LESSON 1. 
THE JAPANESE EMPIRE 
The Japanese Empire consists of Japan itself, the island of Formosa (or Taiwan) lying in the south near China, Korea (or Chosen [Tyosen]) on the continent of Asia, the southern half of Saghalien (or Karafuto [Karahuto]), the Kurile Islands in the far north, Dairen in Manchuria, and a large number of islands in the western Pacific.
Japan itself consists of the Main Island, called Honshu [Honsyu], Kyushu [Kyusyu] and Shikoku [Sikoku] to the south, and the northern island of Hokkaido, and a large number of smaller islands.  On the east side of the islands of Japan, is the Pacific Ocean; on the other side is the Sea of Japan. 
The capital is Tokyo, an enormous city lying on the shore of Tokyo Bay at the edge of the great plain of Musashi [Musasi]. Before 1868 (eighteen sixty-eight), the Imperial capital was Kyoto, and Tokyo (then called Yedo) was the capital of the Tokugawa Shoguns, who had their castle there. 
The most famous road in Japan goes from Tokyo to Kyoto, and is called the Tokaido, or the Road of the Eastern Coast. In the days of the Shoguns, the great Daimyos passed along this road on their way to and from Tokyo.  It passes near Yokohama, through Odawara, over the Hakone mountains, down to Shidzuoka [Siduoka], along to Nagoya, and at Maibara comes to the beautiful Lake Biwa.  Along the shore of this lake, the road passes through Otsu [Otu].  Here the road leaves the lake and, a few miles further, reaches Kyoto. 
The most beautiful mountain in the world, Mount Fuji [Huzi], is the highest mountain in Japan.  It is an old volcano. Other mountains are Asama near Karuizawa, Aso in Kyushu [Kyusyu], both of which are active volcanoes, and the long line of Japanese Alps.
One of the most beautiful seas in the world is the Inland Sea, between Honshu [Honsyu] and Shikoku [Sikoku], with its hundreds of lovely islands.  
The three places which Japanese people think are the most beautiful are Matsushima [Matusima] near Sendai; Miyajima [Miyazima] on the Inland Sea, and Amanohashidate [Amanohasidate] on the Sea of Japan, but foreigners are particularly fond of Nikko and Nara with their temples and shrines, and Hakone with its mountains, valleys and lake. 
Osaka is the most important manufacturing city.  It is often called " The Manchester of Japan."  Just as the great seaport of Yokohama is near Tokyo in the Kwanto, so, in the Kwansai, is the great seaport of Kobe near Osaka. 
About eighty million people live in Japan if we count not only Japan proper but also the other countries in the Empire.  Both the army and the navy are large and perfectly organized.  
The great and wise Emperor Meiji [Meidi] told his people that they must go to all parts of the world to learn about foreign countries and the people that live in them. At the same time, he asked foreigners to come to Japan to teach his people the Western way of doing things. 

LESSON 2. 
FABLES.
A fable is a simple story with a moral.  Children like hearing or reading fables, and they are very useful because they teach us things. 
The first and most famous of all writers of fables was a man called Aesop. He was a Greek, and lived about 2,500 (two thousand five hundred) years ago in Athens. 
You will notice that in fables animals are spoken about as if they were real people, and could talk.  That is why the words he, she, him, her etc. are used instead of it and its. 
Here is one of Aesop's fables.  It is about a clever, bird called a crow.  The moral of this fable is that when a thing seems impossible for us to do, if we think a little and use our intelligence, we may very often find a way of doing the thing.  And it is true that many things which seem difficult are really very easy. 
One day, a crow, who was very tired and thirsty, tried to find some water to drink. 
He looked everywhere, and at last found an old jar which had a little water at the bottom.  But the water was too low in the jar for the crow to reach.  So he tried to knock the jar over, but he was not strong enough to do this, for the jar was very heavy. Then he thought a little, went and picked up some stones, and he dropped them into the jar, one by one.  This made the water rise higher and higher in the jar, until at last it was high enough for the crow to drink as much as he wanted. 
Here is another of Aesop's fables.  It is about a monkey who had good intentions but who did a very silly thing.  Many people are like this monkey.  They mean well and have the best of intentions; but because they do things quickly without thinking, they do harm instead of doing good.  Such friends are worse than enemies. 
There was once an old man living in an Eastern country, who had a monkey. He was very fond of it.  This monkey was very useful because he could frighten the birds from eating the fruit.  He was generally a very clever animal, but sometimes he did things without thinking and was not always very wise. 
One hot afternoon in the Summer, the man was asleep in his chair.  The kind monkey sat by his side to keep the files away from his face.  One fly came and stood on the end of the man's nose; the, monkey quickly sent it off.  Then the fly flew to the man's nose again and the monkey sent it off again.  Then once more the fly came back. This made the monkey so angry that he picked up a large and heavy stone and threw it at the fly.  The stone killed the fly, but it was thrown with such force that it broke the man's nose. 

LESSON 3. 
A CONVERSATION. PART I 
"You seem to be staying at home a good deal these days.  I hardly ever see you. It must be at least a fortnight since I saw you last.  What have you been doing with yourself? "
"What have I been doing with myself?  For the last fortnight I have had very little time for anything except work." 
"Work? I didn't know you had any work to do.  Surely a lazy fellow like you doesn't do any work.  I don't believe you could do any real work even if you tried." 
"Well, you've certainly got a very bad opinion of me, but you're quite mistaken if you think I'm lazy.  I don't like doing unnecessary work, it's true, but I don't mind doing useful work, especially when it's interesting. You're different, I know. You're so fond of work that you prefer work to pleasure even if it isn't necessary for you to do it. 
"Well, you may be right about me.  I often work when I needn't work, and perhaps I prefer work to pleasure.  But I didn't expect to see you change your habits.  It isn't usual for lazy people to become busy people, is it? " 
"I'm not lazy.  I'm not lazy at all.  I never have been lazy.  I don't care for lazy people.  I'm always willing to work.  But I don't care to do useless or needless work." 
"Well, I don't care for useless or needless work myself.  But what work are you doing? Tell me all about it." 
"I'll tell you.  You know there's an Englishman living next door to me." 
"Oh you mean that foreigner who always goes about with a big yellow dog?  I didn't know he was English.  Well what about him? " 
"He's translating a Japanese book into English. " 
"Does he know Japanese? " 
"Of course he does; if he didn't, how could he translate it?  His Japanese pronunciation sounds rather funny, it's true, but he really does know Japanese very well.  One day, about a month ago, he asked me whether I could give him some help." 

