A HIGHER HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES FOR SCHOOLS AND ACADEMIES. JOHN S. PRELL SAN FRANCISCO, CAL. HENRY E. CHAMBERS, Author of "A School History of the United States," Etc. NEW ORLEANS: PUBLISHED BY F. F. HANSELL & BRO. PUBLISHED BY F. F. HANSELL & BRO., NEW ORLEANS. CHAMBERS' TWENTY LESSONS IN BOOK-KEEPING. HANSELL'S SCHOOL HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. NICHOLSON'S INTERMEDIATE ARITHMETIC. PRACTICAL SCHOOL RECORD. PRESS OF 1. GRAHAM & SON, NEW ORLEANS. COPYRIGHT F. F. HANSELL & BRO. GIFT ELECTROTYPED BY T. A. SLATTERY & BRO., NEW ORLEANS, PREFACE. E178 C295 EDUC LIBRARY HE preparation of a work whose purpose it is to guide the intelligence TH and shape the thought of the young mind, carries with it a responsibility, the importance of which must be apparent to all. When this work is one upon the history of our country, and one designed to find its way into the hands of the youth of the South, an obligation is attached to this responsibility which in all its sacredness cannot be too fully dwelt upon. In full realization of this the author undertook the preparation of the present volume with some reluctance. He was encouraged to do so, however, by the favorable reception accorded his "School History of the United States,"-a more elementary text-book,-the general introduction of which into southern schools has brought to him innumerable requests that he supplement his earlier volume with one of a more advanced nature. The author is one of an army of teachers whose experience with the average historical text-book has been thoroughly unsatisfactory. Like most of these teachers, who have attained satisfactory results with their history classes, he has had to devise and originate his own methods, to eradicate many erroneous impressions caused by prejudiced statements in earlier published text-books, and to obviate the glaring faults of omission to be found in those published at a later day. The objections to be urged against most of these text-books include both text and arrangement. The former too often comprises a series of events tritely described, interspersed with stereotyped annecdotes, whose antiquity has long ago robbed them of all interest. The latter as often consists of a strictly chrono'ogical arrangement of these events, to master which is no light feat of mental gymnastics. Of historical cause and historical effect little is shown. The student is expected to take a series of abruptly disconnected facts, associate those that bear upon each other, and generalize the whole into definite knowledge of the subject. It is needless to say that the association is seldom made, and that inasmuch as the faculty of generalization is one of the last to reach development in the youthful mind, the generalization is never accomplished unless the faculty receives systematic aid and training during its earlier period of growth. Question a student pursuing his historical studies by means of the average school history, and one will find that not infrequently his conception of the American Revolution, and of the secession of the Southern States, is that the one was a conspiracy, the 137 |