For the Children

Te Aroha News, Volume XIV, Issue 2072, 29 January 1898, Page 2

For the Children

Kipling's Jungle Book , The most popular story-book in the vyorld with chiidrea of from seven to fourteen is Kipling’s ‘Jungle Book’ To cater successfully for youngsters of this age and yet delight grown-ups too was a superb feat. Mr Kipling now aspires to even a greater one. In his ‘ Ju9t So Stories ’ commenciugthis month in ‘St Nicholas * he tries to write down (or is it up ?) to the intelligence of a child of four of'five. The first of these thrilling narratives, tells how the whale got hi* tiny throat, and here is the openiug sentence. You can picture Daddy with the little one on his knee tellifik-it with appropriate gestures just Be. ‘Once upon a tiiri there was a whale, and he lived ir|iiie sea and heate fishes. He starfish and. the garfish and the crab and the dab, and the plaice and the daee, and the skate and his mate, and the mackeral and the pickereel, and the really truly w twirly-whirly eel. All the fishes could find In all the sea he ate with his mouth. So V The story proceeds to tell how thewhale—advised in true Kiplingese by a ’Cute little fish to. taste man —meets: a solitary mariner on a raft trailing his toes in the water. (He had hie mother’s leave to paddle, or else hewould never have done it, because hewas a man of infinite-resource andsagacity). Then the whale opened his. mouth: back and back, and back till it nearlytouched his tail, and he swallowed the ; shipwrecked mariner and the raft he was sitting on, and his blue canvas; breeches, and the suspenders (which you must not. forget „ and the jack-knife-—he swallowed them all down, into his warm, dark inside cupboards: and then he smacked his lips—so, and turned round three times on his tail. But as soon as the mariner, who was; a man of infinite-resource-and-sagac-ity, found himself in the whale's warm, dark inside cupboards, he hopped and he th uraped and he bumped; and he pranced aud he danced, and he banged and he clanged, and he leaped and he> creeped, and he prowled and he howled and he cried; and he sighed, and he. crawled and. he bawled, and lie-daneed; hornpipes where he shouldn’t, and whale felt very unhappy indeed. So he said to the fish, ‘ This man is. truly very nubbly, and besides he’s; making me: hiccough. What shall T do * At this thrilling juncture we break; off, leaving you to discover for yourselves and your little ones what, sad: things; befel the whale.