped will inaugurate a new era in the style of school-book publications.

The orthoëpical and explanatory aids which accompany the text are unusually complete. The pronunciation of words liable to be mispronounced; definitions; explanations of classical, historical, and other allusions; and biographical sketches of authors, and of persons whose names occur in the readings, are introduced in due order; and a complete index to the notes is added for general reference.

As a table-book for individuals and families, not less than a text-book for students, the author trusts that this concluding volume of his new series will supply an acknowledged want.

NEW YORK, December, 1871.

3. The Sense of Beauty-Part Second.. Adapted from O. Dewey. 93