At first, he thought that he would take the beetle away from Nathan by
force; but he reflected in a moment that this would be wrong, and so
finally he concluded to go and state the case to his mother.
So he rose, and began to walk away, saying,
"Well, Nathan, I mean to go and tell mother, that you won't let me have
my beetle."
Then Nathan, whose conscience secretly reproved him for what he was
doing, pulled the beetle round from behind him, and threw it down upon
the floor, where Rollo had been sitting. This was wrong. It was a very
ill-natured way of giving it up. If he was satisfied that he was wrong,
he ought to have handed it to Rollo pleasantly. Instead of that, he
threw it down, with a sullen look, and sat still.
Then Rollo, thinking that it was now no longer necessary to go and
trouble his mother with the difficulty, began to return. As he came
back, he said, in a kind and soothing tone,
"Now, you are a good boy, Nathan. That is right--to give me back my
beetle. Now I will let you split again, some time."
But Rollo was mistaken in supposing that Nathan was a good boy. Boys are
not good until their _hearts_ are right. When a child has something
which he ought not to have, it is not enough for him to throw it down
upon the floor, sullenly, because he is afraid to have his father or
mother told that he has got it. He ought to give it up pleasantly, and
feel that it is right that he should do so. If Nathan had said to
himself, "I ought not to keep this beetle, for it is not mine--it is
Rollo's; he made it, and he has been kind enough to lend it to me, and
now I ought to be willing to give it back to him pleasantly again;" and
then had given it to him with a pleasant countenance,--that would have
been really being a good boy. But to throw it down in a pet, because he
was afraid to have Rollo complain to his mother, was very far from being
like a good boy.
However, it was very kind in Rollo to speak soothingly and pleasantly to
Nathan; though, if he had reflected how much goodness depends upon the
state of the heart, he would not have supposed that Nathan was yet a
good boy. In fact, when he saw that Rollo was coming back again, and was
not going to his mother, after standing still, looking quite sullen for
a moment, he suddenly stooped down, seized Rollo's knife, and ran off
with it out into the yard.
Rollo instantly pursued him, calling out, "Nathan! bring back my knife;
Nathan! Nathan! give me my knife."
Nathan, however, ran on, though Rollo ran the fastest, and was rapidly
overtaking him; and just at the instant before he reached him, Nathan's
foot tripped; he fell, and as he threw forward his hands to try to save
himself, they came down upon the ground, and his forehead struck the
corner of the knife blade. He immediately screamed out with pain and
terror. Dorothy, alarmed by his cries, came out, took him up in her
arms, and carried him into the house.
She took him to the table, and began to bathe the wounded forehead in
cold water. This was what she always did when the children got cut or
scratched, or hurt in any such way. It prevents inflammation. She saw
that Nathan was not hurt much, though he continued to cry very loud. His
crying was, however, partly from pain, and partly from vexation.
In a few minutes, Rollo's mother came down stairs to see what was the
matter. Rollo thought that his mother might suppose that he had hurt
Nathan, and so he began to explain at once how it happened. But his
mother held up her hand to him, as a signal for him to be silent. She
knew that it was then no time to ascertain the facts.
She came up and looked at Nathan's forehead a moment, and she saw that
it was not much hurt. Besides, she knew, by the sound of Nathan's cries,
that they did not proceed from much pain. She therefore said to him,
gently,
"Stop crying, Nathan!"
Now Nathan knew that his mother did not tell him not to cry, except when
she was sure that he could control himself if he chose to do so; and he
also knew that she punished him if he did not obey. So he began
immediately to repress his sobs and cries, and very soon became still.
She then put a small plaster, of some sort, upon his forehead, and then
carried him up stairs and laid him on the bed.
"There," said she, "Thanny, lie still there a little while, till your
forehead has done aching, and you get pleasant again; then you may get
up, and come to me."
Then she went to her work again, and Rollo came and stood by her side,
and told her the whole story.
"Nathan did wrong," said she; "but it would have been better for you not
to have run after him."
"Why, mother," said Rollo, "he was running away with my knife; and I
can't split at all without my knife. One thing I know,--I shall not let
him split any more with my beetle and wedges."
"That would be one way to treat him," said his mother; "but there is
another thing you might do, if you chose."
