Scene 5. The child finds the natural consequence of his untidiness

in his welcome by the despised pig which brings about his resolve to be clean and orderly, hereafter.

Each story scene, as shown in this analysis is carefully planned, having in mind a grouping of associated ideas that will strengthen and vivify the image made on the child’s mind by the story theme. As a result the child who has heard the story of “The Pig Brother” has gained a store of associated ideas that will be recalled when some one asks him to pick up his toys or use care in eating. He will remember that squirrels and birds are orderly in their nest making, that his cat uses care in regard to her person, that there is a big, unseen force at work in the world that makes for order--whether one calls it an Angel, or not, it really exists--and he remembers that a disregard of this law of order means disaster to the law breaker. The child of the story escaped from the Pig. He may not be so fortunate if he breaks the law. So our real child turns over and examines and sorts and weighs his mental associates of the concept _untidiness_, and makes his own decision in the negative in a way that would not have been possible without the carefully associated scenes of the story.

This may seem an over fine analysis of one story but it will help us in judging other child stories having a regard to their memory value for the child.

Almost, if not more important a consideration than the writing of a drama, is the matter of the stage “business” in its successful production. The manager must decide which movements of his actors, which exits and entrances, which stage arrangement, lighting and what scheme of costuming will strengthen the salient idea underlying the plot of the drama and make it a _memory_ in the minds of the audience. Stage “business” is a matter of psychology. It means that the stage manager, the playwright or whoever knows the audience best is going to plan a mechanical background, a hedge, a wall, of associates that will make the audience remember the play. A good story should have “business,” the necessary costuming and lighting.

How shall the story teller apply this memory test in her selection of stories? How shall she be able to say with authority:

“My children will not forget this story!”

In the first place we should assure ourselves to our complete satisfaction in selecting a story that it _has a theme_, a _motif_ upon which we can build the chords of a complete melody. It is doubtful if the story of “The Greedy Cat” has a sufficient theme to make it of value as a memory story, although it has a very real place in the child’s life as a relaxing bit of nonsense. “The Little Pine Tree That Wished New Leaves” has a well defined theme--that of _contentment_.

The second question that we will ask ourselves will be, _is this story theme a worth while one for us to give the children as a permanent part of their mental lives?_ We would hardly wish a child to remember always about the greed of the gormandizing cat. We would be glad to have him hang up in his mind house a picture of content as illustrated by the little green tree that discovered his own leaves to be better than any others.

Last, we will ask, _is the story theme so compellingly associated with other ideas that it will become a memory for the child?_ In the case of the story of the Little Pine Tree, this treatment is carefully adhered to. Never is the _leaf_ idea lost. Instead, the idea is presented in the form of gold leaves, leaves of glass, in fact all the strange and different leaves for which the discontented tree wished. But the gold leaves are stolen by a miser; the glass leaves are broken in a storm, and its juicy large leaves are all eaten by a goat. The climax is reached when the little tree is glad to have back its slender green needles; and the story is fixed in a child’s mind because of its associative treatment.

This memory training by means of story telling is a legitimate “short cut” in teaching. The nature fact, that difficult bit of geography, that fine point of ethics may all be given a permanent place in the child’s mind if we can find just the right story to help in fixing them. The list of stories that follows at the end of this chapter was selected having in mind in the case of each story, its associative treatment of one theme worth while as a memory for the child. Hans Andersen’s story of Little Tuk is a brilliant example of using associated ideas to set the memory gem of the plot.

LITTLE TUK

Now there was little Tuk. As a matter of fact his name was not Tuk at all, but before he could speak properly he called himself Tuk. He meant it for Carl, so it is just as well we should know that. He had to look after his sister Gustave who was much smaller than he was, and then he had his lessons to do, but these two things were rather difficult to manage at the same time.

The poor little boy sat with his little sister in his lap, at the same time looking at his open geography book which he held in front of him. Before school time the next morning he had to know the names of all the towns by heart and everything there was to know about them.

At last his mother came home, for she had been out, and she took little Gustave. Tuk ran to the window and read as hard as he could, for it was growing dark fast, and his mother could not afford to buy candles.

“There’s the old washerwoman from the lane,” his mother said as she looked out of the window. “She can hardly carry herself, and yet she has to carry the pail from the pump. Run down, little Tuk, and be a dear boy. Help the old woman!”

Tuk jumped up at once and ran to help her, but when he got home again it was quite dark and it was useless to talk about candles. He had to go to bed. He had an old turn-up bed, and he lay in it, thinking about his geography lesson, the Island of Zealand, and all his teacher had told him about it. He ought to have been learning the lesson, but of course, he could not do that now. He put the geography book under his pillow and he lay there thinking, and thinking--and then all at once it seemed just as if some one had kissed him on his eyes and nose and mouth, and he fell asleep.

Yet he was not quite asleep either. It seemed to him as if the old washerwoman were looking at him with her kind eyes and saying,

“It would be a great shame if you were not to know your lesson. You helped me, and now I will help you.”