LESSON 4. 
A CONVERSATION. PART �U
"So he asked you to give him some help, did he?  What did you answer?" 
"I said I should be very pleased to help him if I could, and so we arranged to start at once." 
"What sort of help does he want? "
"It's like this: As I said just, now, he knows Japanese fairly well, but of course he doesn't always know the exact meaning of words.  So when he comes to a word or a sentence he doesn't quite understand, I explain it to him, and he finds the best English translation." 
"Where do you work?"
"At his house.  We sit in his room upstairs and work together every day for five or six hours.  It's very interesting, and I'm learning more about my own language than I ever learnt before." 
"I expect you're learning a lot of English at the same time.  Is that all you have to do?  You just sit there and give him explanations when he wants them? "
"No, I do a good deal of work for him at home in the evening.  Every day he gives me a list of words and expressions so that I can work at them beforehand.  If you do this sort of work in a hurry, you do it carelessly, and careless work is no good." 
"But nearly all works like that.  You can't do it properly unless you work slowly and carefully.  But I hardly expected to find you a slow and careful worker." 
"You said just now that I was lazy, and now you say you didn't expect to find me a slow worker.  Surely a lazy man's a slow worker." 
"I didn't think it likely that you would be a careful worker anyhow; I thought you would work quickly so as to finish what you might be doing, and then you could be lazy again." 
"I see you're always thinking very bad things about me, but I don't believe you mean what you say." 
"You're right.  I like saying nasty things like that so as to make people angry. I ought not to do so.  It's a bad habit of mine." 
"Well, you had better change your habit as soon as possible.  I don't mind it myself because I'm used to you.  But everybody doesn't know you as well as I do, and if you say things like that, people won't like you. 


LESSON 5. 
CLEVER CHILDREN. 
A long long time ago, according to a Chinese story, a man with an elephant came to a certain village in the middle of China.  This was the first time that the people of this village had seen such a large elephant, and they began to wonder how heavy it was.  But everyone had different ideas about it, each one saying that he was right and that the others were wrong. 
Although they tried to think of a plan by which they could discover the weight, they could not find any, for they had no scales large enough to weigh such a huge animal. 
Just then a little boy, who had been listening to their talk, came forward and said: "I have a plan to find out how much it weighs; please let me try it." 
They laughed to think that a little child could find a plan when they themselves had failed, but they agreed to let him try. 
The child first had the elephant put in a boat.  The weight of the animal of course made the boat sink a little way in the water.  The boy then made a mark on the side, of the boat at the point where the water reached.
Then he had the elephant taken out of the boat, and the water went down to its former level. 
After that, he collected a number of large stones and had them put in the boat, one by one.  The boat began gradually to sink again until at last the water came up to the mark on the side.  This showed that the stones in the boat were of the same weight as that of the elephant. 
It was then quite easy to weigh the stones one by one, and when these weights were added together, the people knew what the weight of the elephant was. 
Here is another Chinese story of a clever child.  
Many many years ago, in a village, there was a huge jar full of water standing in front of a house.  By the side of this a number of children were playing.
Presently one of the children climbed to the top of the jar and looked in.  Suddenly he slipped and fell inside! 
What was to be done?  How could they save the child from drowning?  Nobody had any idea what to do.  Then a clever child brought a large stone and threw it at the jar. This broke the jar, the water rushed out and the child was saved. 


LESSON 6. 
WORLDS IN THE SKY. PART �T. 
The earth that we live on is only one of the many worlds that fly through space. If we want to understand our own world, we must learn about the worlds in the sky, which we can see but cannot visit.  The study of the sun, the stars and the other worlds in space is called astronomy, a word which means the law of the stars. 
Astronomy is a science; it is one of the most wonderful and the oldest of the sciences. The ancient Greeks apparently knew that the earth was a spinning ball that turned round the sun.  Then these things were forgotten, and for many hundreds of years, people thought that the earth was flat and without movement, and that the sun went round it, as it certainly seems to do. 
But about four hundred years ago, a Polish monk called Copernicus found again the truth, that had been lost for nearly 2,000 (two thousand) years, that the earth goes round the sun, and that the other planets, such as Mars and Venus and Jupiter and Saturn, do so too. 
His great Italian follower, Galileo, made use of the telescope.  He found that Venus goes round the sun in a path inside the path of the earth.  He found four of the moons of Jupiter, showing that it was like the earth, which also has a moon. 
Another Italian astronomer named Bruno read and thought about the work of Copernicus. And the idea came to him that the sun -- our sun -- must really be one of the stars. So he saw that if the sun is a star, the stars are suns. 
Men had thought of the earth as the center of all things, with the sun as its servant, and the stars as little points of light in the sky above the earth, and meaning nothing. And then Bruno came and taught that these little bright points were suns, like our own, perhaps much bigger and much more important. 
The universe, then, consists chiefly of an enormous number of stars, certainly one hundred millions.  Of these our sun is just one, neither the biggest nor the brightest, although much more important to us than all the others put together. 
Just as our sun has its planets (of which our earth is one), so may each star have its planets.  And just as we have our moon, so may each of these planets have its moon or moons. 
The whole of our earth is only like a grain of dust when compared with the whole mass of, worlds that we can see in the sky on any fine night.  The earth is quite small when compared with Jupiter, the giant planet, and Jupiter is quite small when compared with the sun, and our sun is a very very small thing when compared with our solar system and with other stars. 

LESSON 7. 
WORLDS IN THE SKY. PART II. 
When we look at the sky, then, we must always remember the meaning of these great differences in size and the great distance between one star and another.  And we must not be deceived, as so many men have been deceived, by the apparently equal size of a planet and a star, or by the apparently equal distance from us of a planet and a star. 
We must remember that the bright points in the sky are of two entirely different kinds.  All except seven of these millions and millions of points are suns, immensely far and immensely large.  But seven of these points, together with the sun and the moon, and the moons of the planets, are parts of our solar system; they belong to our system, they are near neighbors of ours, and have nothing to do with any of the stars among which they seem to be mixed. 
What does our system consist of?  It consists of the sun, the chief member; the eight large planets of which our earth is one; the moons of these planets (including our own moon); a number of minor or smaller planets (some of which are much smaller than Japan or England); and a large number of very small things like stones, which are much too small for us to see except when they are attracted to our earth in the form of what we call "shooting stars." 
The names we have given to the eight large planets, according to their size are: Mercury.  Mars, Venus, the Earth, Uranus, Neptune, Saturn and Jupiter.  But we must not forget those strange things called comets, which also move round the sun and belong to our system.  When astronomers first discover a new small planet -- and hundreds of them are known -- they cannot say whether it is a tiny little planet, perhaps smaller than the islands of Shikoku [Sikoku] or Hirado, or whether it is larger than the sun. But when they discover that it moves in the sky, they know that it is a planet and not a "fixed star."
The difficulty that people have in learning how entirely different a planet like Venus is from a star like Sirius is a difficulty that even astronomers have to consider, because distance deceives us in the comparative importance of things.  If our neighbor next door breaks his leg, we think it more important than if twenty thousand people in China are killed by an earthquake.  When most people read in a newspaper of a murder or a suicide that occurred the day before, they think it more important than the death of Christ or of Socrates. 
We learn from astronomy that a very tiny and unimportant thing may be considered as a very big and important thing. 
We can never know any other of the millions of solar systems as we know our own, but whenever we look at a star we must think of it as Bruno thought of it, and remember that it is probably the sun to other planets, on which there may be beings with an intelligence.  Then, when we fully understand the right idea of the universe and what it is made of, we shall be ready to study some of these wonderful things more closely. 

LESSON 8. 
HOW THE ENGLISH WERE DRIVEN OUT OF SCOTLAND. 
England and Scotland to-day form one country, which we call Great Britain.  But this has not always been the case.  A little over six hundred years ago, Scotland was an independent country. 
Edward �T (Edward the First) was the King of England at that time, and he wanted to be King of Scotland as well.  Now it happened that the young Queen of Scotland died.  Edward I was asked to decide which of two men was to be the new King.  On finding that one of them.  John Balliol, would obey him if he made him King, he decided in his favor. 
But after a time, Balliol did not obey Edward I as he had promised, so that he was driven from the capital.  After that, Edward I tried to rule over Scotland with English soldiers and officials, and to force the Scots consider him as their King.  But the Scottish people did not like this, so a brave Scot, called William Wallace, collected an army to fight against the English.  He fought so well and bravely that the English were driven out of Scotland. 
On hearing this, Edward I came himself at the head of an army against Wallace.  But this time, the English army was too strong for Wallace, and the Scots were defeated.  Wallace, however, still fought against the English, until one day, one of his soldiers betrayed him to the English; he was taken prisoner, and put to death at London. 
Soon after, Edward I died, and his son, Edward �U (Edward the Second), became King. The Scots, with Robert Bruce as their leader and King, tried again to drive the English out of their country.  Bruce fought battle after battle against the English, but was defeated every time. 
In the year 1314 (thirteen-fourteen) he got ready once again to make Scotland independent. 
He collected an army once more and waited for the English at a place called Bannockburn.  The English army, twice as large as his, with King Edward 11 at its head, came forward to the attack.  Bruce and his army stood like a wall, and fought with such bravery that the English had to stop, and were defeated with great loss.  King Edward was forced to go back to England, and made no further attempt to fight against the Scots. 
Thanks to the success and bravery of Bruce and his followers, Scotland thus became once more an independent and happy country under "good King Robert" as he was called by his people. 

LESSON 9. 
MORE FABLES. 
Here are two more of Aesop's fables.  The first is about a dove and an ant.  It has two morals.  The first one tells us that we are rewarded for our kind actions.  The other one teaches us that we may get help from those who are much smaller and weaker than ourselves. 
On a hot day in June, an ant went to a stream to drink, but by accident fell in and was on the point of drowning.  
A dove, who was sitting on a tree quite near, saw the ant fall.  Wishing to sate the ant, she threw a leaf down into the stream.  The ant caught hold of the leaf and was brought safely to the land.  He was so glad at being saved from drowning that he resolved to reward the dove if ever he had an opportunity of doing so. 
A few days after this, the ant saw a man getting ready to shoot the dove.  The ant ran up to him and stung him on the foot.  He was just in time, because the pain of the sting made the man jump, so that he couldn't take a careful aim and didn't shoot straight.  Then of course the dove was able to fly away in safety.  Afterwards she thanked the ant for his kind and clever action. 
The next fable, about a fox and a crow, shows us that it is not wise to listen to people who flatter us, and that vanity is a foolish thing. 
A hungry fox once saw a crow sitting on a tree with a piece of cheese in her beak. "What a pretty bird you are!" said the fox.  "You are the prettiest crow I have ever seen.  I wish you would sing me a song.  A bird with such lovely feathers always has a beautiful voice, and it is a very long time since I heard any good music." 
The silly crow was so proud at being asked to sing that she opened her beak to do so and, of course, the piece of cheese fell to the ground. 
The clever fox picked it up at once, and said to himself as he went away to eat it: 
"I said that the crow was beautiful, but I didn't say that she was wise."

LESSON 10. 
THE FAN TARGET.
This is a famous story from history known to every Japanese child. 
During the great war between the armies of Minamoto and Taira, the Minamoto soldiers, once found themselves on the coast of Shikoku [Sikoku] at a place called Yashima [Yasima].  The soldiers of the Taira army, on their boats, were a short way from the land. 
Suddenly from the Taira side came a boat towards the shore.  On this boat was seen a pole to the top of which a red fan had been fixed.  At the foot of the pole was standing a court lady as if to challenge the Minamoto soldiers to shoot at the fan. 
The boat was rocking up and down on the waves and the fan was being blown round and round by the wind.  It seemed almost impossible for the cleverest archer to hit it at the first shot. 
Yoshitsune [Yositune], the Minamoto General, turned to his-men saying: "Is there any one of you who can shoot down that fan ?" 
A soldier came forward and answered: "There is a man here called Yoichi [Yoiti] of Nasu.  He is so clever with his bow that he will shoot down two out of three flying birds." 
Yoshitsune [Yositune] had him called, and Yoichi [Yoiti] was brought before him: "I want you to take your bow and arrow and shoot down that fan," said Yoshitsune [Yositune].  At first Yoichi [Yoiti] asked to be excused; but as Yoshitsune [Yositune] insisted, he at last agreed to try. 
And so Yoichi [Yoiti] got on his horse and rode into the sea resolved to put an end to his life if he did not bring down the fan.  
He raised his bow and looked out to sea.  He saw the boat rocking and the unsteady target.  For a moment he shut his eyes and prayed to the gods for success.  When he opened his eyes again, the fan seemed to be a little steadier.  
He fixed an arrow to his bow, pulled back the string, took careful aim and suddenly let it go.  The fan was hit and flew high up in the air, turned over two or three times and fell upon the waves. 
All those on land, including General Yoshitsune [Yositune], applauded joyfully.  Not only they but even the Taira people as one applauded in admiration of this wonderful shot. 
To-day, nearly everybody who goes to the island of Shikoku [Sikoku] and more especially to Takamatsu [Takamatu] takes the opportunity of visiting the famous place where the honor of Minamoto was saved by the wonderful shot of Yoichi [Yoiti] of Nasu.

