THE FAIRY BOOK.
THE BEST POPULAR STORIES SELECTED
AND RENDERED ANEW.
BY
MISS MULOCK
THE AUTHOR OF
"JOHN HALIFAX, GENTLEMAN."
NEW YORK AND LONDON:
HARPER & BROTHERS, PUBLISHERS.
DEDICATED
TO
LITTLE OLIVE.
PREFACE.
preface is usually an excrescence on a good book, and a vain apologyfor a worthless one; but, in the present instance, a few explanatorywords seem necessary.
This is meant to be the best collection attainable of that delight ofall children, and of many grown people who retain the child-heartstill—the old-fashioned, time-honored classic Fairy-tale. It has beencompiled from all sources—far-off and familiar; when familiar, thestories have been traced with care to their original form, which, ifforeign, has been retranslated, condensed, and in any other needfulway made suitable for modern British children. Perrault, Madamed'Aulnois, and Grimm have thus been laid under contribution. Where itwas not possible to get at the original of a tale, its variousversions have been collated, compared, and combined; and in someinstances, when this proved still unsatisfactory, the whole story hasbeen written afresh. The few English fairy tales extant, such as Jackthe Giant[viii] Killer, Tom Thumb, etc., whose authorship is lost inobscurity, but whose charming Saxon simplicity of style, and intenserealism of narration, make for them an ever-green immortality—thesehave been left intact, for no later touch would improve them. Allmodern stories have been excluded.
Of course, in fairy tales, instruction is not expected; we find inthem only the rude moral of virtue rewarded and vice punished. Butchildren will soon discover for themselves that in real life allbeautiful people are not good, nor all ugly ones wicked; that everyelder sister is not ungenerous, nor every stepmother cruel. And thetender baby-heart is often reached quite as soon by the fancy as bythe reason. Nevertheless, without any direct appeal to conscience ormorality, the Editor of this collection has been especially carefulthat there should be nothing in it which could really harm a child.
She trusts that, whatever its defects, the Fairy Book will not deserveone criticism, almost the sharpest that can be given to anywork—"that it would have been better if the author had taken morepains."