"What, mother?" asked Rollo.
"Why, make him a beetle and wedge, for his own."
"Why, mother!" said Rollo, with surprise.
"Yes," said she. "You might make him one. Think how pleased he would be
with it. Then he could sit down with you, and you could both be
splitting together."
"But, seems to me, mother, that that would be rewarding him for being a
naughty boy."
"It would be so, if you were to make him a beetle and wedge, _because he
was a bad boy_; but I proposed that you should make it for another
reason, that is, to _please_ him."
"But perhaps he would _think_ I did it because he ran away with my
knife," said Rollo.
"I don't think there is any danger that he would imagine that you did it
as a reward for that," replied his mother.
Here Rollo paused a moment. He did not feel quite ready to undertake to
make Nathan a beetle and wedges; but he did not know exactly how to
reply to his mother's reasoning. At length he said, in a timid and
hesitating voice,
"But, mother, it seems to me that it would be better to punish Nathan,
rather than reward him, or do any thing which would seem like rewarding
him for acting so."
"That may be true," said his mother. "And it is true, also, that if you
should refuse to let him split wood any more with your wedges, it would
be punishing him; while, on the other hand, if you should make him a
little beetle and wedge of his own, it would be forgiving him. Now I do
not say that he ought not to be punished; but which do you think is
_your_ duty towards him,--you, yourself, being only another child, a few
years older than he,--to punish or to forgive?"
"Why,--to forgive,--I suppose," said Rollo, rather doubtfully.
"I am rather inclined to that opinion, myself," said his mother: "but
you can do just as you please."
Rollo remained some minutes about his mother's chair, not knowing
exactly what to do or say next. He sat down upon the floor, and began to
play with some shreds of cloth which were lying there. Presently, he
looked up and said,
"Mother, what was the reason why you would not let me tell you what was
the matter with Nathan in the kitchen?"
"Because," said she, "he was crying then, and it is no time to learn how
an injury happened, during the excitement of the moment. If you find
Nathan crying out in the yard, for instance, and try to get him to tell
you how he got hurt, you only make him cry the more. Get him quiet
first, and then learn the story afterwards.
"Then, besides the difficulty of his speaking intelligibly," she
continued, "at such a time, boys are very strongly tempted to misrepresent
the facts, during the excitement of the first moments. They are very
likely to be a little vexed or angry, and, under the influence of those
feelings, not to give a correct and honest account. So that it is always
best to put off inquiries till the trouble is all over."
Here Nathan came into the room. His forehead had ceased to give him
pain, and so he had clambered down from the bed where his mother had
placed him, and now came into the room, looking quiet and calm, though
still not very happy.
Rollo went to him, and said, "Come, Nathan, now we will go down stairs
to play again." And he began to lead him down stairs. As they walked
along, Rollo said,
"I am going to make you a beetle and wedge for your own, Nathan, and
then you and I can split together: only, it is not a _reward_, you must
understand. It was wrong for you to keep my beetle, and run away with my
knife, and you are sorry you did so, an't you, Nathan?"
"Yes," said Nathan.
"And you won't do so any more, will you, Nathan?"
"No," said Nathan, "I won't do so any more."
Whether Nathan was really sorry for what he had done, or whether he only
said so because Rollo was going to make him a beetle, is very doubtful;
though it is not impossible that he was a little sorry.
Rollo went down into the shed again with Nathan; and while he was at
work making the new beetle and wedge, he let Nathan use his. The first
piece of board had been split up; so he laid another one before Nathan,
and gave him his beetle and wedges and knife, and then went away out to
the barn to get some more wood for wedges, and an auger.
When he came back, he found Nathan standing at the shed door, with the
little beetle in his hand, waiting for him. As Nathan saw Rollo coming,
he called to him, saying,
"Come, Rollo, come and help me; the board won't split."
"What is the matter with it?" said Rollo.
"I don't know," said Nathan, "only it won't split."
So Rollo went in to see. He found that Nathan had gone to work wrong.
Instead of trying to drive the wedge into the _end_ of the board, so as
to split it _along_ the grain, he had made the cleft with the knife in
the side of the board, and was attempting to drive it in there, as if
he supposed he could split the board _across_ the grain.
"Why, Nathan," said Rollo, "that isn't right. You can't split it
across."
