If no speaker can be had for the meeting, divide these topics into two or three papers, and have members write or speak on them.
Close with a discussion on these lines: What books have replaced the Rollo Books, Little Prudy, and the Elsie Books? What of giving children grown-up writers to read such as Shakespeare, Don Quixote, Mallory and Bunyan? Does much reading of stories vitiate their taste for better literature?
This program will be more delightful if songs about children are interspersed; Eugene Field's verses set to music by De Koven are admirable.
IV—MURAL PAINTING
In preparing this program look up in advance plenty of illustrations from historical books on art and architecture, magazines of art, and prints and photographs of famous examples, such as the Sistine Chapel.
The first paper will of course deal with the earliest form of mural painting, found in Egypt, Assyria, and Greece. Describe these, and notice the colors used by the Greeks.
The second paper should speak of the wonderful paintings in churches, of altar pieces, and the decorations in fresco of walls and ceilings; select from the many examples of churches in Italy. Then the guild halls of the middle ages should be mentioned, and the curious work on bridges and elsewhere in Germany. The third paper should speak of the extraordinary interest to-day in mural painting; note that of the Houses of Parliament and other places abroad; show pictures of the work of Abbey and Sargent in the Boston Public Library, and of Blashfield and La Farge in the Congressional Library at Washington and elsewhere, and the excellent mural paintings on our public buildings, court houses and capitols, and some public schools in New York.
Discuss: The Cost of Mural Paintings To-day: Are They Worth While?
V—THE ART OF CONVERSATION
This subject opens a whole literary field and will be found delightful to expand into several meetings. A roll-call might be answered with famous bons mots from some of the men and women to be studied. Sidney Smith, Charles Lamb and others have left many.