New Year, I have
bestowed no new year's gifts, as yet. But have received one very
handsome one, Viz, the History of Joseph Andrews abreviated. In nice
Guilt and Flowers covers." Again, she put down an account of a day's
work, which she called "a piecemeal for in the first place I sew'd on
the bosom of unkle's shirt, and mended two pairs of gloves, mended for
the wash two handkerch'fs, (one cambrick) sewed on half a border of a
lawn apron of aunt's, read part of the xxist chapter of Exodous, & a
story in the Mother's Gift." Later she jotted in her book the loan of "3
of Cousin Charles' books to read, viz.--The puzzling Cap, the female
Orators & the history of Gaffer Two Shoes." Little Miss Winslow, though
only eleven years of age, was a typical child of the educated class in
Boston, and, according to her journal, also followed the English custom
of reading aloud "with Miss Winslow, the Generous Inconstant and Sir
Charles Grandison." It is to be regretted that her diary gives no
information as to how she liked such tales. We must anticipate some
years to find a comment in the Commonplace Book of a Connecticut girl.
Lucy Sheldon lived in Litchfield, a thriving town in eighteen hundred,
and did much reading for a child in those days. Upon "Sir Charles
Grandison" she confided to her book this offhand note: "Read in little
Grandison, which shows that, virtue always meets its reward and vice is
punished." The item is very suggestive of Goldsmith's success in
producing an abridgment that left the moral where it could not be
overlooked.

To discuss in detail this class of writings is not necessary, but a
glance at the story of "Clarissa" gives an instructive impression of
what old-fashioned children found zestful.

"Clarissa Harlowe" in its abridged form was first published by Newbery,
Senior. The book that lies before the writer was printed in seventeen
hundred and seventy-two by his son, Francis Newbery. In size five by
three and one-half inches, it is decked in once gay parti-colored heavy
Dutch paper, with a delicate gold tracery over all. This paper binding,
called by Anna Winslow "Flowery Guilt," can no longer be found in
Holland, the place of its manufacture; with sarsinet and other
fascinating materials it has vanished so completely that it exists only
on the faded bindings of such small books as "Clarissa."

The narrative itself is compressed from the original seven volumes into
one volume of one hundred and seventy