Not Bedtime Reading

This is the old children's book I bought at the consignment shop, the one from which I have been scanning illustrations.  The only color in the book is on the cover, and what lurid color it is!  I have digitally repaired a few tears to show a better approximation of what it must have originally looked like.  I cannot imagine that any publisher of children's books would put such a bloody image on a cover, or anywhere.  Were children of earlier times made of sturdier emotional stuff?  Were they less prone to nightmares?  Tastes change, I suppose.  Perhaps the publishers saw this side-show style painting as emblematic of adventure.  

This is the postcard I assembled while sorting through my paper folders.  The sheep are at a Shaker farm, and the hand is from an old ad for Remington typewriters.  The sheet music is from something I vowed never to play again.  That hand is elegant, but also reminiscent of the nightmare scene in Carrie.  I have a friend whose parents, while watching that scene in a dark movie theater, were holding hands.  When her father jumped in startled terror, he sprained his wife's wrist.  The hand also reminds me of a tree. 

Maybe I should just go paint a vase of daffodils...