Flow Willie Learned to Read. 63

 

At length, one day, he said to the shoe-
maker—

“Shall I read a little poem to you, Hector?”

“You told me you couldn’t read, Willie.”

“T can now though.”

“ Do then,” said Hector.

Looking for but a small result in such a short
time, he was considerably astonished to find how
well the boy could read; for he not merely gave
the words correctly, but the sentences, which is far
more difficult; that is, he read so that Hector
could understand what the writer meant. It is a
great thing to read well. Few can. Whoever
reads aloud and does not read well, is a sort of
deceiver; for he pretends to introduce one person
to another, while he misrepresents him.

In after life, Willie continued to pay a good deal
of attention not merely to reading for its own sake,
but to reading for the sake of other people, that is,
to reading aloud. As often as he came, in the
course of his own reading, to any verse that he
liked very much, he always read it aloud in order
to teach himself how it ought to be read; doing
his best—first, to make it sound true, that is, to
read it according to the sense; next, to make it
sound beautiful, that is, to read it according to
the measure of the verse and the melody of the
words.

He now read a great deal to Hector. There