evelopment of the
child's reason and memory. He may remember the sequence of the plot or
remake the tale if he forgets, by reasoning out the association
between the successive objects from whom aid was asked. It is through
this association that the memory is exercised.

_How Two Beetles Took Lodgings_, in _Tales of Laughter_, is a
realistic story which has a scientific spirit and interest. Its basis
of truth belongs to the realm of nature study. Its narration of how
two Beetles set up housekeeping by visiting an ant-hill and helping
themselves to the home and furnishings of the Ants, would be very well
suited either to precede or to follow the actual study of an ant-hill
by the children. The story gives a good glimpse of the home of the
Ants, of their manner of living, and of the characteristics of the
Ants and Beetles. It is not science mollified, but a good story full
of life and humor, with a basis of scientific truth.

Many tales not realistic contain a large realistic element. The fine
old romantic tales, such as _Cinderella_, _Sleeping Beauty_, and
_Bremen Town Musicians_, have a large realistic element. In _The
Little Elves_ we have the realistic picture of a simple German home.
In _Beauty and the Beast_ we have a realistic glimpse of the three
various ways the wealthy merchant's daughters accommodated themselves
to their father's loss of fortune, which reminds us of a parallel
theme in Shakespeare's _King Lear_. In _Red Riding Hood_ we have the
realistic starting out of a little girl to visit her grandmother. This
realistic element appeals to the child because, as we have noted, it
accords with his experience, and it therefore seems less strange.

In _Titty Mouse and Tatty Mouse_ the setting is realistic but becomes
transformed into the romantic when natural doings of everyday life
take on meaning from the unusual happening in the tale. It is
realistic for Titty Mouse and Tatty Mouse to live in a little house,
to get some corn, to make a pudding, and to put it on to boil. But
when the pot tumbled over and scalded Titty, the romantic began. The
stool which was real and common and stood by the door became
transformed with animation, it talked: "Titty's dead, and so I weep";
and it hopped! Then a broom caught the same animation from the same
theme, and swept; a door jarred; a window creaked; an old form ran
round the house; a walnut tree shed its leaves; a little bird moulted
his pretty feathers; a little girl s