O Ye Jigs and Juleps!

With the pixiness of Eloise and the innocence of Dennis the Menace, Virginia Cary Hudson was a sprite of ten when she wrote these essays for a very understanding teacher at the Episcopal boarding school she was attending in 1904. With over 1 million copies sold, this humorous collection of small-town Americana has become a modern-day classic, celebrating the honesty and charm of a child's world at the turn of the century. On Moses: "I got so tired of Moses walking forty years and never getting to where he was going. I sure would have bought myself a mule." On the library: "In the library there are signs. Silence. Mrs. Simons [the librarian] must not know they are there. She talks the whole long day." These naively trouncing concepts of school, church etiquette, and everlasting life are both a child's mischievous collection of impressions and an adult's hilarious comeuppance.