Maggie. B.
You. No, no, that was a house, not a hut, and it had two windows. Don’t be so inaccurate. This is a big A. Now, what’s next?
Maggie. A little house with a nanny inside. And there’s a goose in the garden. And a baby.
You (patiently). No, this is another P. He is like a man with a pack on his back. P-A-P pap—there you are. That’s very good.
Maggie. May I go into the garden now?
You. Yes.
After that we learn sentences, and we raise in the child’s mind a few more simple pictures of Nature by repeating several times such statements as:
A pig had a fig.
The author introduces us to Ben, who can sup sop. Ben, however, has a fat pup, and this pup cannot sip sop. My daughter, as I said, has a logical mind, and she immediately asked if Ben’s pup could sup sop. She had perceived at once that if he could neither sip nor sup the unfortunate animal was cut off from sop altogether. I said I didn’t know. I don’t. But I see that Ben fed Poll on bun, so I expect he gave the pup some too.
It is a pity that the author could not provide pictures for some of the more striking incidents she records. Some of these would do: