MS Girton College Cambridge, Yonge VIII
My dear Mr Warburton
I am afraid that when I think of myself as teaching Standards V and VI I feel your first sections somewhat alarming – though perhaps they are not harder than some of the extracts in the advanced Readers and my country children may be no fair criterion
I do not think that the narrative part is so difficult, but in the generalising. What makes it delightful reading to us – the allusions, and allusive forms of expression would be great stumbling blocks – e.g. What would they make of Sitting Bull and Flying cloud – who by the by would surely burn wigwams rather than kraals This is very impertinent but you see you have set me on, and I am figuring to my self working at it with the best scholars I ever had!
After the first section I do not see than it is beyond a wholesome stretch to the mind except for a few ideas that belong to a degree of cultivation one can not expect. I really think it is chiefly in the first section that the difficulty lies, and that alarms the reader – it would be a great pity to recast the ensuing chapters, and spoil their flow, – and I hope the Sanctuary will not insist on such a change1 – would not it look easier if the paragraphs were more divided. I think in the end of Sect II, the allusion to Upper and Lower Canada and Egypt would confuse a 12 year old intellect more than elucidate matters
I am afraid this is what be called a candid opinion, but I wish the history was not hampered with the consideration of the children, and that I could be free to enjoy it as it is
Do you happen to have by you Andrew Marvell’s few lines on Charles I’s death I can only remember the first and last.2
The poetry in this 4th standard vol is a great difficulty everything spirited is naturally so strong one way or the other as not to suit the needful neutrality
Yours sincerely
C M Yonge