The purpose of this book of short stories of modernAmerican life is twofold.

First, these narratives give an interpretation ofcertain great forces and movements in the life of thisage. All the authors represented are especially qualifiedto describe with force and feeling some phase ofcontemporary life.

Thinking people everywhere realize that it is notenough to place before the pupils in the schools thebare facts in regard to community and national life.The heart must be warmed, the feelings must be stirred,before the will can be aroused to noble action in anygreat movement.

President Wilson has urged school officers to increasematerially the time and attention devoted to instructionbearing directly upon the problems of communityand national life. This was not a plea for the temporaryenlargement of the school programme, appropriatemerely to the period of the war, but a plea for the realizationin public education of the new emphasis whichthe war has given to the ideals of democracy.

The first aim of this book, then, is to help to placeclearly before young people the ideals of Americathrough the medium of literature that will grip theattention and quicken the will to action.

Second, librarians have stated that there are veryfew compilations of modern short stories of interestand significance with which to meet the needs of youngpeople who turn to the libraries for help in reading.

It is hoped that this book may be of real value inthe schools, by clothing the dry bones of civics withsignificant and interesting material, and that it mayalso supply a need of the libraries and the homes fora book of live and valuable short stories.