Mr. Cummings, curator of the Lower Hall card-catalogue of the
Boston Public Library, and Miss Jenkins, assistant librarian in
the same place, have kindly sent me the manuscripts of their
forthcoming reports to the trustees. These reports are wholly on
the methods and results of their personal intercourse with
readers, and the increase in special reading during the last few
years. Concerning boys and girls Mr. Cummings writes: "I must not
forget the juvenile readers, school-boys and school- girls, and
the children from the stores and offices about town. These latter
are smart, bright, active little bodies, often more in earnest
than their more fortunate fellows of the same age. They are an
object of special solicitude and care. The school children come
for points in reading for their compositions and for parallel
reading with their lessons in school; and such books are
suggested as may be found useful. The two most available
faculties in children to work upon are the heart and the
imagination. Get a hold on their affections by encouraging words
and manifesting a readiness to help them, and you command their
devotion and confidence. Give them interesting books (Optic and
Alger, if needs be), and you fix their attention. Above all, let
the book be interesting; for the attention is never fixed by, nor
does the memory ever retain, what is laborious to read. But, once
assured of their devotion, with their confidence secured and
their attention fixed, there is nothing to prevent the work of
direction succeeding admirably with them."

Miss Jenkins says: "The use of the library by the young people is
increasing every year. The change in the character of children's
books has been a great help to us, fairly crowding out many of
the trashy stories so long the favorite reading. One of the first