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To many friends thanks are due for advice, criticism and proofreading. I also desire especially to acknowledge my debt to Dr. W. F. Russell, Dean of the College of Education of the University of Iowa; Professor Jean Broadhurst and Miss Caroline E. Stackpole of Columbia University, and Dr. Martin Edwards of Boston, all of whom have given generously of their time and interest in behalf of these books. To Miss Emma Dolfinger, Normal School, Louisville, Kentucky, I am indebted for the valuable questions and suggestions at the end of each chapter. MARY S. HAVILAND.

National Child Welfare Association,
New York City.

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THE PLAY-HOUSE

CHAPTER I

THE TREE-HOUSE

"ROCKABY BABY on the tree-top!" sang a gay voice overhead. Uncle George halted to peer upward through the cherry-tree boughs. A plump, red cherry struck his cheek, followed by a vision of Ruth's flushed face and tangled locks framed in intertwining, sun-flecked leaves.

"Oh, Uncle George," she cried, "do come up into my tree-house (frontispiece) and have some cherrywine in my parlor."

"Nothing I'd like better," assented Uncle George, "but please direct me to the front door-steps, kind lady."

"Oh, do you really need steps?" queried Ruth, in what her brother Paul called her "grown-up" voice. "I didn't suppose you were so feeble. When Mother comes up, she uses the ladder that is in the garage, but Father and Paul and I just climb."

"Indeed! Well, here goes!" And after a moment of "just climbing," Uncle George was sitting on the platform in the cherry-tree beside Ruth and drinking a glass of the cherry-wine.

"I made it myself-out of my own head," explained Ruth. "I just squeezed the juice into some

ice-water and then sugared it. I do love this treehouse. I can make all sorts of messes here and never bother anyone and never be bothered by anyone. I'd like to live up in a tree all the time."

"You ought to go and live in the Philippines," replied Uncle George. "I was reading last night about a traveler who said that in the wilder parts of the Philippine Islands there are whole villages built on platforms in the trees like your house here. He hunted and hunted for one of these villages until at last he came upon a rustic ladder. He climbed this and found a swinging bridge-path from tree to tree. He walked along through the tree-tops in this way until he reached the village of the Manobos."

"How queer!" exclaimed Ruth. "To have a whole village full of people living up in trees. It sounds like the Banderlog in the Jungle Book. You know they were monkeys and lived way up in the tree-tops in the jungle."

"Yes," agreed Uncle George. "It does seem queer to us, but I suppose our great-great-great-ancestors, thousands of years ago, if they lived in the tropics, where there were lots of hungry beasts roaming about, were only too glad to have a safe home up in a tree, out of reach of their enemies. Perhaps those far-away ancestors of yours have handed down to you their love of the tree-tops and that is why, when you want to get away from folks, you love to scramble up here."

"Perhaps that is the reason," mused Ruth. "But my tree-house isn't in the jungle, and sometimes,

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