I devoured this series by Mr. Burgess. It featured different animals solving problems together and learning to live with each other. What a metaphor! I remember being saddened by his passing in 1963 as young child. ( )

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Michael Hague AND Thornton W. Burgess...What a Treat!, April 5, 2003


"All the Merry Little Breezes of Old Mother West Wind were hurrying over the Green Meadows. Some flew this way and some ran that way and some danced the other way. You see, Jerry Muskrat had asked them to carry his invitations to a party at the Big Rock in the Smiling Pool." Originally published in 1910, the Old Mother West Wind Stories of Thornton W. Burgess are brimming with just this type of endearing and whimsical imagery. They are quaint but clever, sensitive and fun-filled. This lovely book contains sixteen stories featuring many charming woodland characters such as Tommy Trout, Mrs. Redwing, the Willful Little Breeze, Billy Mink, and Little Joe Otter. Burgess was a dedicated conservationist and these stories were intended to instill an abiding love of Nature and wildlife in small children. They do a wonderful job of it and Burgess would be delighted, as I am, in this edition's beautiful illustrations that are the work of the talented Michael Hague. The first illustration in the book, featuring Old Mother West Wind in her flowing grey and blue gown and her long flowing hooded cape, is worth the price of the entire book in and of itself. We have come to expect great things from Hague but he outdoes himself in this book. I'm glad to see these wonderful stories available to another generation of children. Their gentle pastoral nature really is timeless and the less our world sees of natural habitat and woodland creatures the more we need this book. Treat yourself and you children to it. It's one of my favorites. ( )

These cute stories were written one by one by Thornton W. Burgess for his son and later published. In them we meet a cast of animal characters with very particular personalities, and of course "Old Mother West Wind" and her children, the merry little breezes. These stories range from silly stories to fables and legends (such as the race of the tortoise and the hare and why the skunk is striped). They're a little out of date, but children should enjoy them anyway. ( )