HEIDI
by JOHANNA SPYRI
CONTENTS
I Up the Mountain to Alm-Uncle
II At Home with Grandfather
III Out with the Goats
IV The Visit to Grandmother
V Two Visits and What Came of Them
VI A New Chapter about New Things
VII Fraulein Rottenmeier Spends an Uncomfortable Day
VIII There is Great Commotion in the Large House
IX Herr Sesemann Hears of Things that are New to Him
X Another Grandmother
XI Heidi Gains in One Way and Loses in Another
XII A Ghost in the House
XIII A Summer Evening on the Mountain
XIV Sunday Bells
XV Preparations for a journey
XVI A Visitor
XVII A Compensation
XVIII Winter in Dorfli
XIX The Winter Continues
XX News from Distant Friends
XXI How Life went on at Grandfather's
XXII Something Unexpected Happens
XXIII "Good-bye Till We Meet Again"
INTRODUCTION
"Heidi" is a delightful story for children of life in the Alps, one of many tales written by the Swiss authoress, Johanna Spyri, who died in her home at Zurich in 1891. She had been well known to the younger readers of her own country since 1880, when she published her story, Heimathlos, which ran into three or more editions, and which, like her other books, as she states on the title page, was written for those who love children, as well as for the youngsters themselves. Her own sympathy with the instincts and longings of the child's heart is shown in her picture of Heidi. The record of the early life of this Swiss child amid the beauties of her passionately loved mountain-home and during her exile in the great town has been for many years a favorite book of younger readers in Germany and America.
Madame Spyri, like Hans Andersen, had by temperament a peculiar skill in writing the simple histories of an innocent world. In all her stories she shows an underlying desire to preserve children alike from misunderstanding and the mistaken kindness that frequently hinder the happiness and natural development of their lives and characters. The authoress, as we feel in reading her tales, lived among the scenes and people she describes, and the setting of her stories has the charm of the mountain scenery amid which she places her small actors.
Her chief works, besides Heidi, were:— Am Sonntag; Arthur und
Squirrel; Aus dem Leben; Aus den Schweizer Bergen; Aus Nah und
Fern; Aus unserem, Lande; Cornelli wird erzogen; Einer vom Hause
Lesa; 10 Geschichten fur Yung und Alt; Kurze Geschichten, 2
vols.; Gritli's Kinder, 2 vols.; Heimathlos; Im Tilonethal; In
Leuchtensa; Keiner zu Klein Helfer zu sein; Onkel Titus; Schloss
Wildenstein; Sina; Ein Goldener Spruch; Die Hauffer Muhle;
Verschollen, nicht vergessen; Was soll deim aus ihr werden; Was
aus ihr Geworden ist. M.E.