The stories in this book, some very old and unchanged, some new, and some changed from an older form, grew into their present shape by the process of being told to children many, many times. They were shortened or lengthened, modelled and remodelled, by the conscious or instinctive adaptation of the story-teller to the listener. A few of them took this form long since, and are included here because children of many generations have loved to hear them thus, but the greater part are the fruit of my own story-telling years, and, because of their good fortune in the favor of English-speaking children of to-day, have served as model forms for teachers and mothers all over the world.All of them, with others, are included in one or the other of my two earlier books, "How to Tell Stories to Children" and "Stories to Tell to Children, " both of which are used chiefly by persons in some way actively concerned in the education of children, and both of which deal largely with the aims and method of storytelling as an art.