hor avy and ic he school children. The publ Return this book on or before the Latest Date Stamped below. A charge is made on all overdue books. University of Illinois Library L161—H41- RAS a oR OR aE RR: ‘ yor Li yadee \ . Pekhcd it Bar et Pith tht HT Hi eptyere +h eb tty ‘y ) yells f gh fey } { ak Rae te Be) rey ’ Vid ry " any On ie PAN Oy i hry aR Agr ek eel 8 : yf ' yee ty ; i eRe Bea BV tae Hp hits ¥,) ho4 2 OK Se US pata t Py teha et) ye eal a rato bi bid 1k BASH aR ona AUR we ot aa raeht FEF hasty yer rear Bt toes oan) yly tilt ‘ ¥y) Lt, way hy) naan wea hoe ty thd 9A oe a) A at as ba ee i} in j 4 Vk y yh) a) { why RAY PRN 1 ra] ‘OA ma} Kohada hy pne OV V dd ee ee Vee ERROR EEE | ht ; pry ee? are De ie se (¥ Pasa Ts a oe N APPEAL, 10 THE PARENTS, Pooh AND. ‘TEACHERS OF BOSTON. s ate $ went. LIBRARY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS THE PUBLIC LIBRARY AND THE SCHOOL- CHILDREN. An Appeal to the Parents, Clergymen, and Teachers of Boston. In the course of some investigations into the nature of the work of the Boston Public Library, which I made some time ago, my attention was naturally directed to the books which are classed under the head of ‘‘ Fiction and Juveniles.” As my duties, while in the service of the Library, had no connection with this department, and.as Iam no noyvel-reader, the subject was entirely new to me; and the results of my inquiry, which I now propose to lay before you, filled me with surprise and alarm. I found that over three- quarters of the work of the popular department of the main library and its branches was the circulation’ of novels and stories chiefly, according to a published statement of the librarian, among ‘+ young people, the greater part of whom were pupils in the public schools.” Since these books had been bought for several years in large num- bers and without proper examination, I was convinced that among them were many which were unfit for the reading of young people. A brief investigation proved to me beyond a doubt that my con- . viction was correct, and I called the attention of the Trustees, through the Committee of the City Government on the Library, to the “act, at the same time asking that measures might be taken to prevent the circulation of such books among our school-children. “ » Inorder to avoid the charge of a want of definiteness I presented ~ a list of about a hundred objectionable books, together with evi- *. dence as to their character. In the last annual report of the — ( 1The whole number of books circulated during the year 1880-81 was 1,065,081. Of these about 680,000 were fiction and juveniles. This does not include, however, the novels in the , Bates Hall, nor those in the magazines and papers. The expense to the city, for the mere circulation at 4 55-100 cents a volume, was over $30,000. S66318 2 Trustees they make answer as follows: ‘‘ The Trustees have re- cently been charged with wilfully or ignorantly consenting to the circulation of immoral literature. The only definition which the author of the charge gives of his meaning is by referring to books written by such writers as Rhoda Broughton, Annie Thomas, Mrs. Ross Church (Florence Marryat), Mrs. Annie Edwards, Helen Mathers, Mrs. Forrester, Edmund Yates, Jessie Fothergill, J. P. Story, Edgar Fawcett, and Mrs. C. F. Corbin. It is obviously impossible, as it would be highly improper, for the Trustees to exclude such authors as these, whose works are read in every circle of society, and which the public who are taxed to support the insti- tution demand. While they carefully exclude from circulation, especially among the young, all books of an immoral influence, they do not consider themselves in the position of parents, or guardians to the community, bound to select for it only such books as suit their own tastes.” Following this are some remarks of a general character, which it is unnecessary to quote; but in a note at the foot of the page it is added: ‘‘ Since the above was written a list of books has been furnished to the Committee on the Library of the City Council, considered reprehensible, and by them trans- mitted to the Trustees. It is now under examination, but so far as the observation has extended, it presents no features to which the foregoing remarks will not apply. Reference upon this point is invited to the report of the Librarian.” As I find nothing farther in reference to these especial books, I am justified in believing that the Trustees, Messrs. W. W. Greenough, James Freeman Clarke, Henry W. Haynes, Hugh O’Brien, and Chas. E. Pratt, are of the opinion that these books, together with the works’ of the authors mentioned above, are not ‘‘ books of an immoral influence.”’ Mr. S. A. B. Abbott, it should be said, declined to sign | this report. . I desire now to call your attention to this important fact, that the Trustees have stated, in the most explicit manner, the standard by which they make their selection of books for the read- ing of our children and youth. As it is of the very greatest moment that this standard should be clearly understood, I will, 1That is, those only mentioned in the list. I made no sweeping charge against all the works of any writer. \ 3 give, for your consideration, the list of books which was presented to the City Committee, and by them transmitted to the Trustees. You will please notice that the evidence as to their character, which I append to each one, is not my own judgment upon them, but that of the best critics, taken from the reviews in the leading English literary journals. And I should add that the list is by no means exhaustive, but was merely selected hap-hazard, as it were, from the catalogues, and might be increased indefinitely on further examination. You will also see that it is limited, with two excep- tions, to English books, and does not include the large number of French novels which the library contains. Should it be necessary I will extend my investigations to these, though it is a task from which I shrink. ‘‘ Not wisely, but too well,” by Rhoda Broughton. The London Atheneum begins its notice by suggesting that this novel (pub- lished anonymously) was by Maj. Lawrence, author of ‘* Guy Livingstone.” ‘* We sincerely hope our original suspicion is correct, for we should be very sorry to see two writers of ability pandering to the gross tastes of the day by writing such books as ‘Guy Livingstone’ and ‘Not wisely, but too well.’ The great object of books like these is to teach immorality by representing it in an interesting and seductive form, and by making good peo- ple, who live according to the ordinary laws of decency, appear tame, stupid, and despicable. At any rate, if this is not their object, we can assure their authors that it must inevitably be their effect. This has been pointed out time after time; but still we find these books being written and published, and the almost unanimous voice of rebuke and morality despised and neglected. It is time, then, for critics to speak out boldly, and to declare in | plain language what they think of the tendencies of these books, and see by so doing whether they cannot put a stop to their pro- duction.” After giving an outline of the plot, a passage is quoted (of which the following is an extract), in which the heroine solilo- quizes over her lover, whom she knows to be a married man, and a seducer of women: ‘‘O Dare, I would do anything wicked, anything insane for you. . . . IfI could make a bargain this minute that I should have Dare to myself for just one month, and a 1 Hight additional copies of this novel were put into the Library three years ago. 4 a then to die and live in tortures for all the countless ages of eternity —why, I’d do it this second, that I would, without a moment’s hesitation.” — Atheneum, Nov. 2, 1867. ‘‘It is true that the lady, whose passionate love is the theme of the story, has the flower of her life blighted, and that the gentleman, whose sinister influence drives her to-the verge of ruin, suffers greatly and dies young; but that does not in any way deprive these characters of the charm of romance, or their examples of a dangerous attraction.” — Saturday Review, Oct. 26, 1867. ‘*Cometh up as a flower.’ —‘‘ The style of the book is bad, and full of slang; the story itself is not one to be put into the hands of girls with a view to what some one calls ‘their beneficial amuse- ment.’ There is an all-pervading coarseness of thought and expression which is startling in its free and unrestrained utter- ance. The descriptions which the young lady gives of her love- scenes would be coarse and flippant even as the confidential narrative of a fast young man of the order of ‘jolly dogs’ toa kindred companion. ‘There is a mixture of slang and sensuality, which, setting aside all other considerations, is in the worst possi- ble taste. Of good feeling, or ordinary good principle, there is not atrace. . . . Weare-sorry to see a book of this kind making its appearance among our works of fiction; it is a thoroughly bad style of book, and it is not redeemed by talent; there is no knowl- edge of life, or character, or human nature displayed.” — Ath., April 20, 1867. ‘‘ Red as a rose is she.’’ — ‘* We have the same gross and de- grading conception of human nature [as in her former works], the same spasmodic love-making (to dignify the exhibition of animal passion by such a name), on the part of full-blooded and small- brained men and maidens, and everywhere the same evidences of very bad taste. . . . Itis too bad that our daughters should be taught to consider the speeches, and conduct, and behavior described in this book as possible to any English lady. . . . Indeed, we seriously deprecate the effect of such books as this upon the girlhood of England; and our best wish is that the innocent eyes which may scan these pages may be blind to their real meaning, and able only to perceive the current of the story which runs through them.” — Examiner, Feb. 12, 1870. * ** Joan.” — ‘* Unfortunately, however, it [a novel by Miss Broughton] is almost equally certain to contain much that is flip- pant. and in bad taste, and in these latter respects Joan seems to us even a greater offender than its predecessors. ... . The whole tone of the book is utterly distasteful. . . . The very children are not exempt from the fleshly taint of the whole book, but ask embarrassing questions as to Queen Caroline and the relations between Lord Nelson and Lady Hamilton. . . . There is another point that we dislike extremely, and that is the use of God’s name, which is invoked more frequently than we have ever before seen it in any novel. Does Miss Broughton write in the style of Joan to please herself, or to please the public? In either case we trust the public will give its opinion with no uncertain voice.” — Academy, Dec. 9, 1876. There are in the catalogues of our Public Library forty-four copies, not including duplicates, of this writer’s novels. ‘* A passion in tatters,” by Annie Thomas (Mrs. Pender Cudlip). Referring to her continual sneers at society, to be found ‘* more or less in all her works,” the critic says: ‘* It is joined to a perpetual unfeminine raid against her own sex; not for their follies so much as for their holding a strict moral standard, and requiring some kind of obedience to recognized social and moral laws from women.” — Sat. Rev., Oct. 5, 1872. ** He cometh not, she said,” — ‘* Her new novel is vulgar and un- interesting. It is not very vulgar in any one passage, but quietly and steadily vulgar throughout.” — Ath., April 26, 1878. [Four copies, not including duplicates, were bought for the Library. ] ‘* Two widows.” — ‘*‘ We could forgive the terrible vulgarity both of language and of sentiment which pervades the pages of ‘ The two widows,’ were it redeemed by even the force of ‘ Denis Donne.’ — Ath., Oct. 4, 18738. ** No alternative.” — ‘It is destitute of generous aims and lofty motives ; it is simply a plea for the indulgence of society to the frailty of women, a plea founded on nothing deeper than the nice- ness of naughtiness.” — Saturday Review, May 16, 1874. [Three copies. | | ‘* A narrow escape.” — ‘* The whole tone is petty, coarse, and vul- gar throughout. . . . The hero . ... is finally depicted ra * as the very soul of honor, which does not prevent him from luring a motherless girl to compromise herself with him almost irremedi- ably, from telling a lie about another young woman he has in tow, and from keeping up, at the very time he is intending to marry the heroine, two more than platonic attachments to ladies who are certainly made widows during the narrative, but who both preferred him very much to their husband when alive.” — Academy, Aug. 28, 1875. [Eleven copies.] The Library has over seventeen of this writer’s novels. : ‘¢Love’s conflict,” by Mrs. Ross Church (Florence Marry- at). An account of the ‘terrible temptation” of a young wife to break the seventh commandment, in which are scenes which it would be ‘‘ awkward for a gentleman to read before ladies.”’ — Ath., Feb. 11, 1865. ‘¢ Confessions of Gerald Estcourt.” In her representations of the fashionable world, ‘‘ Its young men divide their time between seducing and being seduced. Its maidens have reason for thank- fulness if they struggle through life unscathed by young men’s. villanies. . . . The most prosperous character of the lot [in the story] is a barefaced courtesan; the most religious are two repulsive combinations of heartlessness and brainlessness.” — Ath., Nov. 9, 1867. ‘¢ The prey of the gods.” —‘‘ She makes a great parade of re- ligious sentiment, and gives effusive descriptions of the effect which the sight of a crucifix produces on a married woman medi- tating an elopement with her lover, also on the loss which the same palpitating sinner foresees she will feel when she can no longer go to Holy Communion ; while, at the same time, she revels in the details of a meditated adultery which only just escapes the last actual crime — painting the progress, raptures, and dangers of the situation with odious minuteness . . . And why, with all this in hand, and something like blasphemy to boot, commit so hide- ous an offence against sesthetics, as is implied in such a sentence as this? ‘The white and crimson roses that clung so confidingly to the deep porch with early dawn, now, shamefaced at the day’s debauch, shrink backward from its embrace, and hang their full- blown beauties from weak and enervated stalks, while their strong | scent mingles with the still sodden air, and turns it sickly.’ It Pe seems tous asif Mrs. Church did not at times know what she wrote.” After another quotation the critic adds: ‘‘ We owe the reader an apology for quoting the language in which Mrs. Ross Church mixes up the most sacred subject a Christian can contem- plate with the nauseous sentimentalism and immorality of this silly book. . . . From first to last, the ‘ Prey of the gods’ is as vulgar, dull, and immoral as its fantastic title is unmeaning and absurd.” — Sat. Rev., Sept. 23, 1871. ‘¢ Mad Dumaresq.” — ‘+ What the characters are may be judged — from the fact that the best of them, or the one intended to be the best, isa young lady . . . whotells her cousin in so many words, that his wife is ‘in the family way ;’ and who, in order to prevent that cousin from running away with a married woman, tells him, a married man, that she herself is, and always has been, in love with him.” The critic refers to a conversation ‘* which it is hardly too strong to call nauseous. At any rate, the epithet is not strong enough properly to characterize the scenes which took place between him and the woman whom he fails to marry, and afterwards elopes with.” — Ath., Dec. 6, 1878. ‘¢ Fiohting the air” — ‘* is an advance on its predecessors, in that it is somewhat less coarse and not quite so improper. It deals, to be sure, with bigamy, but then it is bigamy by mistake, discarded as soon as discovered; an ‘innocent adultery,’ to be pitied and ad- mired rather than condemned ; hence a tragedy affording occasion for a vast amount of pretty sentiment and heart-breaking elo- quence.” — Sat. Rev., Sept. 18, 1875. ‘¢ Fair-haired Alda.” — ‘*‘ Bigamy and murder form the staple incidents in this extremely sensational novel, which combines some of this able writer’s most brilliant efforts with her most baneful ideas. The book is incapable of doing good; but it is quite capa- ble of doing harm. It is impossible to avoid the feeling that it would have been better, both for the author and for the public, had it never have been written.” — London Graphic, July 10, 1880. ‘¢'The minor characters are chiefly women who are either false to their husbands, or subject to what the author calls dypsomania. These two latter characteristics she seems to think usual among Englishwomen. . . . The book is, in short, a farrago of vul- garity.” — Ath., June 19, 1880. [Five copies.] There are at least 8 eighty-three copies of this writer’s novels in the printed catalogues. of the Library. ‘¢ Philip Earnescliffe, or morals of May Fair,” by Annie Edwardes. A story of adultery prevented only by the sudden death of the woman. There is ‘¢ A feeble sense of what is healthy and honest, in action, — though there are passing moralities in words, and a sort of notion that giving way to feeling or passion in a refined mode, yielding to temptation appearing in a polished manner, if not de- fensible, is pardonable. . . . In real life an honest scullion wench would know that the spontaneous confession of love by a married woman to an old lover was ‘most heathenish and most gross.’” — Spectator, Ape 30, 1858. ‘Ordeal for wives” — ‘‘ professes to give a picture of life and conduct amongst the young ladies of the middle class in England, and which, if it were a true representation of English maidens as they are would render the Divorce Court only a natural