LESSON 11.
THE ANCIENT GREEKS.
About 2,500 (two thousand five hundred) years ago, that is to say, about the time that Confucius lived, the most civilized people in the West were the Greeks.  At that time in Greece there were great rulers, philosophers, writers and artists.  It is said that there have never been any buildings so beautiful as the temples of ancient Greece, and that the work of our most famous modem sculptors are inferior to the 
masterpieces of the ancient Greek sculptors.  Indeed, there are some people who declare that if anyone says or thinks of anything very wise or very beautiful, we shall find that there was some Greek who said or thought of exactly the same thing more than 2,000 (two thousand) years ago. 
Plato. Aristotle and Socrates were perhaps the three greatest philosophers that the world has ever seen.  Homer is said to have been that the greatest of all poets.  Then there was Aesop, who wrote the fables that we have been reading.  Demosthenes is said to have been the greatest orator.  The brave Leonidas gave an example of patriotism and courage that the world will never forget. 
Alexander the Great was a Greek so ambitious that he wanted to conquer the whole of the civilized world.  He defeated the Egyptians, the Persians and other peoples and destroyed the armies and cities of those who resisted him.  He persevered in his conquests until he succeeded in realizing his ambition.  He was a successful conqueror but did no good to the world.  He did not succeed in organizing his great Empire, and when he died, this Empire immediately fell to pieces. 
The ancient Greek language was one in which the most abstract thoughts could be expressed in the most beautiful way.  It is said, too, that the Greeks were the first to use a real alphabet for writing. 
It may be interesting for you to know that there are now many Greek words used in English.  Just as the Japanese take Chinese words in order to make new Japanese words, the English often take Greek words to make new English words, especially words used in science.  The word "alphabet" is a Greek word.  It comes from "alpha" (��) and "beta" (��), which are the names of the first two letters in the Greek alphabet.  "Telescope" is a word which comes from two Greek words meaning "far" and "see." 
So when we speak of the greatness of Greece, we must remember that without Greek civilization, to-day there would probably be no Western civilization at all.  In other words, the Western peoples owe their civilization to the Greeks.

LESSON 12. 
ROBERT BRUCE AND THE SPIDER 
You remember reading about the different people who tried to drive the English out of Scotland, and how, after many unsuccessful efforts, Robert Bruce finally succeeded.
Now there is a story told about Robert Bruce, and how he was encouraged to persevere. Bruce had once again fought against the English.  He had been defeated, and had to hide himself in an old hut where he would not be found.  He had lost hope, for it did not seem possible that he could ever succeed. 
As he lay there on a bed of straw feeling very sad and disappointed, he noticed a spider making a web.  To amuse himself, and to see what the spider would do, Bruce broke the web when it was finished.  The spider took no notice of this disaster, but immediately went to work again to make a new web.  Once again Bruce pulled it to pieces; once again, the spider started to work on another web. 
The King began to wonder how long it would be before the spider was discouraged.  He said to himself: "I have been defeated by the English six times, and I am ready to give up fighting.  Will the spider give up building if I destroy the web six times?  If the spider has enough perseverance to try a seventh time, I, too, will persevere, and make one more effort." 
Six times he broke the spider's web.  Taking no notice at all of these disasters, the spider started a seventh web, and finished it successfully.  Encouraged by this example, Bruce made up his mind to try once again to free his country from the English.  He gathered a new army, made his preparations very carefully and very patiently, and, as you know, won the battle of Bannockburn and drove the English out of the country.
Now whenever we feel discouraged about anything, we must follow the example of Bruce, who followed the example of the spider.  The moral of this story is: 
"If at first you don't succeed, try, try, try again." 
If you fail in an examination, you must not let your failure discourage you.  You must not lose heart.  You must be hopeful and full of courage, ready to go to work and to try again.

LESSON 13. 
A RAILWAY JOURNEY. 
"Hallo, here you are!  How long have you been here?" 
"Not long.  Only about two minutes." 
"What's the time?  I'm afraid my watch is wrong." 
"It's exactly eight minutes to nine." 
"Then I'm five minutes fast." 
"Well, it's better than having it slow.  Ah, there's the ticket place open; shall I get your ticket too?" 
"Yes, if you don't mind." 
"Which class?" 
"Oh, second, I suppose." 
"I don't see any reason why we shouldn't go third.  It isn't as if third-class carriages were dirty or uncomfortable.  And it's certainly cheaper traveling third class." 
"Well, yes.  The third-class carriages on this line are certainly clean and comfortable and, as you say, third-class is cheap.  After all, it's no use spending money needlessly." 
"I suppose we'd better not take return tickets, we may want to come back some other way." 
"No, it isn't worth while taking returns; better take single." 
(To booking-clerk) "Two thirds, Green Hill." 
(Booking-clerk) "Return?" 
"No.  Single." 
"Two (shillings) and twopence." 
"Here's your ticket; you owe me one (shilling) and a penny. I suppose this is the side for Green Hill, isn't it?"
"Well, they seem to be all going over to the other side.  I'll ask that porter...... Yes, it's the other platform; we must go across the bridge." 
"I rather like this, having a carriage all to ourselves.  It's almost like having a private car.  Hallo, where's my umbrella?  I must go and look for it." 
"You'd better be quick." 
"Here it is.  I'd left it in the booking-office." 
"Now we're off at last." 
"What do you do with yourself on Sundays as a rule?"  
"Oh, I'm generally too lazy to do anything on Sundays except to sit out in the garden and read." 
"Don't you ever go for a walk?" 
"Very rarely, and when I do, I go out into the country.  I don't care for walking about the streets on a Sunday.  It looks so dull with all the shops shut and nobody about except when the people are coming out of church.  Walking up one street and down another isn't very lively." 
"Here we are.  This is Green Hill." 
"I'm glad to hear it.  Let's get out." 
"What's the matter? " 
"I thought I'd lost my ticket but I had it in my hand all the time, but where are my gloves?" 
"What, have you lost your gloves now?" 
"Yes, I must have left them in the train." 
"Shall we go back for them?" 
"It's too late now.  The train has gone." 
"You're always leaving things behind.  I don't know what you do when you travel with luggage.  I expect you lose half of it." 
"Oh no, that's a different matter.  I never forget luggage; only things like umbrellas or sticks or gloves." 
"Yes, one often does forget one's umbrella or stick; with some people it's a habit. It's a bad habit all the same."

