80 STORIES OF COLONIAL CHILDREN.

work-boxes and learned to sew, while the
boys did hard sums in the big arithmetic.
There was no need for girls to learn very
miuchies these. early. people thought 9%
little reading and writing, and a great deal
of spinning and sewing, was what was _ best
for them.

And as the teacher herself did not
know very much, she, of course, could teach
the boys only while they were quite small. —

Their letters, their songs and their verses,
they learned from an odd _ little book, called
“The New England Primer.” It was illustra-
ted with small woodcuts, one for every letter
of the alphabet, These were placed up and
down the pages, each with its couplet at the
right. All the children in all the colonies
used the same book. Here are some of

the pages from which they learned their letters :