supple- ment to the marriage ceremony.” — Ath., Dec. 31, 1864. ‘s Miss Forrester.” — ‘‘ There is a low condition of moral health which will readily develope into specific vices. “The female writers of fiction of the present day are, with few exceptions, doing their utmost to bring about this state of things. There may not, in their books, be any one scene or incident that transgresses the bounds of conventional decorum ; but there is a total absence of all noble and heroic element. In these novels women recognize a startling amount of badness and baseness, not as evil to be hated and protested against, but with quiet, callous unconsciousness of what is right and what is wrong. The low tone of morality in novels re-acts upon the readers, tends to weaken their judgment, and to obscure the light of conscience within them.” After dwell- ing at some length upon the * all-pervading, subtle sensuality ” which characterizes them, he continues: Mrs. Edwardes ‘‘is guilty, in an eminent degree, of the faults we have alluded to.” She “ has written novels of great ability, but all distinguished by ne absence of ordinary moral sensibility. ‘ Miss Forrester’ is a very exciting story; it is well told, and that disguises its absolute ab- surdity ; but it is bad with the badness of utter immorality. Mrs. Edwardes is not true to herself nor to the talents entrusted to her: in writing such novels as ‘ Miss Forrester’ she is employing 9 them to do mischief to the utmost of her power.” — Ath., Oct. 7, 1865. ‘* Leah.” —‘** The devious and dirty paths through which her characters are dragged, produce more effect upon the reader than the ultimate triumph of virtue succeeds in counteracting.” —Ath., Sept. 11, 1875. [Eleven copies. ] *¢ Point of honor.’’ — ‘‘ The character of the hero and his wife is ageressively vulgar, he with his athletic coarseness and she with her reminiscences of life at various gambling-places, and this vulgarity, which so stains even Mrs. Edwardes’s best work, is of a sort that cannot, in a very inferior novel, wisely be made prominent.” — Nation, March 22, 1877. . [Seven copies. | ‘¢ Vivian the beauty.” —‘‘ Probably the worst story that Mrs. Edwardes ever wrote. . . . Vivian may be shortly described as grossly rude, vulgar, envious, deceitful, ‘ loud,’ and lacking every- thing that makes a woman attractive except physical beauty.” — Nation, Dec. 25, 1879. [Thirteen copies. ] ‘¢Comin’ thro’ the rye,” by Helen Mathers —‘‘has all Miss Broughton’s faults greatly exaggerated. . . . Occasionally she is decidedly coarse: ‘The older she gets,’ says Fane, ‘ the more she shows; and the Lord only knows what further revelations time may have in store forus.’ .. . ‘Itis a fact that a large portion of woman’s assurance lies in her tail.’ . . . The writer is simply shocking when she affects religious sentiment. . . . What could induce a being with any powers of thought or delicacy of taste to force so much tedious and disagreeable rubbish on the public?” — Sat. Rev., July 24,1875. [Seven copies. | ‘¢ Cherry ripe.” — ‘‘ The age, indeed, has its blots. Perhaps one of the greatest of its blots is the school of novelists to which this writer belongs. She wants, it would seem, to mend the times. Let her cease to write, and she will have done something... . There is, indeed, a fog over this age, though we should hesitate to call it a mental fog. Neither the writers nor the readers of such novels as ‘Cherry Ripe,’ in whatever fog and obscurity they may unhappily be wrapped, have much to do with what is mental. The air in which they move is gross indeed when they find their pleasure in writing or reading stories of vicious life and of coarse animal natures. These stories are written for low tastes and mean 10 understandings. . . . Of the morality of these books we need not say much. It is worthy of the style: low in tone; often indelicate in suggestion, if not in expression; sometimes worse. ... The author of ‘Cherry Ripe’ attacks ‘maudlin, unhealthy sentiment. Why, her book is full of it; and there is something especially offen- sive in the sudden turn from maudlin, unhealthy sentiment to still unhealthier descriptions of an ‘ imprudent’ married woman like this Mrs. Dundas.” — Sat. Rev., Dec. 22, 1877. ‘‘ Cherry ripe” is a disgusting book. . . . The sole object seems to be to make a fit of hysterics into a book, and to gloat, in a sort of indistinct manner, over indefinite but corrupting thoughts.” — Ath., Jan. 5, 1878. ‘It is