A century of children's books

by Florence V. Barry

The Letters between Master Tommy and Miss Nancy Goodwill, published by Carnan and Newbery in 1770, was revised in 1786 with “the Parts not altogether properly adapted to the Improvement and Entertainment of little Masters and Misses expunged”.[65] What remains, however, shows no change in style or substance; the Lilliputian features are intact. As the editor observed: “The epistolatory Style here adopted is that which little Masters and Misses should use in their Correspondence with each other” (not that which they naturally would fall into) and it is designed “to regulate their Judgments, to give them an early Taste for true Politeness and inspire them with a Love of Virtue”.

The “Holiday Amusements” described in the letters seem to be “regulated” on the same plan (the editor had obviously forgotten his own); and it is something of a relief to find Master Tommy (whose relationship to the Juvenile Biographer is close) warning his sister and her schoolfellows against the cult of nursery bluestockings.[66] He hopes they are “not going to turn Philosophers”; if they are, he will put them in mind of their needles, their pins and their thread papers. “Leave these Subjects” advises this lordly midget, “to us Boys (I was going to say Men) and we may perhaps now and then condescend to give you some short Lectures upon those Matters”.

Miss Nancy, schooled in the sisterly virtues, responds with Persian stories, references to Mr. Addison, quotations from Pope, and (to clear herself of any suspicion of the bluestocking heresy) a present of worked ruffles. Upon this, he, with restored confidence, imparts an allegorical dream, an instructive story and a “Dissertation on the Value of Time” which closes on this characteristic note:

“But of all the Diversions of Life, there is none so proper to fill up its empty Spaces as the reading useful and entertaining Authors. For this Reason, my dear Nancy, you will receive by the next Coach, Mr. Newbery’s Circle of the Sciences, and such other of his Books as I apprehend could anyway contribute to your Instruction and Amusement.”

There is one letter, and one only, in which Master Tommy forgets his Philosophy and lets the Child in him escape:

“O, my dear Nancy, how shall I tell you that my sweet Kite which boasted of the two finest glass Eyes perhaps ever seen, which was so crowded with Stars and which cost me such immense Labour, is lost.”

The revised edition was doubtless an attempt to keep pace with the rival firm of John Marshall; for between the two issues (about 1777) they had printed a new collection under the title of Juvenile Correspondence,[67] which in some ways was better adapted to Locke’s original plan, as well as to the theories of Rousseau.

The very fact that these letters are “suited to Children from four to above ten Years of Age”, and that their aim is to encourage “a natural Way of Writing”, implies a change in the general view of education; yet it would be rash to assume that the writer had more than a passing acquaintance with Rousseau, or that she (this writer is almost certainly a woman) drew any clear distinction between childhood and youth. The whole design of Juvenile Correspondence is Lilliputian; its aim is expressed almost in the exact phrase of the Royal Society, and its origin (apart from the Goodwill “Letters”) can be traced to a remark of Pope’s (quoted in the book) that he “should have Pleasure in reading the Thoughts of an Infant, could it commit them to Writing as they arose in its little Mind”.

Moreover the children who write the letters, instead of developing on Rousseau’s lines, become more Lilliputian with each year of growth.[68] All the natural touches are in the letters of the younger ones; from five to seven, they would pass for living children. Indeed, the first letter “from Miss Goodchild, a little more than seven Years of Age to her Brother nearly five” suggests that the next generation of Lilliputians will refuse to grow up so soon: