Peter Spier

Six puppies have fun playing together as they grow into dogs. On heavy board pages.

Pictures different kinds of trucks and describes how some of them are used. On board pages.

Before the dawn of history mankind was engaged in the study of dreaming. The wise man among the ancients was preeminently the interpreter of dreams. The ability to interpret successfully or plausibly was the quickest road to royal favor, as Joseph and Daniel found it to be; failure to give satisfaction in this respect led to banishment from court or death. When a scholar laboriously translates a cuneiform tablet dug up from a Babylonian mound where it has lain buried for five thousand years or more, the chances are that it will turn out either an astrological treatise or a dream book. If the former, we look upon it with some indulgence; if the latter with pure contempt. For we know that the study of the stars, though undertaken for selfish reasons and pursued in the spirit of charlatanry, led at length to physical science, while the study of dreams has proved as unprofitable as the dreaming of them. Out of astrology grew astronomy. Out of oneiromancy has grown - nothing.That at least was substantially true up to the beginning of the present century. Dream books in all languages continued to sell in cheap editions and the interpreters of dreams made a decent or, at any rate, a comfortable living out of the poorer classes. But the psychologist rarely paid attention to dreams except incidentally in his study of imagery, association and the speed of thought. But now a change has come over the spirit of the times. The subject of the significance of dreams, so long ignored, has suddenly become a matter of energetic study and of fiery controversy the world over.The cause of this revival of interest is the new point of view brought forward by Professor Bergson in the paper which is here made accessible to the English-reading public. This is the idea that we can explore the unconscious substratum of our mentality, the storehouse of our memories, by means of dreams, for these memories are by no means inert, but have, as it were, a life and purpose of their own, and strive to rise into consciousness whenever they get a chance, even into the semi-consciousness of a dream. To use Professor Bergson's striking metaphor, our memories are packed away under pressure like steam in a boiler and the dream is their escape valve.That this is more than a mere metaphor has been proved by Professor Freud and others of the Vienna school, who cure cases of hysteria by inducing the patient to give expression to the secret anxieties and emotions which, unknown to him, have been preying upon his mind. The clue to these disturbing thoughts is generally obtained in dreams or similar states of relaxed consciousness. According to the Freudians a dream always means something, but never what it appears to mean. It is symbolic and expresses desires or fears which we refuse ordinarily to admit to consciousness, either because they are painful or because they are repugnant to our moral nature. A watchman is stationed at the gate of consciousness to keep them back, but sometimes these unwelcome intruders slip past him in disguise.

A collection of nursery rhymes illustrated by pictures of the wanderings of two children through towns and places of nineteenth-century Italy.

On a lazy afternoon, two bored brothers keep themselves busy by building and flying an airplane.

Harry and Janet visit a pet store, where they look at the various animals and supplies for sale there. On heavy board pages cut in the shape of the store.

One Saturday morning while their parents are away, the three Noonan children decide to paint the house.

Relates the struggle of the people of Holland since 500 B.C. to reclaim land from the sea using windmills and dikes.

A traveling circus arrives, sets up its village of tents, performs for the crowd, and then moves on again.

"The Toy Shop - A Romantic Story of Lincoln the Man" tells of a bereaved President Lincoln in the midst of civil war. He feels he is failing his country, and doesn't know what to do about it. As he is about to take a walk through the city to meditate over his problems his young son accosts him and asks that he pick up some toy soldiers for him. Lincoln remembers a toy shop he has passed before, and stops in for the soldiers. There he befriends the shop owner, Schotz, an invalid soldier from Napoleon's army. Schotz tells the President his stories of the Great Emperor, and how Napoleon had a way of ensuring unfailing loyalty from his men, walking in and among them. He said Napoleon had a way of just standing, as if he could not be dislodged. From these encounters President Lincoln gleans great pearls of wisdom to aid him in his efforts to pull the country out of civil war. Lincoln and Schotz have many meetings where the two men become friends exchanging 'war' stories together and even finding time to play with the toys.

Chronicles the experiences of a Model T Ford with a series of owners from 1909 to the present day.

On social conditions of poor and Dalits in Maharashtra.

Depicts a day's activities of a hook and ladder company, including putting out a fire, pumping out a basement, and rescuing a cat. On heavy board pages in the shape of a firehouse.

In 1687 young Sietze Hemmes sets in motion the rescue of a floundering ship off the coast of a Dutch island in the North Sea, and three hundred years later similar rescues are still taking place.

Five little rabbits explore their surroundings and find tasty things to eat. On heavy board pages.

Night animals, barnyard animals, polar animals, jungle animals, pond animals, birds, fish, insects... here are over six hundred animals portrayed by Peter Spier in a breathtaking succession of lively, brilliantly-coloured double-page spreads, along with the sound that each animal makes. This book will be a constant source of delight for young children who are just learning to relate the sights and sounds of the world around them to what they see in books.

Describes life in bustling 17th-century New Amsterdam and a woman whose seemingly "crazy" behavior raises an interesting question in light of New York's subsequent development.

Using the sea chanties and rhymes of Mother Goose, an illustrator takes us on sea voyages to many places.