d in his contest
for life with the advice his own common sense would have offered. As
an allegory of Experience _The Elephant's Child_ does not view life as
a whole; it gives but a glimpse of life. It would say: Experience
teaches us to make the best with what we have. The way to get
experience is to try a new power, just as the Child with his trunk
tried to kill the fly and eat grass. As soon as he had received his
new power he tested it on the Hippopotamous. He won the respect of his
kind by beating them at their own game.

The emotional appeal in _The Elephant's Child_ would repay study. The
dominant emotional tone is that of the adventurous hero with his
"'satiable curtiosity." There is vividness of emotion, steadiness of
emotion, and a rich variety in the contrasts of feeling. Emotion of a
moral quality is characteristic of its implied message of worldly
wisdom but it does not leave one exactly satisfied.

The form of the story is a splendid example of a literary classic
style. A pleasing humorous touch is given to the unity of the tale by
making the Elephant's Child pick up with his new trunk, on his way
home, the melon-rinds he had scattered on his journey to the Limpopo.
The coherence in the tale is unusually fine and is secured largely by
expressions which look backward or forwards; as, "By and by when that
was finished," or "One fine morning," or "That very next morning." Any
study will show that the tale possesses the general qualities of form
and has its parts controlled by the principles of composition.

OUTLINE

I. THE WORTH OF FAIRY TALES

I. Two public tributes 1

II. The value of fairy tales in education 3

1. They bring joy into child-life 3

2. They satisfy the play-spirit of childhood 4

3. They give a power of accurate observation 6

4. They strengthen the power of emotion, develop the
power of imagination, train the memory and
exercise the reason 6

5. They extend and intensify the child's social
relations 7

6. In school they unify the child's work or play 8

7. In the home they employ leisure time profitably 9

8. They afford a vital basis for language-training 10