LESSON 14. 
A FABLE WITH SEVERAL MORALS. 
This is one of the best-known of Aesop's fables.  It seems to have several morals. One is that perseverance may be better than skill.  Another is that it is foolish to boast, even if one is very clever at doing something.  Another moral is that it may be foolish to have too much confidence in one's powers.  Another conclusion is that it is not wise to under-estimate the strength of one's rival.
The story also suggests two well-known proverbs.  One of these is "Slow but sure." The other is "Slow and steady wins the race."  
These morals and proverbs may be useful to boys and girls who are trying to win prizes in races or other contests. 
Now here is the story.
A hare laughed at a tortoise one day and said: "You have as many legs as I have, but you can't run nearly so quickly as I can.  Perhaps you can't run at all.  You must have been very badly brought up, and I am surprised that your parents didn't give you a better education." 
"I quite agree," the tortoise answered quietly, "that I can't run very fast.  You can run -- and talk -- very much quicker than I can.  But all the same I don't mind having a five-mile race with you." 
At first the hare was very annoyed.  She thought that the tortoise was very rude and bold to suggest such a thing.  Of course, it seemed as if it was absolutely impossible for the tortoise to win.  But the hare considered the matter for a moment and then said: "Come along, then, but you can't possibly win." 
So it was agreed that they should start at once.  The hare ran a mile m a few moments. "I am sure to win," the hare thought to herself.  "In fact I am quite sure to win. There's no doubt about it wherever; the tortoise has only walked a yard or two.  If I have a short sleep under the shade of this grass, it won't matter in the least; I have plenty of time." 
While the lazy hare was sleeping, the tortoise walked patiently on and on for many hours.  He walked very slowly, it is true, but he never stopped. 
When the evening came, the hare suddenly woke up and she was surprised to find how late it was.  So she began running again as fast as she could.  But when she got to the end of the five miles, she found that the tortoise had already got there a long time before. 
The tortoise had won in spite of the fact that he could not run, and the hare lost on account of her laziness and over-confidence.

LESSON 15. 
HOW AMERICA WAS DISCOVERED. PART I.
Nearly five hundred years ago, in a seaport of Italy called Genoa, a little boy was helping his father to weave wool in his little workshop.  The father's name was Columbus, and the boy's name was Christopher.  But little Christopher Columbus was not fond of this work; he was interested in the big ships coming from or leaving for strange and distant lands.  He would amuse himself by watching them or by making the maps used by sailors, a work at which he soon became very expert.
At last he felt that he could not stay a home any longer, and when he was still quite young, one day he went off to sea.  He made many voyages and gained more and more experience in sailing and navigation. 
It was about this time that astronomer were declaring the earth to be a ball.  This theory interested Columbus very greatly, and he said to himself that if this were true it would be possible to reach India (or the Indies, as the Eastern counties were then called) by sailing to the West!  He was not satisfied with this interesting idea; he made up his mind to realize it by sailing to the West until he came to the Indies, and this became his ambition. 
The trouble was: how could he get the ships and the men?  He first went to England and tried to interest King Henry VII (the seventh) and his Court.  But he received no encouragement from them; his idea seemed so strange that they thought him mad, and they refused to give him any help. 
The idea was received in the same way everywhere, for most people usually laugh at new ideas however good and reasonable they may be.  In the end, however, King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella of Spain came to hear of his plan, and offered him ships and men so that he could try to carry out his proposed voyage. 
Columbus accepted the offer with joy, and in the year 1492 (fourteen ninety-two) he left Spain on this great expedition with three small ships and less than a hundred men.  He sailed to the West and reached the Canary Islands.  These islands were, as people thought, the end of the world, so when he continued to sail further and further to the West, his men got more and more anxious. 
Columbus did his best to reassure them, but in the end they declared that they did not dare go any further.

LESSON 16. 
HOW AMERICA WAS DISCOVERED. PART II. 
Brave Columbus pointed out to his men that the could not be far from land, for birds that were never known to go far from shore were seen about the ships in increasing numbers.  Also pieces of wood evidently carved by men, and a broken branch of a tree were seen floating by.  In the end the discontented men promised to sail three more days, and Columbus promised that if land were not sighted by the end of the three days, he would turn back towards Spain.  He knew it would not be long before they sighted land. 
On the very next day they sighted land!  You can easily imagine how great was the joy of the explorer, and how sorry his men were for their disbelief and for the trouble they had given.  You may imagine, too, their astonishment when, on landing, they saw strange natives with red skins, strange trees, plants and animals such as had never been seen before. 
Columbus gave the name of San Salvador to this island.  Then the three ships sailed further and they next came to the large islands now called Haiti and Cuba.  Columbus had no idea that he had discovered a new continent; he simply thought that he was in an unknown part of the Indies, or even near a country then called Cipangu (the name by which Japan was called in those days).  From that day to this, the Islands discovered by Columbus have been called "The West Indies." 
The explorers then went back to Spain, where they were welcomed by the King and Queen.  What a time of triumph for Columbus!  But neither he nor the King and Queen realized the immense importance of the discovery. 
Columbus then went off on a second voyage, when he discovered many more islands. About five years after this, he landed on the north-east shores of the continent of South America.  About this time a new period of troubles began; indeed Columbus was now to have the worst experience of his whole life.  He had been trying to establish Spanish colonies in these recently discovered lands, but could not rule the rough people who came out as colonists.  They did not like his interference in their way of treating the natives and were perhaps jealous of him. 
So they sent to the King and Queen Spain false reports about him, saying that it was he who was cruel to the natives and it was he who was ruling badly.  The Queen was sorry to hear these stories, and sent out a governor to see what was going on.  This new governor also being a jealous and cruel man, it was not long before he put Columbus into prison and later sent him back to Spain as a prisoner.

