| Altemus'
Illustrated
Fairy Tales Series
The Magic Bed A Book of East Indian Tales The Cat and the Mouse A Book of Persian Tales The Jeweled Sea A Book of Chinese Tales The Magic Jaw Bone A Book of South Sea Islands Tales The Man Elephant A Book of African Tales The Enchanted Castle A Book of Tales from Flower Land Fifty Cents Each Copyright, 1906 By Henry Altemus |
Introduction
India is undoubtedly the home of the fairy-tale. Of those now in existence, probably one-third of them came from India. Gypsies, missionaries, travelers, and traders carried them to other countries where they were told and retold until much of their original form was obliterated, and many of their titles lost.
The "Jatakas," or birth-stories of Buddha, form the earliest collection of fairy-tales in the world, and were gathered together more than two thousand years before the Brothers Grimm—well and justly beloved of children—began to write the stories which have delighted a world of readers, young and old.
It is from these, and from others told by native nurses, or ayahs, to children in India--where the belief in fairies, gnomes, ogres, and monsters is still widespread--that five stories most likely to interest young people have been selected to form this volume. They are stories which have aroused the wonder and laughter of thousands of children in the far East, and can hardly fail to produce the same effect upon the children of America.
H.J.
