nationalism of the middle decades of the 19th century was the emergence of a special literature designed for the younger generation. The appearance of The Juvenile Miscell-ny in 1826, The Youth's Companion, The Tales of Peter Parley about and Eliza Leslie's Atlantic Stories in the following year-soon augmented by such books as Dorothea Dix's Moral Tales for Young Persons, Jacob Abbott's Little Philosopher and Dr. William Alcott's Young Man's Guide-signaled the beginning of an impressive campaign of informal indoctrination of young Americans by their solicitous elders. For the next thirty-five years children and adolescents were bombarded with books of various sizes, shapes and degrees of ornamentation-giftbooks, toybooks, storybooks, travel books, histories and geographies, literary annuals, counseling and etiquette manuals, tracts and periodical miscellanieswhich contained a common, central and calculated element; the official word of the middle-class, mid-19th century adults.' The cultural climate which nurtured an indigenous adult literature had an atmosphere equally conducive to the creation of an American reading diet for the young. A generation with a fervid faith in the uniqueness of institutions, pride in achievements and a deep-seated confidence in the mission of America could not sit back and allow its youngsters to feed on the writings of Europeans. Whatever intrinsic excellence these transatlantic writings may possess, said William Cardell in the preface of a pioneer juvenile volume, give, in the proportion in which they are here read, a general wrong direction to the minds of the young and, to an extent of which few per-