im have; they called him "Don Christopher
Columbus," "Your Excellency," and "Admiral," and at once he set about
getting ready for his voyage.

416

Most children who read public library books
know something about the work of Horace E.
Scudder (1838-1902). For eight years he was
editor of the _Atlantic Monthly_, but he is
more widely known as a writer and compiler of
books for children. The entertaining and
informing _Bodley Books_ were widely read by a
former generation and are still decidedly worth
reading. Perhaps his most popular work is _The
Children's Book_, a collection of literature
suitable for the first four grades. Pupils in
the third, fourth, and fifth grades read with
pleasure _The Book of Fables_, _The Book of
Folk Stories_, _Fables and Folk Stories_, and
_The Book of Legends_. Mr. Scudder was the
leading advocate of introducing literature into
the schools at a time when such advocacy was
uphill work, and he edited a great number of
literary classics for school use. He wrote a
number of historical and biographical works of
value. _George Washington_, from which the next
selection is taken, is considered by many to be
the best biography of Washington that has been
written for children. (The chapter below is
used by permission of and special arrangement
with The Houghton Mifflin Co., Boston.)

THE BOYHOOD OF WASHINGTON

HORACE E. SCUDDER

It was near the shore of the Potomac River, between Pope's Creek and
Bridge's Creek, that Augustine Washington lived when his son George was
born. The land had been in the family ever since Augustine's
grandfather, John Washington, had bought it, when he came over from
England in 1657. John Washington was a soldier and a public-spirited
man, and so the parish in which he lived--for Virginia was divided into
parishes as some other colonies into townships--was named Washington.
It is a quiet neighborhood; not a sign remains of the old house, and the
only mark of the place is a stone slab, broken and overgrown with weeds
and brambles, which lies on a bed of bricks taken from the remnants of
the old chimney of the house. It bears the inscription:--

Here
The 11th of February, 1732 (old style)
George Washing