McGuffey's Readers · Sixth Reader · revised edition
The last and fullest McGuffey reader: an opening course in elocution, then 138 selections by great English and American writers, with author notes, definitions and notes, for students about 13 and up. Every lesson has a guide you can follow step by step, with the right page of the book beside it.
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The book's opening course in reading aloud: articulation, inflection, accent and emphasis, reading verse, the voice and gesture. Optional, and good as short warm-ups. Lessons 1–6.
A comic anecdote, descriptions of dawn and storm, Johnson on putting off our plans, a story of Durer's pupil, and the first poems and short selections. Lessons 7–18.
The death of Little Nell, Gray's Elegy, "give me liberty, or give me death," and essays on tact, debt and the memory of the founders. Lessons 19–30.
Napoleon, war and peace, the great parliamentary debates of Walpole and Pitt, Scott and Shakespeare, and Paul on Mars Hill. Lessons 31–42.
Wolsey's fall, Marmion and Douglas, the Covenanters at worship, Irving on Columbus, psalms and poems of faith, and a comic Virginia parson. Lessons 43–54.
Ivanhoe's siege, the Greek patriots of Halleck and Byron, Lochiel, Goldsmith and Mackenzie, Rienzi, the Pilgrims and the Puritans, and a ride on a snow-plow. Lessons 55–66.
Shakespeare's quarrel scene, a comic quack, Rip Van Winkle's return, Holmes and Irving, Jefferson on toleration, and Hayne's speech for South Carolina. Lessons 67–76.
Webster's great reply, Longfellow, Hood, Bryant's Thanatopsis, Hazlitt, Antony's funeral speech, Prescott, Howells and Addison. Lessons 77–87.
Jupiter and Ten, a comic scene, Cowper and Milton, an evening surprise, The Barefoot Boy, Leigh Hunt, Othello and Henry IV, Starved Rock and Bacon's Studies. Lessons 88–98.
The fall of Granada, Hamlet's soliloquy, Ginevra, Calhoun, Enoch Arden, Lochinvar, Webster's two great speeches, a new Colorado town and Tyndall on the sun. Lessons 99–109.
Franklin's talk, Clarence's dream, Dana at sea, Macaulay and Burke on India, The Raven, Rome's Colosseum, The Bridge, science, Poland and labor. Lessons 110–120.
A buried city, Holmes, Byron's storm and Waterloo, Blackstone, Opie's brains, a New England pastor, Absalom, the Dark Day, Yosemite, Longfellow and young Franklin. Lessons 121–132.
Bryant's water-fowl, Thackeray, Cato, two portraits of Washington, The Solitary Reaper, Emerson, Pope, Marion, Timrod, a reading plan and Coleridge's hymn. Lessons 133–144.
The most advanced book: essays, speeches, stories and poems from great writers in English, with notes on each author. Many families use it as a high-school literature reader.
Scanned from a University of Alberta copy.
Lesson numbers match the book's Roman numerals: Lesson 3 is the book's Lesson III. The guides are written for this site; the book is in the public domain.