The little books printed about a hundred years ago "for the amusement
of little masters and misses" must now be looked for in the cabinets
of the curious. The type is quaint, the illustrations quainter and the
grayish tinted paper abounds in obtrusive specks of embedded dirt. For
the covers, gaudy Dutch gilt paper was used, or paper with patchy blobs
of startlingly contrasted colours laid on with a brush by young people.
The text, always amusing, is of course redolent of earlier days.
* * * * *
1899-1900.
LONDON: PUBLISHED BY
The Leadenhall Press, Ltd: 50, Leadenhall Street, E.C.
_Simpkin, Marshall, Hamilton, Kent & Co., Ltd:_
_New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 153-157 Fifth Avenue._
1. THE DAISY; OR, CAUTIONARY STORIES IN VERSE, adapted to Ideas of
Children from Four to Eight Years Old. 1807.
Re-prints of this laughter-laden little book, written by Mrs. ELIZABETH
TURNER, followed each other right up to about 1850: in the illustrated
edition before the reader, nothing is omitted and nothing is added.
With a view to greater profit, the publisher discarded the pretty
copperplates which adorned the first edition (now a thing of price)
substituting roughly cut wooden blocks.
2. THE COWSLIP; OR, MORE CAUTIONARY STORIES IN VERSE. By the author of
that much-admired little work, entitled THE DAISY. 1811.
Under this title in 1811 Mrs. Turner wrote some more Cautionary Stories
which became almost as popular as _The Daisy_. She also wrote other
books of poetry for children, including _The Crocus_, _The Pink_, and
_Short Poems_; but none had the charm or vogue of _The Daisy_ and _The
Cowslip_.