LESSON 17
HOW AMERICA WAS DISCOVERED. (Conclusion.) 
And so Columbus came back to Spain.  Besides being a prisoner, he was weak and ill as a result of his hard work and all that he had been obliged to suffer.  You may well imagine that his heart was almost broken. 
When he came before the King and Queen, they scarcely recognized this poor old man with gray hair and an unhappy anxious face. 
He told them his sad story.  He told them of all he had done for the sake of Spain and for the sake of justice.  He had not been unjust or cruel to the natives; on the contrary he had been protecting them from the cruelty and injustice of others. 
The King and Queen listened to his long story and believed it.  They were sorry to hear how badly their brave and faithful servant had been treated.  They promised to give him four more ships so that he could go on another voyage of discovery. 
Columbus was very happy to have this new opportunity, and left Spain in 1501 (fifteen one) to explore more of this new country. 
But this voyage, from first to last, was a very unfortunate one.  He sailed as far as the shores of Central America, but his ships were old and they were no good in bad weather and when the sea was rough. 
He was obliged to turn back towards the island of Haiti, but he was unable to go beyond Jamaica.  Here he had to remain for nearly a year, because his old enemy the wicked governor refused to send him help any earlier. 
Columbus had only one ship left, and even this one was very old and rotten.  With this last remaining ship he was able to return to Spain. 
A short time after this, Queen Isabella died.  King Ferdinand had so much other business to attend to that he forgot Columbus and forgot to reward him for his faithful service. 
Columbus, unhappy and disappointed at this terrible ingratitude, suffering and broken in health, and an old man, died in poverty in 1506 (fifteen six).  He never realized that he had made the most remarkable voyage in the history of the world, and indeed, that he had been fortunate enough to discover a new world. 
On the contrary, he was dissatisfied at not having succeeded in sailing to the Indies by way of the West, which was his original object and ambition.  Columbus was one of those many men who have had to suffer for the sake of knowledge. 
In the meantime, a man named Amerigo Vespucci explored the coast which Columbus had discovered, and found that it was not the coast of India.  "It is a new world" he said.  
For a long time the land had no special name, it was called simply "The New World," but at last it was decided to name it after the man who found that it was not India. It was named America after Amerigo instead of after the name of the man who found it.  America was discovered by Columbus in 1492 (fourteen ninety-two).  It was not named America until 1506 (fifteen six), the year which Columbus died.

LESSON 18. 
HOW ROBIN HOOD BECAME AN OUTLAW. 
This is a story about Robin Hood, who, with his band of archers, lived in the great forests of England about 700 (seven hundred) years ago.  Although they were outlaws and robbers, they were neither cruel nor bad men.  They were bold, brave and loyal fellows.  They robbed the proud nobles, greedy merchants and rich priests, but were very kind to the poor people, and helped all who were in trouble. 
Although Richard the Lion-Heart was King of England at this time, he rarely governed, for most of the time he was fighting in foreign lands, and so the government of his country was left to his cruel brother, Prince John.  
When Robin was a boy, his father, Hugh Fitzooth, was a high official in the service of the King.  He was the head of the King's Foresters, whose duties were to guard the royal, forest of Sherwood and to prevent people from shooting the King's deer.  Young Robin, like the Japanese hero Yoichi (Yoiti) of Nasu, was a very clever archer; he was never happier than when he was practicing with his bow and arrows.  His ambition was to become the chief of the King's Archers.  One of his young friends was a beautiful girl called Marian Fitzwalter, the daughter of the Earl of Huntingdon.  This Earl was an enemy of Hugh Fitzooth, for it was said that Hugh himself was the lawful Earl, and Fitzwalter was afraid of him. 
One day the bad Earl and his friends the Sheriff of Nottingham and the Bishop of Hereford told Prince John that Hugh Fitzooth was disloyal and a traitor.  So Prince John ordered him to be put into prison.  Robin and his mother were driven from their home into the snow and the dark night.  At last they found a new home with Robin's uncle but a short time after, his mother died as the result of her terrible experience.  A year later, his father died in prison.  His uncle was very kind to him, but, as you may imagine, he was very sad and lonely.  He had such pleasant memories of the time when he was so happy living with his parents and friends.  He often wished that he were back in the old days when he was free to go at any time wandering down the valleys or up on the hills or over the broad spaces in the heart of the forest.

LESSON 19. 
HOW ROBIN HOOD BECAME AN OUTLAW. (Conclusion). 
In the meantime, he was growing more and more expert at shooting with his bow and arrows.  His arms were so strong that he could send his arrows almost out of sight, and his aim was so accurate that he could hit almost any target.  It was rare for him to miss a distant mark even when it was very tiny. 
One day when he was walking through the forest on his way to an archery contest, he met the new Head Forester and about a dozen of his men.  This was the man who had so cruelly driven Robin and his mother from their home.  They began laughing at him because he looked too young to be an archer.  Naturally, this made him very angry, and when they kept on laughing, he made up his mind to show them that they were mistaken.  Now at that moment a deer came into sight about a hundred yards away. 
"If I cared to do so, I could send an arrow through the heart of that deer," he said. 
The Head Forester laughed more than ever.  "You could not shoot an arrow half that distance," he said. 
Robin raised his bow, took aim, and a moment later the deer fell dead with an arrow through its heart.  The Foresters were astonished at this wonderful shot.  But at the same time they were very angry, for in those days anybody who killed one of the King's deer was punished with death.  Robin ran for his life.  As he did so, the Head 
Forester took his bow and shot at him, but his foot slipped and, fortunately for Robin, the arrow passed by his head. 
Robin turned, fitted an arrow to his bow, and sent it through the heart of the wicked 
Forester.  Before the other foresters could recover from their astonishment, Robin sprang into the bushes and escaped into the heart of the forest that he loved so well.
He had avenged the death of his parents, but in so doing had become an outlaw.  From now onwards it was natural that the King's officers would do all that was in their power to catch him and to hang him. 
In other stories, we shall see what happened to Robin afterwards, and how he gathered around him a band of outlaws like himself.  We shall read how Robin took the name of Robin Hood, and how he found and married Marian.  We shall read about the curious and amusing adventures and doings of Robin Hood and his Merry Men. 

