nnings
of culture of the sympathies. It is not, of course, a help confined to the
powers of the nature story; all types of story share in some degree the
powers of each. But each has some especial virtue in dominant degree, and
the nature story is, on this ground, identified with the thought given.

The nature story shares its influence especially with

THE HISTORICAL STORY

As the one widens the circle of connection with other kinds of life, the
other deepens the sense of relation to past lives; it gives the sense of
background, of the close and endless connection of generation with
generation. A good historical story vitalises the conception of past
events and brings their characters into relation with the present. This is
especially true of stories of things and persons in the history of our own
race. They foster race-consciousness, the feeling of kinship and community
of blood. It is this property which makes the historical story so good an
agent for furthering a proper national pride in children. Genuine
patriotism, neither arrogant nor melodramatic, is so generally recognised
as having its roots in early training that I need not dwell on this
possibility, further than to note its connection with the instinct of
hero-worship which is quick in the healthy child. Let us feed that hunger
for the heroic which gnaws at the imagination of every boy and of more
girls than is generally admitted. There have been heroes in plenty in the
world's records,--heroes of action, of endurance, of decision, of faith.
Biographical history is full of them. And the deeds of these heroes are
every one a story. We tell these stories, both to bring the great past
into its due relation with the living present, and to arouse that generous
admiration and desire for emulation which is the source of so much
inspiration in childhood. When these stories are tales of the doings and
happenings of our own heroes, the strong men and women whose lives are a
part of our own country's history, they serve the double demands of
hero-worship and patriotism. Stories of wise and honest statesmanship, of
struggle with primitive conditions, of generous love and sacrifice,
and--in some measure--of physical courage, form a subtle and powerful
influence for pride in one's people, the intimate sense of kinship with
one's own nation, and the desire to serve it in one's own time.

It is not particularly useful to tell batches of unrelated anecdote. It is
much mor