Educ T798.94.290 HARVARD COLLEGE LIBRARY GIFT OF THE NEWTON FREE LIBRARY COPYRIGHT, 1894, BY THE AMERICAN ASYLUM, AT HARTFORD, FOR THE EDUCATION The Case, Lockwood & Brainard Co. Print, Hartford, Conn. THI PREFACE. HIS book has been prepared with special reference to deaf children, in the hope that it will be useful in opening to them a glimpse of the wealth and beauty of thought embodied in our English tongue. I have endeavored to give the subject an historical setting in order that the successive stages of growth and the relation of the past and present conditions of our literature to one another may be seen. 66 Exception will perhaps be taken to certain features of the book, such as, for instance, the nature of some of the selections from different authors. 'What," it may be asked, "have the deaf to do with poetry?" Well, in the first place, among those likely to use this book there will be a proportion of semi-mutes, for whom the poetry here given will have no difficulty at all; and, further, a careful choice has been made of poems in which the thought is so clearly and simply expressed that the average pupil can understand and enjoy them. As for the other selections, it is almost needless to say, they are, in the main, taken from authors of the distant past, whose works are not generally accessible to children. For the study of modern authors there is abundant opportunity in every library, and in special editions of Modern Classics. In common with those who have prepared previous books of this series I gladly acknowledge my indebtedness to Dr. Job Williams, the Principal of the American Asylum, for valuable aid. HARTFORD, Apr. 10, 1894. A. S. C. CONTENTS. Origin and Meaning of the word Literature - The Two Forms of Literature - Poetry the Earliest Form of Literature - Re- ligious and Secular Literature - Have Barbarous People a Literature - Value of Early Records - Sources of English Literature - Origin of the English Language - Earliest Saxon Literature -- Beowulf - Nature of Early Saxon Poetry - The First Christian Saxon Poem - Caedmon - English Poetry after Caedmon Early War Poetry - Old English Prose- Decline of Early English Literature - Revival of Early Lit- erature under Alfred - Alfred's Good Work Continued The Influence of Foreign Invasion upon a Language-Slight Effect of the Roman Occupation upon the Language of Britain - Permanent Effect of the Saxon Occupation Ef- fects of Danish Invasions - Important Influence of the Nor- man Conquest-Why the French Language did not Wipe out the English - Decline of the French Language in Eng- land Influence of French Language and Literature upon English - Rise of Modern English-The Latin Language in England - Literary Work in the Monasteries, Matthew Paris English Literature of the Fourteenth Century - Piers Plowman's English Literature of the Fifteenth and Sixteenth Centuries- Fifteenth Century Poetry, Lydgate — Fifteenth Century Prose, Pecock, Fortescue, Mallory—The Invention of Printing - Sixteenth Century Poetry, Hawes, Skelton, Surrey, Wyatt — Sixteenth Century Prose, More, The Utopia, Ascham, Tyn- Elizabethan Literature: First Period, Sackville, Fox Later Elizabethan Literature, Lyly, Sidney, Nash, Hooker, Donne, The English Drama: The Mystery Play, Moral Plays, Interludes, Udall's Roister Doister, The Gorboduc, Edwards, The Thea- ter - Second Period of the Drama, Marlowe, Shakespeare — |