Excerpt from The First Greek Book

Since the publication of my Beginner's Greek Book in 1892, I have from time to time had letters from teachers in different parts of the country, who have informed me that the Beginner's Book, because of its length, was not well adapted for use in the schools in which they taught, and who have urged me to prepare a briefer book on the same plan. They wished a book, they said, which could be completed in two terms, and which would properly prepare their pupils for the rapid but exact reading of a book of the Anabasis during the last third of the year.

The First Greek Book is an attempt to meet this reasonable request. I am aware that it is impossible that any elementary book should be equally well adapted to the needs of all schools but I have at least succeeded in making this book briefer than its immediate predecessor. In writing it I have aimed to give, first, only such fundamental facts of Greek grammar as the young pupil must know before he can begin to read the connected narrative of Xenophon intelligently and with pleasure, and secondly, a moderate amount of practice, both in reading and in writing, in the application of these principles. I have entirely excluded from the eighty lessons into which the First Greek Book is divided the Attic second declension, the systematic treatment of the affinity of words, word lists, word groups, the principles of word formation, and the divi sion of verbs into eight classes, although provision is made for the study of some of these important matters, if the teacher finds the time for it, in the materials furnished in the Appendix. Further.

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