Transcriber's Note
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THE STORY OF GREECE
THE
STORY OF GREECE
TOLD TO BOYS AND GIRLS BY
MARY MACGREGOR
AUTHOR OF ‘THE STORY OF ROME’
‘THE STORY OF FRANCE,’ ETC.
WITH NINETEEN PLATES IN COLOUR
BY WALTER CRANE
LONDON: T. C. & E. C. JACK, Ltd.
35 PATERNOSTER ROW, E.C., & EDINBURGH
TO
JOYCE MOFFAT SCOTT
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Dear little Joyce,—One of the reasons why this bookis to be your very own is that the story it tells begins inWonderland, and that is a land in which you and all otherlittle people wander at will.
Grown up children, men and women as we call them,do not know the secrets of this strange land, yet there area few who can always find their way across its border, asthey used to do when they were small like you. Some fewothers there are who remember its secrets well.
Shall I tell you some of the things you hear and see anddo in Wonderland?
Why, when the wind blows soft, faint whispers reachyour ear, but you alone know what the whispers tell. Whenthe brooks gurgle you hear joyous laughter, and in thesprings of water you see the sparkle of elfin eyes.
As the bluebells shake in the breeze, your tiny feet marchto the music of fairy bands, as the raindrops fall you gatherpearls with your little hands.
The secrets of this strange Wonderland make you soglad that you laugh and dance and sing.
The ancient Wonderland of Hellas, of which this storytells, was unlike your Wonderland in this, that men andwomen dwelt in it as well as boys and girls, and they, too,saw and heard its secrets. And this was because, in a waynot known to-day, each had kept the heart of a little child.
So it was that these men and women heard voices in thewind and laughter in the streams, so it was that they saweyes in water springs and pearls in raindrops.
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More even than these things the Hellenes saw. Foracross lone hillsides, through