LESSON 20. 
JOSEPH THE DREAMER. 
This is one of the oldest stories of the Jewish people; It is found in the Bible.  It tells us how a boy was hated by his brothers and sold as a slave to the Egyptians.  Another story, that we shall read later, tells us what happened to the boy afterwards, and how he became one of the chief officers of the King of Egypt. 
Two boys, Joseph and Benjamin, sons of a rich Eastern shepherd, lived in their father's wide tent in the country now called Palestine.  Joseph was about seventeen years of age, tall and strong, Benjamin was a little boy of five, and his brother Joseph loved him very dearly, for their mother was dead. 
The father of the boys, whose name was Jacob, had thousands of sheep and hundreds of camels and cattle, so that he was a very rich man.  He had ten grown-up sons who went about the country feeding the sheep in the valleys and plains. 
Jacob loved Joseph very dearly because the boy had been born when his father was an old man; and that was one reason why his older brothers hated Joseph and did all they could to annoy him.  Perhaps they were afraid that their father would leave all his wealth to his favorite son, and you know that this sort of jealousy sometimes makes quarrels among brothers and sisters. 
Now Jacob showed his special love for Joseph by making him a coat of many colors -- a long coat with stripes of red, green, blue and yellow, with a bright cloth to tie round his body.  Joseph was very proud of this coat, but the others hated both it and him, believing that he would get the best of everything from their father.  But Reuben, the eldest, loved the boy and smiled kindly when he saw the bright coat.
One day the sons of Jacob were all at home cutting down the yellow corn.  Joseph, of course, worked with them, but they were always finding fault with him and trying to annoy him.  He knew, however, that his father loved him, and this made him able to bear their unkindness with patience. 
But at night when Joseph lay down with his little brother on a heap of straw at the back of the tent, he slept and had wonderful dreams.  One night he dreamt that they were all binding sheaves of corn in the fields, and that his brothers' sheaves stood up and bowed down to his sheaf. 
Joseph was so interested in this dream that the next day he told it to his brothers.  He thought that they would be interested too, but he soon knew from their angry faces that they were not pleased at all.  They said: 
"What!  Do you mean that you, one of these days, are going to rule over us? " 
They were jealous of him, and, of course, this did not make them any kinder to the boy.  But Joseph remembered what his father had told him -- that dreams were sometimes messages from God; and he believed that his dream was a message, and that he would be greater than all his brothers. 
His brothers believed in dreams too, and were afraid that what the boy had said might come true, so that they began to hate him all the more.  Joseph often looked at the stars and wondered what they were and who put them there.  One night as he lay asleep in his father's tent he had another dream, and this time it was about the stars.  He dreamt that the sun and the moon and eleven of the largest stars came 
and bowed down to him. 
He told this dream, too, to his angry brothers, as well as to his father.  This time even his father was annoyed with him for his foolish thoughts.  But he had other dreams from time to time, so that his brothers called him "Joseph the Dreamer." 
Now at certain seasons, grass was rather scarce in that part of the country, and at one of these times Jacob sent his sons away with their sheep and cattle to find food for them in a beautiful valley fifty miles away.  Some time passed and the old man began to wonder whether all was well, for he had not received any news from them. 
So he asked Joseph to go to the place where they were, and to take them presents of cheese, butter and wine and other nice things to eat. 
Mounted on a strong camel, with side baskets filled with fresh and dried fruit, corn, and leather bottles containing oil and wine, the young lad, dressed in his favorite coat of many colors, rode away.


LESSON 21. 
JOSEPH THE DREAMER (conclusion). 
Joseph came at last to the valley but could not find his brothers.  He was told by a man that they had gone to a place called Dothan, where there were two wells, and there he found his brothers resting beside the wells.  
"Who is this coming over the hill?" said the brothers.  They wondered who this lonely traveler might be.  As he came near they guessed that it was Joseph. 
"It is the Dreamer!" one said. 
"Let us kill him and throw him into a pit," said another, "and we will say that some wild animal has eaten him." 
But Reuben, the kind brother, would not consent to their hurting the boy.  But he agreed to their putting him into a pit, and he made up his mind that he would come back when it was dark, help him out of the pit and send him home to his father. 
Joseph was so pleased to see his brothers that he shouted with joy, but he was very disappointed when they shouted no answering greeting.  He got off the camel and turned to the nearest of his brothers but received only a frown.  He turned to another in surprise, only to meet with the same cold looks.  He told them what his father had sent, and took out the presents from the bags, giving them the old shepherd's kind messages.  But it was all of no use.  He could not make friends of these dark-bearded men whose faces showed only their bitter hatred towards the young lad who was their brother.  
They caught hold of him roughly, they took off his coat of many colors, and taking him to a deep hole in the ground called a pit, they pushed him in. 
"Let him die there of thirst and hunger," said the cruel brothers, as they turned to eat the good things that the boy had brought them with such joy. 
In the meantime, Reuben had gone away, so as not to see his brother cruelly treated, and now the men were feasting together in silence, for they were by no means happy. 
While they sat at their feast, they saw a string of camels come over the hills and come nearer and nearer across the plain.  Before, long they saw that the travelers were a band of merchants taking slaves to the distant land of Egypt.  Slaves!  That was the very thing and Judah said to his brothers: 
"What shall we gain if we kill our brother?  Let us sell him to these men.  We will not kill him, for, after all, he is our brother." 
So they helped Joseph out of the pit and showed him to the merchants, who saw that he was a good-looking boy, such as would bring a good price in the slave-market in Egypt.  So they bought him, for twenty silver pieces, which they counted out to Judah.
Tied with rope like a dog to his master's camel, Joseph was led away by these merchants on their march to Egypt.  They paid no attention to his cries and tears, for they bought and sold boys and girls as other men bought and sold sheep and cattle, almost every day of their lives. 
When night came on, Reuben came quietly back to the edge of the pit and called his young brother's name.  But he got no answer.  In those days, when Hebrews were overcome with grief they covered their faces and tore their clothes.  Believing that the lad was dead, Reuben tore his clothes in grief, and ran quickly to his brothers' tents, but they hid the truth from him.  They dipped Joseph's coat in the blood of a goat which they had killed, and took it to their father. 
"We have found this," they said. "Tell as whether it is Joseph's coat or not." 
Then the old man knew it at once, and said, "It is my son's coat; some wild animal has eaten him.  Joseph has been torn to pieces."  And in his bitter grief he tore his clothes while his sons and daughters tried in vain to comfort him. 
"I will die," he said, "of grief and sorrow."