Then he put the wedge into the end, where it ought to be put, and set
Nathan to driving it. _Now_ it began to split at once; though Nathan
could not see why the board should not split one way as well as the
other.
Rollo himself did not understand it very well. Nathan asked him why it
would not split the other way, and he said that that was _across_ the
grain. But when Nathan asked him what he meant by _grain_, he could not
tell.
He took up the wood and examined it, and observed little lines and
ridges, running along in the direction in which it would split; but at
the ends of the board, where it had been sawed across the grain, it was
rough. He determined to ask Jonas about it, or his father.
He then went to work, and made the wedges and a little beetle for
Nathan. He made Nathan's beetle smaller than his own, because Nathan
was not strong enough to strike hard with such a heavy beetle. He did
not get it done in season to use that day; but, the next day, he and
Nathan sat down upon the shed floor, and spent an hour in splitting up
the boards. They split them all up into good, fine kindling wood. Then
they piled the pieces up in a neat pile, and then brought Dorothy out to
see them.
Dorothy seemed very much pleased, and promised the boys that, the next
time she baked pies, she would kindle the fire in the oven with their
kindling wood, and then she would bake them each a little apple
turnover.
* * * * *
That evening, just before Rollo went to bed, he asked Jonas if he could
tell him why boards would only split _along_ the grain.
"Yes," said Jonas, "I think I can tell you. But do you know what the
grain is?"
"No," said Rollo, "I don't know any thing about it."
"You know that boards are made from the stems of tall trees."
"Yes," said Rollo.
"Well, now when trees are growing, there are little channels running up
and down from the roots to the branches."
"What are they for?" said Rollo.
"They are for the sap. The sap flows up and down in them. But then there
are no channels across from one side of the tree to the other, because
there is no sap to go across. The sap all has to go up from the roots to
the branches; and so the channels must all be up and down the tree.
"Now," continued Jonas, "when they cut down the tree, the trunk will
split easily, up and down, the way the channels and fibres all go; but
it won't split easily across. And just so, when they saw it up into
boards, the boards will all split lengthwise, from end to end, for this
is the way the channels and fibres all lie; but it won't split across,
for that would be across all the fibres, and the wood is made very
strong in that direction, and it is well it is so."
"Why?" said Rollo.
"Because, if trees would split across, as easily as they do up and down,
the first good wind would blow down all the forests in the world."
"O, Jonas!" exclaimed Rollo, "all the forests in the world?"
"Yes," replied Jonas, "if the wind blew all over the world."
HOROLOGY.
One day, at eleven o'clock, Rollo, after having put away his books
carefully into his desk, went out to play. It was a calm and pleasant
autumnal day. Brown and yellow leaves were falling from the trees, and
lying about the yard. Rollo found Nathan sitting upon the steps of the
door which looked toward the garden yard. He felt satisfied and happy,
for he had studied his lessons diligently, and, when he saw Nathan, he
concluded to have a little play with him.
"Now, Nathan," said Rollo, "I will lie down upon the steps, and make
believe I am a bear gone to sleep, and you come and poke me with your
stick, and then I will growl at you."
"Well," said Nathan, "I will."
So Rollo laid down upon the steps, putting his arms upon the threshold
of the door for a pillow, and his head upon his arms, and pretended to
be asleep; but he did not look much as if he was asleep, after all, for
he could not look quite sober. He tried to look sober; but there was a
lurking smile upon his face, which made his countenance look quite
different from that of a bear. Nathan came creeping along softly, and
when he got near enough, he began to poke him with the end of his little
whip-handle; then Rollo would start up and begin to growl, when Nathan
would scamper away, shouting with laughter, Rollo after him, upon
all-fours.
This play lasted several minutes, until at length Nathan spoiled it by
punching Rollo too hard with his whip-handle. A great many plays are
spoiled by roughness on the part of some who are engaged. Rollo, being
hurt a little, got out of patience. He ought to have asked Nathan,
pleasantly, not to punch him so hard. Instead of that, however, he
declared that he would not play any more, and got up and went away.
Nathan followed him, lashing the ground and the leaves with his whip.