And all at once the book under his head went “cribble, crabble.”

“Cluck, cluck, cluck!” There stood a hen from the town of Kiöge.

“I am a Kiöge hen,” it said, and then it went on to tell him how many inhabitants there were, and about the battle which had taken place there.

“Cribble, crabble, bang!” something plumped down; it was a wooden bird, the popinjay from Præstö. It told him that there were just as many inhabitants in Præstö as it had nails in its body, and it was very proud of this.

Now little Tuk no longer lay in bed. Gallop-a-gallop he went. He was sitting in front of a splendidly dressed knight with a shining helmet and a waving plume. They rode through the woods to the old town of Vordingborg, a very large and prosperous town. The castle towered above the royal city, and lights shone through the windows. There were songs and dancing within and the king was leading out the stately young court ladies to the dance. Morning came, and as the sun rose, the town sank away and the king’s palace, one tower after the other. At last only a single tower remained on the hill where the castle had stood, and the town had become tiny and very poor. The schoolboys came along with their books under their arms, and they said, “two thousand inhabitants,” but that was not true. There were not so many.

Little Tuk was still lying in his bed. First he thought he was dreaming, and then he thought he was not dreaming, but there was somebody close to him.

It was a sailor, a tiny little fellow, who might have been a cadet, and he said, “Little Tuk! Little Tuk! I greet you warmly from Korsöer which is a rising town. It is a flourishing town with steamers and coaches. It lies close to the sea and it has good high roads and pleasure gardens. It wanted to send a ship round the world but it did not do it, although it might have. And there is the most delicious scent about the town because there are beautiful rose gardens close by the gates.”

Little Tuk saw them, the green and red flowering branches, and then they vanished before his eyes and changed into wooded heights sloping down to the clear waters of the fjord. A stately old church towered over the fjord with its twin spires. Springs of water rushed down in bubbling streams, close by them sat an old king with a golden crown round his flowing locks. It was King Kroar of the Springs, and little Tuk was in Roeskilde. Down over the slopes and past the springs walked hand in hand all Denmark’s kings and queens wearing their crowns. On and on they went into the old church in time to the pealing of the bells and the rippling of the springs.

All at once everything vanished--where were they? Now an old peasant woman stood before little Tuk. She was a weeding woman and came from Sorö where the grass grows in the market place. She had put her gray linen apron over her head and shoulders. It was soaking wet; there must have been rain.

“Yes, indeed, it has been raining,” she said. Then she suddenly shrank up and wagged her head. It looked as if she were about to take a leap.

“Koax,” she said, “it is wet; it is wet; it is dull as ditch water--in good old Sorö.” She had become a frog.

“Koax” and then once more she was the old woman.

“One must dress according to the weather,” said she. “It is wet, it is wet. My town is like a bottle; you get in by the neck and you have to come out the same way again.”

The old woman’s voice sounded just like the croaking of frogs, or the creaking of fishing boots when you walk in the swamp. It was always the same sound, so tiresome, so tiresome that little Tuk fell into a deep sleep, which was the best thing for him.

But even in this sound sleep he had a dream, or something of the sort. His little sister, Gustave, with the blue eyes and golden, curly hair, had all at once become a lovely grown up girl and, without having wings, she could fly. So Gustave and Tuk flew together right across Zealand, over the green woods and deep blue waters.

“Do you hear the cock crowing, little Tuk? The hens come flying up from Kiöge town. You shall have such a big, big chicken yard. You will be a rich and happy man! Your house shall hold up its head like the king’s towers, and be richly built up with marble statues like those in Præstö.

“Your name will spread round the world with praise like the ship which was to have sailed from Korsöer; and it will be known as far as Roeskilde town.”

Little Tuk seemed to hear all this in his dreams, but he suddenly woke up. It was bright daylight, and he sprang out of bed and read his book. He found that he knew all the towns in his geography book almost at once.

The old washerwoman put her head in at the door, nodded to him and said--

“Many thanks for your help of yesterday, you dear child. May you have the wish of your heart!”

But little Tuk hurried off to school with his book under his arm. He knew that he had already the wish of his heart--he had learned his geography lesson.

STORIES SELECTED BECAUSE OF THEIR STIMULUS TO A CHILD’S MEMORY

THE LITTLE PINE TREE THAT WISHED FOR NEW LEAVES _In For the Children’s Hour_ THE STORY OF THE MORNING GLORY SEED _Emilie Poulsson, in In the Child’s World_ THE SEED BABIES’ BLANKET _Mary Gaylord, in For the Children’s Hour_ ABOUT ANGELS _Laura Richards, in The Golden Windows_ THE CRY FAIRY _Alice Brown, in The One-Footed Fairy_ THE DISAPPOINTED BUSH _Thornton Burgess, in Mother West Wind’s Children_ HOW THE CAMEL GOT HIS HUMP _Rudyard Kipling, in Just So Stories_