Howard Pyle, a chronicle by Charles D. Abbott, with an introduction by N. C. Wyeth and many illustrations from Howard Pyle's works.

THE MIDDLE AGES
action. It is the story of the adventures of a brave little
fellow, living in the strenuous times of the baronial robbers
who made the Rhineland a place of terror. Little Otto
suffers nobly from the effects of the warfare between his
father and a neighboring baron. Through it all he is unspoiled, he remains sweet and kindly. As a character, he is
drawn with a precision of touch that cannot be equaled even
in Robin Hood; he is a real child and one that unfailingly
attracts the sympathy of other children. The impression
which this story made is admirably shown in a letter from
Hjalmar H. Boyesen,1 dated January 12, 1889:
"it.0..There is a note in your book-strong, wholesome,
and sympathetic-far removed from sentimentality--but
vibrating with true sentiment-in short it is a lovely book.
The scene on the bridge where Baron Konrad calls out to
his enemy Baron Henry: 'You were brave enough to cut
off the hand of a little child; are you now brave enough to
meet his father?' (or words to that effect) thrilled my
boys. They shed a few furtive tears; and I am not sure
but that their papa kept them company. It has the true
dramatic ringi it is strong, self-restrained art.
"To me the illustrations seem marvelously done by a
kind of historic second sight--or artistic divination-I don't
know which. I know no children's book which I have
enjoyed half so much....."
It is particularly of the drawings of this book and their
Diireresque qualities that Joseph Pennell speaks so enthusiastically in his Pen Drawuing and Pen Draughtsmen:
"The most superficial comparison of Pyle's composition
" The Norwegian-American novelist and litterateur, author of Falconberg,
Goethe and Schiller, etc.
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