Dear power nappers,
On Saturday, David and I headed to the vertical Long Island—that is, New Jersey—to meet my new nephew Sammy, a beautiful little boy who has the eyes of his father (my brother), the ears of his mother, and the sleep patterns of a lazy-scholar-to-be: he spent the majority of our visit napping, waking up only to say hello and to eat.
So in honor of Sammy, I bring you today the marvelous Baldwin Library of Children’s Literature, courtesy of the University of Florida. The digital archive includes over 5000 books from the early 1700s to the present, including Baby’s Rhyme Book, from 1886, which starts out with the rousing tale “Kit-ty’s Day”: “9 A.M. Hungry, and tired of waiting for those people who will not come down; so I am obliged to help myself. Cream not so thick as it ought to be, but I do not complain.” Though if any book deserves a reissue, it’s the handsomely illustrated Jolly Animal ABC (1888), which features a fiddling pig and a truly relaxed hare.
Far less kid-friendly today is the 1876 book Simple Addition by a Little Nigger, published in New York, which follows an ever-increasing number of black children as they get into trouble.
For Sammy’s sake, when choosing children’s books for bedtime, I’ll stick to clever fauna, like this finely-dressed specimen from Palmer Cox’s Funny Animals.
Sleep well little ones!
Sartorially yours,
Stephen
The Lazy Scholar 