Publisher's Synopsis
There are numerous time-honored stories which have become so incorporated intothe literature and thought of our race that a knowledge of them is an indispensablepart of one's education. These stories are of several different classes. To one classbelong the popular fairy tales which have delighted untold generations of children, and will continue to delight them to the end of time. To another class belong thelimited number of fables that have come down to us through many channels fromhoar antiquity. To a third belong the charming stories of olden times that arederived from the literatures of ancient peoples, such as the Greeks and theHebrews. A fourth class includes the half-legendary tales of a distinctly later origin, which have for their subjects certain romantic episodes in the lives of well-knownheroes and famous men, or in the history of a peopl