Page:Books and men.djvu/86

 76 school-girl along the track of her self-chosen reading, we shall be astonished that so much printed matter can yield so little mental nourishment. She has begun, no doubt, with childish stories, bright and well-written, probably, but following each other in such quick succession that none of them have left any distinct impression on her mind. Books that children read but once are of scant service to them; those that have really helped to warm our imaginations and to train our faculties are the few old friends we know so well that they have become a portion of our thinking selves. At ten or twelve the little girl aspires to something partly grown-up, to those nondescript tales which, trembling ever on the brink of sentiment, seem afraid to risk the plunge; and with her appetite whetted by a course of this unsatisfying diet, she is soon ripe for a little more excitement and a great deal more love-making, so graduates into Rhoda Broughton and the "Duchess," at which point her intellectual career is closed. She has no idea, even, of what she has missed in the world of books. She tells you that she "don't care for