They both went into a corner of the yard, where Rollo used to have his
sand-garden. This sand-garden was made of clean sand, which Rollo and
his cousin James once wheeled up from the brook; and then, after they
had smoothed it out, and raked it over, they used to get plants and
flowers, without any roots, and stick down, and then call it their
garden. They used to water the plants, and so they could keep them green
and bright for several days, which was long enough for them; for, after
that, they generally preferred putting down fresh ones. But, now, the
sand-garden had been for a long time neglected. The remains of some of
the old plants were there, withered and dried, and the leaves of autumn
were scattered over its surface.
Rollo began to rake off the leaves with his fingers, and then sat down,
and went to digging a hole in the sand. It was very dry upon the top,
but on digging down a little way, he found it damp, and so it would hold
together pretty well, and he could pat it into any shape. A load of
clean sand makes a very good place for children to play in, in a corner
of a yard.
Rollo sat down on one side of the sand-garden, and Nathan on the other,
and both busied themselves in digging and building little houses. They
both became very much interested, and sat some time very still, until,
at length, Rollo looked around to see what Nathan might be doing.
"What are you doing, Thanny?" said he.
"O, I'm making the sand run down through."
Rollo observed that Nathan had an old tin dipper, which he was holding
up in one hand, and putting some dry sand into it with the other. There
was a very small hole in the bottom of the dipper, for it was an old one
which had been worn out and thrown away; and the sand ran out of this
little hole in a fine stream, and it was this which interested Nathan so
much.
"O, Nathan," said Rollo, "let me have the dipper."
"No," said Nathan, "I want it myself."
Rollo would not take it away from Nathan, though he wanted it very much
indeed.
"Yes, Nathan," said he, "let me have the dipper, and I will make you an
hour-glass out of it."
But Nathan said, "No, no," and moved away a little farther.
Rollo then remembered that such a little boy was generally not
interested in any one thing very long, and that, if he should let Nathan
alone, he would soon put the dipper down, and then he could have it
without any difficulty. So he went on making houses in the sand, and in
a few minutes Nathan put the dipper down. Then, soon after, Rollo took
it up and put some dry sand into it, and he found that the sand would
run very smoothly, in a fine stream, through a small hole there was in
the bottom of it.
He determined to make an hour-glass of it. He had seen an hour-glass at
his uncle George's. It was made of glass, big at the bottom and at the
top, and narrow in the middle between the two. Through the narrow part
in the middle, there was a very small hole, to let the sand run down
through; and there was just sand enough put in to run through in an
hour. So that, if a person should set the sand to running, he would know
when an hour had expired, by observing when the sand had all run
through.
Rollo thought that he could make an hour-glass; and he thought it would
be a great convenience to him to have an hour-glass in the yard;
because it often happened, when he came out to play, that his mother
would tell him that he might stay out an hour; and then he had to go in
very often to look at the clock, in order to know exactly when the hour
had expired.
There were, however, so many little sticks and old leaves in the sand,
that it kept getting continually clogged up, and at last Rollo began to
get discouraged. He tried to pick out the little sticks; but he found he
could not do that, and at last it occurred to him that probably Dorothy
had some sand in the house that was cleaner.
He accordingly went in and asked her. She told him that he must wash his
own sand, and that would make it clean.
"But haven't you got some that is clean already?" said he.
"Yes," said Dorothy; "but you will like your hour-glass better if you
make it all yourself."
So Dorothy told him how to wash sand, for Rollo said that he did not
know. She said he must put a little in a basin, and then pump water into
it. "When the basin is nearly full of water, you must stir it round,
and then pour off the water, and pump in more;--do this until the water
comes off clear."
So Rollo took the basin which Dorothy gave him, and went out to his
sand-garden, and put in a little sand. Then he went to the pump, and
pumped water into it. Then he stirred it about with his hand. The water
immediately became very turbid, and a great many little sticks and
leaves came floating up to the surface. Rollo was surprised to find how
rapidly the water separated the light things which would float upon the
top, from the heavy sand which would sink to the bottom. He kept pouring
off the water, and pumping in more, until at length no more sticks and
leaves came off, and the water appeared pretty clear. Then he carried
the sand away, and spread it out upon a clean board in the sun to dry.
