A Wonder Book for Girls and Boys

by Nathaniel Hawthorne, Mint Editions (Contribution by)

Overview

Nathaniel Hawthorne presents a multilayered story consisting of six Greek myths that are told from a unique perspective and appeals to all readers, specifically children. His writing style transcends age to deliver a family-friendly narrative.

A Wonder-Book for Girls and Boys is a compilation of classic stories inspired by Greek mythology. Hawthorne's interpretation is filtered through the fictional character, Eustace Bright, a college student who's entertaining a group of children. The book features "The Gorgon's Head," a popular epic that follows Perseus and his quest to slay Medusa. There's also "The Paradise of Children," a cautionary tale about Pandora's box, and "The Golden Touch," which recalls the story of King Midas.

Originally published in 1851, A Wonder-Book for Girls and Boys continues to stand the test of time. Its stories are literary staples that have been adapted for multiple mediums. The collection also produced the sequel, Tanglewood Tales, which was released in 1853.

With an eye-catching new cover, and professionally typeset manuscript, this edition of A Wonder-Book for Girls and Boys is both modern and readable.

Since our inception in 2020, Mint Editions has kept sustainability and innovation at the forefront of our mission. Each and every Mint Edition title gets a fresh, professionally typeset manuscript and a dazzling new cover, all while maintaining the integrity of the original book.

With thousands of titles in our collection, we aim to spotlight diverse public domain works to help them find modern audiences. Mint Editions celebrates a breadth of literary works, curated from both canonical and overlooked classics from writers around the globe.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781513269108
Publisher:	Mint Editions
Publication date:	02/16/2021
Series:	Mint Editions (The Children's Library)
Pages:	126
Product dimensions:	5.00(w) x 8.00(h) x 0.30(d)
Age Range:	8 - 14 Years

About the Author

Nathaniel Hawthorne (1804-1864) was an American writer best known for his novels and short stories. Born in Massachusetts, Hawthorne was a descendant of some of the state's earliest settlers. One of his ancestors, John Hathorne, was a judge during the infamous Salem witch trials. As a young man, Hawthorne attended Bowdoin College, where he met many notable figures including future president Franklin Pierce and poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. He then began his literary career as a magazine editor and sketch writer. Hawthorne would also produce novels such as Fanshawe, The House of the Seven Gables, and his most famous work, The Scarlet Letter.

Date of Birth:

July 4, 1804

Date of Death:

May 19, 1864

Place of Birth:

Salem, Massachusetts

Place of Death:

Plymouth, New Hampshire

Education:

Bowdoin College, Brunswick, Maine, 1824

Read an Excerpt

The Gorgon’s Head

Tanglewood Porch

INTRODUCTORY TO “THE GORGON’S HEAD”

