PREFACE

To open the door and let the children go out to the woods, the fields and the shore, where countless things of interest invite and await them, is the purpose of the little nature sketches of this book.

To show that such outdoor joys are felt even after the boys and girls have joined the ranks of the "grown-ups," stories are given from John Burroughs, Thomas Nelson Page, Frank M. Chapman, Gilbert Pearson, Ella Florence Padon, Mrs. Olive Thorne Miller, Mrs. Grinnell, and many other authors, to whom grateful and courteous acknowledgment is made for permission to use them.

To respond to the human interests of children, is the purpose of the indoor stories, and of the tales of other lands and times.

Further acknowledgment is gratefully made to Mr. William Beutenmuller of the Natural History Museum, New York City, and to the following publishers, who, through special arrangement, have permitted the use of many stories and poems: Messrs. Houghton, Mifflin and Company, D. Appleton and Company, D. C. Heath and Company, the B. F. Johnson Publishing Company, R. H. Russell, The Century Company, and The Outlook.