While he was thus at work preparing the sand for his hour-glass, Jonas
happened to come by, and asked Rollo what he was doing. Rollo told him
that he was making an hour-glass. Jonas looked on for a few minutes, and
then he told Rollo that he thought that was a pretty good plan. "And
_I_ am going to have a time-keeper, too," said he.
"Are you?" said Rollo. "What?"
"I am going to make a dial," said he.
"A dial!" said Rollo; "what, a real dial?"
Rollo had an idea that a dial was exceedingly complicated and difficult
to make, or to understand; and, in fact, it is difficult to make one
that shall be exact in its indications. He did not think it possible
that Jonas could make one.
"Yes," said Jonas, "a real dial; and I have got a noon mark already."
"A noon mark!" said Rollo; "what is a noon mark?"
"It is a mark to show when it is exactly twelve o'clock."
"Let me go and see it," said Rollo, "while my sand is drying."
Rollo followed Jonas off into the barn, and when there, Jonas pointed to
a small line which he had cut with his penknife upon the barn floor. It
began at the foot of one of the posts, by the side of the door, and
extended back into the barn exactly straight.
"Is that the noon mark?" said Rollo. He was surprised to see that a
noon mark was nothing but a cut with a penknife upon a barn floor.
"Yes," said Jonas; "that is a meridian."
"A meridian!" said Rollo, looking upon it with an air of great curiosity
and respect.
"Yes," said Jonas; "a line drawn exactly north and south, is called a
meridian line; and that is exactly north and south."
"What do you call it a noon mark for?" said Rollo.
"Because," said Jonas, "the shadow of the edge of the door post will
always be exactly upon it at noon. So that I can always tell now when it
is noon, by the shadow of the post upon my noon mark, if the sun
shines."
All this was very new and very curious to Rollo. He had never seen or
heard of a noon mark before; and it seemed to him a very simple and
beautiful way of knowing when it was noon. He asked Jonas how he found
out about it, and Jonas told him that he had been reading about it in a
book on astronomy.
"Your father let me have the book," said he; "and see my chalk marks for
the sun's shadow."
Rollo looked, and found that Jonas had put down quite a number of chalk
marks along in a line, where they had first began to mark the place
where the shadow of the door reached into. Rollo and Lucy had forgotten
all about their plan of making such a series of observations; but Jonas
had gone on regularly, making a mark every Monday, at noon, precisely.
As the sun, at that season of the year, was going round farther and
farther to the south every week, it shone in farther and farther upon
the floor, so that each chalk mark was farther in than the one made the
week before.
In order to make his marks at the right time, Jonas wanted to know,
every Monday, when it was precisely twelve o'clock, and this led him to
make his noon mark, having seen the account of it in the book which
Rollo's father had lent him. He learned there that the shadows of all
upright objects are cast exactly north at twelve o'clock, or rather very
nearly north; near enough for his purposes. Now, as the post of the barn
door was upright, he knew that the shadow of it would be in the north
and south line at noon. Of course, if he had a north and south line, or
a meridian line, as it was called in the book, drawn upon the floor, he
knew that he could tell when it was noon, by the shadow of the post
coming then exactly upon that line. He explained this all to Rollo, and
Rollo was very much pleased with it indeed. He determined to have a noon
line somewhere in the house.
Rollo asked Jonas what was the way to draw a noon line. Jonas told him
that there were several ways. One way, he said, was to observe some day,
by the clock, when it was exactly noon, and then to mark, upon the barn
floor, the line where the shadow of the edge of the post fell precisely
at that moment. Another way was to get a compass needle, and put it down
upon the floor, and then draw a north and south line precisely in the
direction that the needle indicated. That would, of course, be a north
and south line, because the compass needle always pointed north and
south. He said that he adopted both these methods to make his noon line.
First, he got a compass needle, which Rollo's father had lent him, and
put that down upon the barn floor just at the foot of the door post, and
observed the direction; and he also noticed when it was twelve, by the
clock in the house, and he found that, when it was twelve by the clock,
the shadow of the post came exactly to the line indicated by the
direction of the compass needle; and so he knew that that was a correct
meridian line.
JONAS'S DIAL.
That evening, Rollo told his father about his hour-glass, and also about
Jonas's noon line. His father said it was very difficult to draw a
meridian line.
"O no, father," said Rollo; "Jonas has drawn one, and he told me how,
and it was a very easy way."