Beneath the porch of the country-seat called Tangle-wood, one fine autumnal morning, was assembled a merry party of little folks, with a tall youth in the midst of them. They had planned a nutting expedition, and were impatiently waiting for the mists to roll up the hill-slopes, and for the sun to pour the warmth of the Indian summer over the fields and pastures, and into the nooks of the many-colored woods. There was a prospect of as fine a day as ever gladdened the aspect of this beautiful and comfortable world. As yet, however, the morning mist filled up the whole length and breadth of the valley, above which, on a gently sloping eminence, the mansion stood.
This body of white vapor extended to within less than a hundred yards of the house. It completely hid everything beyond that distance, except a few ruddy or yellow treetops, which here and there emerged, and were glorified by the early sunshine, as was likewise the broad surface of the mist. Four or five miles off to the southward rose the summit of Monument Mountain, and seemed to be floating on a cloud. Some fifteen miles farther away, in the same direction, appeared the loftier Dome of Taconic, looking blue and indistinct, and hardly so substantial as the vapory sea that almost rolled over it. The nearer hills, which bordered the valley, were half submerged, and were specked with little cloud-wreaths all the way to their tops. On the whole, there was so much cloud, and so little solid earth, that it had the effect of a vision.
The children above-mentioned, being as full oflife as they could hold, kept overflowing from the porch of Tangle-wood, and scampering along the gravel-walk, or rushing across the dewy herbage of the lawn. I can hardly tell how many of these small people there were; not less than nine or ten, however, nor more than a dozen, of all sorts, sizes, and ages, whether girls or boys. They were brothers, sisters, and cousins, together with a few of their young acquaintances, who had been invited by Mr. and Mrs. Pringle to spend some of this delightful weather with their own children, at Tanglewood. I am afraid to tell you their names, or even to give them any names which other children have ever been called by; because, to my certain knowledge, authors sometimes get themselves into great trouble by accidentally giving the names of real persons to the characters in their books. For this reason, I mean to call them Primrose, Periwinkle, Sweet Fern, Dandelion, Blue Eye, Clover, Huckleberry, Cowslip, Squash-Blossom, Milkweed, Plantain, and Buttercup; although, to be sure, such titles might better suit a group of fairies than a company of earthly children.
It is not to be supposed that these little folks were to be permitted by their careful fathers and mothers, uncles, aunts, or grandparents, to stray abroad into the woods and fields, without the guardianship of some particularly grave and elderly person. Oh no, indeed! In the first sentence of my book, you will recollect that I spoke of a tall youth, standing in the midst of the children. His name—(and I shall let you know his real name, because he considers it a great honor to have told the stories that are here to be printed)—his name was Eustace Bright. He was a student at Williams College, and had reached, I think, at this period, the venerable age of eighteen years; so that he felt quite like a grandfather towards Periwinkle, Dandelion, Huckleberry, Squash-Blossom, Milkweed, and the rest, who were only half or a third as venerable as he. A trouble in his eyesight (such as many students think it necessary to have, nowadays, in order to prove their diligence at their books) had kept him from college a week or two after the beginning of the term. But, for my part, I have seldom met with a pair of eyes that looked as if they could see farther or better than those of Eustace Bright.
This learned student was slender, and rather pale, as all Yankee students are; but yet of a healthy aspect, and as light and active as if he had wings to his shoes. By the by, being much addicted to wading through streamlets and across meadows, he had put on cowhide boots for the expedition. He wore a linen blouse, a cloth cap, and a pair of green spectacles, which he had assumed, probably, less for the preservation of his eyes than for the dignity that they imparted to his countenance. In either case, however, he might as well have let them alone; for Huckleberry, a mischievous little elf, crept behind Eustace as he sat on the steps of the porch, snatched the spectacles from his nose, and clapped them on her own; and as the student forgot to take them back, they fell off into the grass, and lay there till the next spring.
Now, Eustace Bright, you must know, had won great fame among the children, as a narrator of wonderful stories; and though he sometimes pretended to be annoyed, when they teased him for more, and more, and always for more, yet I really doubt whether he liked anything quite so well as to tell them. You might have seen his eyes twinkle, therefore, when Clover, Sweet Fern, Cowslip, Buttercup, and most of their playmates, besought him to relate one of his stories, while they were waiting for the mist to clear up.
“Yes, Cousin Eustace,” said Primrose, who was a bright girl of twelve, with laughing eyes, and a nose that turned up a little, “the morning is certainly the best time for the stories with which you so often tire out our patience. We shall be in less danger of hurting your feelings, by falling asleep at the most interesting points,—as little Cowslip and I did last night!”
“Naughty Primrose,” cried Cowslip, a child of six years old; “I did not fall asleep, and I only shut my eyes, so as to see a picture of what Cousin Eustace was telling about. His stories are good to hear at night, because we can dream about them asleep; and good in the morning, too, because then we can dream about them awake. So I hope he will tell us one this very minute.”
“Thank you, my little Cowslip,” said Eustace; “certainly you shall have the best story I can think of, if it were only for defending me so well from that naughty Primrose. But, children, I have already told you so many fairy tales, that I doubt whether there is a single one which you have not heard at least twice over. I am afraid you will fall asleep in reality, if I repeat any of them again.”
“No, no, no!” cried Blue Eye, Periwinkle, Plantain, and half a dozen others. “We like a story all the better for having heard it two or three times before.”
And it is a truth, as regards children, that a story seems often to deepen its mark in their interest, not merely by two or three, but by numberless repetitions. But Eustace Bright, in the exuberance of his resources, scorned to avail himself of an advantage which an older story-teller would have been glad to grasp at.
“It would be a great pity,” said he, “if a man of my learning (to say nothing of original fancy) could not find a new story every day, year in and year out, for children such as you. I will tell you one of the nursery tales that were made for the amusement of our great old grandmother, the Earth, when she was a child in frock and pinafore. There are a hundred such; and it is a wonder to me that they have not long ago been put into picture-books for little girls and boys. But, instead of that, old gray-bearded grandsires pore over them in musty volumes of Greek, and puzzle themselves with trying to find out when, and how, and for what they were made.”
“Well, well, well, well, Cousin Eustace!” cried all the children at once; “talk no more about your stories, but begin.”
“Sit down, then, every soul of you,” said Eustace Bright, “and be all as still as so many mice. At the slightest interruption, whether from great, naughty Primrose, little Dandelion, or any other, I shall bite the story short off between my teeth, and swallow the untold part. But, in the first place, do any of you know what a Gorgon is?”
“I do,” said Primrose.
“Then hold your tongue!” rejoined Eustace, who had rather she would have known nothing about the matter. “Hold all your tongues, and I shall tell you a sweet pretty story of a Gorgon’s head.”
And so he did, as you may begin to read on the next page. Working up his sophomorical erudition with a good deal of tact, and incurring great obligations to Professor Anthon, he, nevertheless, disregarded all classical authorities, whenever the vagrant audacity of his imagination impelled him to do so.

