Mr. Edwin Markham: "The Day and the Work," "The Man with the Hoe,” and “Lincoln, The Man of the People,” these poems appearing for the first time in revised form in this volume. Josephine Preston Peabody: (Mrs. S. L. Marks) and Houghton Mifflin Company: Peabody's "The Singing Man." Mr. Horace Traubel,. Literary Executor of Walt Whitman: "Vigil Strange I Kept on the Field One Night." Dr. Henry Van Dyke and The Art World, where it originally appeared: Van Dyke's "The Name of France." INTRODUCTION THIS small collection of American poems is designed for use in the first year of the high school. It is issued with the hope that it may help to establish a love for poetry, especially American poetry, in the hearts of some boys and girls who chance to read its pages. The poems in this volume are not intended to be studied; they are meant to be read for pleasure and for profit, just as any pieces of good literature should be read. The pleasure should come chiefly through the contact of the youthful mind with the serious, the humorous, the inspiring, the patriotic, as expressed in verse of various types. The profit should come through the thought contained in the poems themselves or through the knowledge that these poems were written by people whose writings it is worth while to know. No apology is made for including so few of the names "great in story." This is not intended to be a collection of classic poetry if by that is implied poetry written by the few whom time has made imperishable. But it is human if it is not classical, and it is intended to appeal to boys and girls for whom the human side of life has charm if presented in the right spirit, whether in verse or in prose. No apology is made, likewise, for the number of selections with a patriotic setting that are included in this little book. We shall need more than ever in the years succeeding to dwell on things patriotic. The task of the teacher of English is to help in the Americanization of all the polyglot peoples that come to our land. No better way is possible than to introduce their children to literature, American literature, strictly American in its theme. And not only these children, but the children of American parentage, so-called natives, need to become acquainted with things literary, having a distinctly national flavor. No poem with a history should be read unless that history is first made clear to the pupil. In like manner no poem should ever be read unless we know something about the person who wrote it. To that end a brief introduction prefaces each poem where the facts warrant it, and a short sketch of the author and his writings is included in the appendix. Neither is intended to be exhaustive even for first-year pupils, merely suggestive. It is important to get the spirit of the poems clearly in one's mind as well as the theme underlying. The spirit, the theme, the author-these should be the aim in reading each poem. "Of the making of many hooks there is no end." Of the making of collections of American poems there will never be an end. This collection is only one of many, equally good in various respects. Its value will lie in its right use. With that last word it is sent forth. E. B. R. |