type and large margins (features often considered appropriate only for books for more privileged readers). The stories themselves were also innovative: they emphasized the ordinary lives of ordinary children—"these children climbed trees, played with fire, threw cricket bats at sheep and begged in the streets". The book was adopted by Andrew Bell around 1800 for his Madras system of education and by various educational societies throughout Britain and its colonies; it was even used to educate slaves in Antigua and Jamaica. The proposed "Scripture Lessons" became Trimmer's An Abridgement of Scripture History, consisting of Lessons selected from the Old Testament, for the Use of Schools and Families which was an anthology of selections from the Bible. Like the Charity School Spelling Book, it was adopted throughout the British educational system and was part of school life well into the mid-19th century. In 1798 SPCK published Scripture Catechisms, Part I and II; these works were intended to aid the teacher while the Abridgements (a shorthand name for the Scripture Histories of both the Old and New Testament that Trimmer eventually published) were intended to aid the pupil. The "Exemplary Tales" seem not to have been written exactly as planned but Trimmer's Servant's Friend and Two Farmers fulfilled the purpose she outlined in her plan of publishing pleasurable moral tales. These two books served as Sunday school prizes as well. The Teacher's Assistant was an instruction aid and was also widely adopted throughout British schools. The only texts not published by the SPCK were Trimmer's adaptations and commentaries on the Book of Common Prayer, which she had printed elsewhere. Fabulous Histories Fabulous Histories (later known as The Story of the Robins), Trimmer's most popular work, was first published in 1786, and remained in print until the beginning of the 20th century. It tells the story of two families, a robin family and a human family, who learn to live together congenially. Most importantly, the human children and the baby robins must learn to adopt virtue and to shun vice. For Trimmer, practising kindness to animals as a child would hopefully lead one to "universal benevolence" as an adult. According to Samuel Pickering, Jr., a scholar of 18th-century children's literature, "in its depiction of 18th-century attitudes toward animals, Mrs. Trimmer's Fabulous Histories was the most representative children's book of the period". The text expresses most of the themes that would come to dominate