All new material copyright © 1998 by Tom Doherty Associates, Inc.

Table of Contents

	The Gorgon's Head
	Tanglewood Porch--Introductory to The Gorgon's Head	15
	The Gorgon's Head	21
	Tanglewood Porch--After the Story	57
	The Golden Touch
	Shadow Brook--Introductory to The Golden Touch	60
	The Golden Touch	64
	Shadow Brook--After the Story	90
	The Paradise of Children
	Tanglewood Play-Room--Introductory to The Paradise of Children	94
	The Paradise of Children	99
	Tanglewood Play-Room--After the Story	124
	The Three Golden Apples
	Tanglewood Fireside--Introductory to The Three Golden Apples	126
	The Three Golden Apples	133
	Tanglewood Fireside--After the Story	163
	The Miraculous Pitcher
	The Hill-Side--Introductory to the Miraculous Pitcher	167
	The Miraculous Pitcher	171
	The Hill-Side--After the Story	200
	The Chimaera
	Bald-Summit--Introductory to The Chimaera	202
	The Chimaera	206
	Bald-Summit--After the Story	238
	List of Designs
	Half-Title	1
	Frontispiece--Bellerophon on Pegasus	2
	Title	3
	Preface	8
	Tailpiece	9
	Contents	11
	List of Designs	12
	Tailpiece	13
	Headpiece--Tanglewood Porch	15
	The Gorgon's Head--Headpiece	21
	Perseus and the Graiae	37
	Perseus armed by the Nymphs	42
	Perseus and the Gorgons	49
	Perseus showing the Gorgon's Head	54
	Tailpiece	56
	Headpiece--Tanglewood Porch, After the Story	57
	Tailpiece	59
	Headpiece--Shadow Brook	60
	The Golden Touch--Headpiece	64
	The Stranger appearing to Midas	69
	Midas' Daughter turned to Gold	82
	Midas with the Pitcher	87
	Tailpiece	89
	Headpiece--Shadow Brook, After the Story	90
	Tailpiece	93
	Headpiece--Tanglewood Play-Room	94
	Tailpiece	98
	The Paradise of Children--Headpiece	99
	Pandora wonders at the Box	102
	Pandora desires to open the Box	109
	Pandora opens the Box	116
	Tailpiece	123
	Headpiece--Tanglewood Play-Room, After the Story	124
	Headpiece--Tanglewood Fireside	126
	Tailpiece	132
	The Three Golden Apples--Headpiece	133
	Hercules and the Nymphs	137
	Hercules and the Old Man of the Sea	146
	Hercules and Atlas	153
	Tailpiece	162
	Headpiece--Tanglewood Fireside, After the Story	163
	Tailpiece	166
	Headpiece--The Hill-Side	167
	Tailpiece	170
	The Miraculous Pitcher--Headpiece	171
	Philemon and Baucis	172
	The Strangers in the Village	177
	The Strangers entertained	188
	Tailpiece	199
	Headpiece--The Hill-Side, After the Story	200
	Tailpiece	201
	Headpiece--Bald Summit	202
	Tailpiece	205
	The Chimaera--Headpiece	206
	Bellerophon at the Fountain	211
	Bellerophon slays the Chimaera	232
	Tailpiece	237
	Headpiece--Bald Summit, After the Story	238
	Tailpiece	242

Editorial Reviews

"A handsome replica of the original 1893 edition, A Wonder Book for Girls & Boys by Nathaniel Hawthorne features Medusa, Hercules, Pandora, Midas et al—and the art of the illustrious Walter Crane.... Crane's color plates are lushly romantic in style; the plainer printed story titles and illuminated letters are just as beautiful."—Publishers Weekly

"Hawthorne's delightful retelling of Greek myths displays his command of narrative and character as well as his sense of adventure. The stories of Midas, Medusa, Hercules, and others will delight both children and adult readers."—The Tampa Tribune Times

"An exceptionally fine series of Hawthorne retellings of Greek classics.... An excellent keepsake edition."—The Children's Bookwatch

From the Publisher