Little Stories for Little Children

Excerpt

John-ny Wil-son and Ned Brown were play-ing at ball one day, and the ball hit John on the hand: he was ve-ry an-gry, and ran af-ter Ned and beat him ve-ry hard. Just then, a man came by and gave John a box on the ear which made him let go of Ned, and he be-gan to cry. Then the man said, “You beat that lit-tle boy and for-get how you hurt him, but you do not like it your-self."

Then John was sor-ry, and said he would ne-ver do so any more; he shook hands with Ned, and he kept his word, and all who knew him lov-ed him.

JANE NORTH.

Jane North was an i-dle girl; she did not like her book, and when she was told to read her les-son she would cry, and say she want-ed to play with her doll. So her doll was tak-en from her till she had read; but she read ill, and would not learn to write. So she grew up a dunce, and no one lov-ed her.

Had each a nice doll, and they took care of them. One day Tom call-ed them to play at ball, and they ran a-way to play, and left the two dolls on a chair. By and by the cat came in the room, and pull-ed the dolls to pieces, think-ing I dare say, that it was fine fun to tear them to bits, and scam-per round the room with poor dol-ly's nose in her mouth.

When the girls came back, and saw the nice new dolls all in bits, they be-gan to cry, and to beat poor puss; but their mam-ma said, “No, you must not beat puss, for you left your dolls a-bout, and the cat did not know that they were not for her to play with. Next time you must be more care-ful of your toys."

ANN SHARP.

Was a kind girl. One day she was out, and a poor girl came to her and said, “Give me some bread, I have had none to eat all day.” So Ann said, “I have no bread, but here is six-pence that my mam-ma gave me, take it, and buy some bread.”

The poor girl took it and said, “Oh! thank you, miss, I can now get some-thing to eat, and will take some to my poor dad-dy who is sick.”

“Do not go out with-out your warm coat, Tom; it is a hard frost, and the snow lies thick on the ground, and you will catch cold, if you do, and then poor Tom will be ill.”

“But I feel quite warm.”

“Yes, you do now; but see what a large fire there is here, out of doors there is no fire, and the cold wind blows; and if you have no warm coat on, you will feel cold.”

But Tom thought he knew best, so he went out with no coat on, and he caught a bad cold and cough, and he was put to bed quite ill. Now Jack and Will and Tom were to have had some fine sport on the fro-zen pond in the farm, but Tom was too ill to go. When he was in bed he thought how sil-ly he had been, to think he knew bet-ter than his kind friends; and then he said to him-self, he would try and do all that he was bid when he got well.

THE BURNT CHILD.

One day a child want-ed to reach some-thing off the man-tel shelf, and not be-ing tall e-nough, she stood on the fen-der, and her mo-ther said, “Fan-ny, you must not get on the fen-der, it will turn o-ver, and then you will fall in the fire and be sad-ly burnt.”

But Fan-ny was not a good child, and did not al-ways do as she was bid: so when her mo-ther went out of the room, she want-ed to get her fa-ther's watch that lay on the man-tel shelf, and she stood on the fen-der to reach it, but the fen-der turn-ed o-ver, and Fan-ny fell in the hearth and her clothes took fire. She scream-ed loud-ly, but she was not heard for a lit-tle time, and when her mo-ther ran to her, all her clothes were in a blaze; she roll-ed the rug over to put out the flame and then car-ried her to bed....