Not long ago I was telling a story to a little five-year-old friend of mine. She listened with great delight till we came to the inevitable fairy, who helps the distracted heroine through her troubles, when she interrupted with ‘Please let the fairy be an angel!’ I thought of this instinctive desire of a child for angelic comradeship, when looking through a number of modern children’s books in a large bookshop lately. I was struck with the entire absence of a reference to any form of religion in the charming and artistic productions which are published by the hundred to amuse and instruct the younger children of to-day. There are fairies in abundance, talking flowers, singing pigs, intelligent carrots, but no saints, or angels, and never a reference, however remote, to Almighty God.

I am not, of course, referring to the numberless story books by well-intentioned writers of all denominations, which are written with a definite religious purpose, to convey a definite religious lesson; many of these are excellent, if some are a trifle tedious; but of the many beautifully illustrated and charming little tales which find their way into any house where there is a child.