Acknowledgment for permission to use the stories printed in this book
is gratefully made to Doubleday, Page and Company for "The Gift of the
Magi" from _Stories of the Four Million_ by O. Henry; to Hamlin Garland
for "A Camping Trip" from _Boy Life on the Prairie_, published by
Harper and Brothers; to Henry Holt and Company for "A Thread without a
Knot" from _The Real Motive_, by Dorothy Canfield Fisher; to Charles
Scribner's Sons for "Friends" from _Little Aliens_ by Myra Kelly, and
for the story, "American, Sir," by Mary Raymond Shipman Andrews; to
Booth Tarkington for "A Reward of Merit" from _Penrod and Sam_. The
stories by Katherine Mayo, Bret Harte, and Nathaniel Hawthorne are used
by permission of, and by special arrangement with, Houghton Mifflin
Company, the authorized publishers.
Special acknowledgment should be made to Mr. Garland for so kindly
revising the selection from _Boy Life on the Prairie_, to meet our
needs; and to Mr. Carlson for the translation from the Swedish of Miss
Lagerlöf's story.