impossible to get rid of one’s irritation at the intense and mischievous folly of the book for some time.” — Academy, Dec. 22, 1877. ‘* Author and publisher share a serious responsibility in sending forth such a book. After all, the practical remedy lies in the hands of the librarians, who, if they never sent out an unwhole- some book that was not asked for, would effect a great and salutary change.” — Spectator, Feb. 9, 1878. ~[Eleven copies. ] ‘* Viva,” by Mrs. Forrester. ‘* We can easily believe that this book may have a decided success with a certain class of readers. The delightful mixture of virtue and adultery, of a saint’s sublime : purity and a Magdalen’s edifying repentance, presented to us in the character of Viva herself, is one that cannot fail to enchant the large world of ladies’-maids and milliners’ apprentices. And when we add to this delicious combination of niceness and naughtiness the _ veracious sketches of high life with which the novel regales us, we should be still less inclined to wonder atits popularity. ‘ At Com- piegne’ heads the opening chapter, and what silly, half-educated girl would not feel her heart flutter at the scene of flashy finery and. latent sensuality which the author dashes off as her first instalment of bad writing and worse morality. . . . Style, sentiment, plot, and characters, are worthy of each other, and of the false and bad school to which the book belongs. ”—_ Sat. Review, May 18, 1878. [Eleven copies. ] ‘‘ Rhona ” — ‘‘is not more or less detestable than its class, and has, at least, some outward merits. . . . After all, this is only — one more of those monstrous caricatures of high life: too: coarse in tone for the decent; too prudish.in expression for the prurient % 11 reader; too dreary almost in their foolish unreality, even for the taste to which they appeal.” — Academy, April 26, 1879. [Six copies. | | ‘‘ Roy and Viola.” —‘‘ Yet the tone is healthier than in most of Mrs. Forrester’s novels. There is no sensational infraction of the seventh commandment, no lively descriptions of the demi-monde, none of that peculiar flavouring which renders this author’s works so palatable to a certain class of readers.” — Ath., Oct. 9, 1880. ‘¢ Mrs. Forrester has taken for her plot the usual and favorite, not to say hackneyed, topic of a young man who is in love with a young woman who is in the power of one of those fiends called husbands. The hostility entertained by average lady novelists like Mrs. Forrester against husbands is one of the features of modern fiction.” — London Graphic, Nov. 27, 1880. [Ten copies. ] Seventy-five copies of this author’s nine novels have been put into the Public Library, seven of which novels circulated one hundred and seventeen times between May and October, 1880, from the Lower Hall alone. That my readers may have a perfectly clear concep- tion of the nature of these books, I quote once more: ‘‘ These pictures she is so fond of indulging in of wives standing on the brink of matrimonial infidelity, and only saved —if they are saved — from ruin ‘ by the skin of their teeth,’ as the phrase runs, cannot be held edifying reading for the innocent, whilst we do not believe that they are of the faintest benefit to those potential sinners for whom we must suppose them intended.” — London Graphic, Aug. 2, 1879. Or, as the Spectator puts the truth very shortly in its question: ‘¢ Why will writers like Mrs. Forrester stick pertinaciously to this hateful topic of adultery ?” — Spect., July 27, 1878. It is with inexpressible relief that I turn from this ‘‘ base herd of female novelists,” as the Saturday Review, with well-merited severity, terms them, ‘‘ who are trying to drag [woman] down to a level of their own coarse imaginations,” to consider the writings of Mr. Edmund Yates. For, whatever his faults as a novelist, we are spared the repulsive spectacle of a woman describing sins the very knowledge of which we would fain have believed was con- fined to the vile and depraved of her sex. His stories appear to be exclusively pictures of low, fast life, in which gamblers and « 12 blacklegs of both sexes are the principal characters. ‘‘ The suc- cess of the school — in our opinion a very bad one —to which he belongs is principally due to the fact that, though their characters are flashy and unnatural, and their morality objectionable, they pay more attention to a good plot than is usual amongst writers of a superior class.” — Sat. Review, May 16, 1868.