LESSON 22
A PANIC.
This Indian story of a stupid hare teaches us how foolish it is to get into a panic.  Some people are just as silly as the hare: they see a sudden light in a moving picture show, or a theatre, and they call out that the place is on fire; they make everybody frightened, and perhaps make a panic.  Such people have too much imagination, and they exaggerate everything. 
A hare lived under a young palm-tree.  One day, he lay down beneath the tree.  Suddenly, a large nut fell on a palm leaf.  The noise startled the hare, and he jumped up crying: 
"This earth is breaking up!"  And without stopping to look round, he ran away as fast as his legs would take him. 
Another hare saw this, and said: "Why are you running so fast?" 
Without even looking back, the hare cried: "The earth is breaking up."  When the second hare heard this, he ran after the other.  Other hares saw these two running, and all joined in the flight until one hundred thousand hares were racing along as fast as they could run. 
The deer, the bears, the wolves and the buffaloes saw them, and asked why they were running.  When they were told that the earth was breaking up, they, too, started running.  The monkeys, the tigers, and the elephants saw these hares dash by, and they, too, joined the group of frightened animals. 
When the lion saw this crowd running by, he roared: 
"What's the matter?  What has frightened you?" 
"The earth is breaking up!" they said. 
The lion said to himself: "I'm sure the earth is not breaking up.  Perhaps someone heard a sound that made him think so.  I must find out what it was.  I must stop this flight or they will all die." 
So he dashed ahead of them, stopped, and roared three times.  They were terribly frightened when they saw the lion, and stopped suddenly in their flight.  The lion walked calmly among them and asked why they were running away.  
"The earth is breaking up," they answered. 
"Who saw it breaking up?" he asked. 
"The elephants know all about it," was the reply. 
He asked the elephants. 
"We don t know," they said: "the tigers know." 
And so it went on until the hares were asked. 
"This one told us," they said, pointing to a particular hare.
"It is true, " said the lion," that the earth is breaking up? " 
"Yes, sir, I saw it," was the answer." 
"Where? " exclaimed the lion.  
"In a grove of palms mixed with nut-trees," said the hare.  "As I was lying under a young palm at the foot of a nut-tree, I heard the earth breaking up, and I ran away."
 "Jump on my back," said the lion to the hare, "and I'll carry you to the place where you heard these dreadful sounds." 
Then he sprang forward carrying the hare and soon reached the palm grove. 
"Now, my friend," he said, "show me the place you meant." 
"I dare not, my lord," was the answer. 
"Come, don't be afraid," said the lion. "It's quite safe." 
"Over there, sir, at the foot of the nut-tree," called the hare, standing a long way off. 
The lion went to the foot of the nut-tree and there, in exactly the same spot where the hare had been lying, he found a ripe nut. 
"The earth is not breaking up here," he said, " but that nut must have fallen on the palm leaf and frightened the hare.  Now I see the cause of all this trouble."
Then with the hare on his back, he ran back to the animals and told them the whole story. 
"It is quite clear that there is no danger," he said "it was merely the noise of a falling nut, but the hare exaggerated the noise and thought the world was breaking up." 
Then he gave the animals some excellent advice. " Don't exaggerate things," he said. "Avoid believing what is merely your imagination.  Avoid believing everything you hear.  The next time you hear of danger, be sure to find out exactly what it is before running away." 
The hare was thoroughly ashamed of his stupidity.

LESSON 23. 
WHAT IS ELECTRICITY? PART I. 
Electricity is perhaps the most powerful and the strangest force in the world; perhaps even the most powerful and strangest force in the whole universe. 
What is electricity? 
That is of course the first question which you will wish to have answered.  It is a most important question, but I am sorry to say that no one really knows.  Many men of science have offered explanations, but they have told us only what they thought electricity might be, and not what it really is. 
It is almost impossible to explain what electricity is in any way except in words which would be understood only by a man of science.  Our knowledge of this subject has all been gained in recent years, and we can find only a rather complicated explanation which cannot really be proved to be true. 
If you want this explanation, I will give it to you in the simplest possible words.
Electricity is the name given to a force which we cannot see, and which is known to us only by the effects it produces.  It appears to exist throughout all space, and modern men of science consider it to consist of immense numbers of very small quantities; each of these quantities is called an electron.  These electrons are not joined together, but are separated from each other. 
Perhaps, however, we really need not concern ourselves with what electricity is, and had better not try to understand, but pass on to some of the wonderful things which this unknown force can do, for much is known about the laws which it obeys. 
We can produce it when we like, and use it so as to make it our servant.  It is easy to push a button or turn a switch and, in so doing, light up a room.  Most trains move by steam, but many of our trains are drawn by electricity.  Many houses are lighted by gas, but probably to-day most houses are lighted by electricity, which is more convenient as well as being cheaper.  With the help of electricity, we can talk to one another when we are separated by many thousands of miles or even to anybody in an aeroplane far away in the sky.  Electricity has increased the strength of man many million times.  A list of the things that this wonderful power can do would be a very very long list. 
The name electricity is also given to that branch of science which tells us about the things that electricity can do and the laws and theories concerning it. 
For a long time, it was thought that there might be different kinds of electricity because it acted in different ways at different times.  It was thought, for instance, that magnetism was a separate subject.  Later discoveries however showed that it is Impossible to separate the two subjects.  Electricity sometimes moves and sometimes stands still and the properties of electricity when it is moving are very different from those of electricity when it is at rest.  Then again, not only does electricity sometimes move, but it moves in different ways.  We may classify it according to its movement under four separate heads, as: 
1. Static Electricity, or electricity at rest. 
2. Magnetism, or electricity which is turning. 
3. Current Electricity, or electricity which is in steady movement. 
4. Electric Waves, or electricity which is vibrating.

LESSON 24. 
WHAT IS ELECTRICITY? (Conclusion.) 
The four branches of electricity spoken about in the last lesson are very closely connected. 
Static electricity was the first known to man and was probably discovered many thousands of years ago, when it was noticed that a piece of amber which has been rubbed has the power of attracting to itself various light bodies as dust, leaves, etc. 
The electricity which is seen on amber is produced by friction or rubbing.  How or why friction produces electricity is hard to explain but all the same a great many substances do make static electricity when rubbed in the right way. 
About the year 1600 (sixteen hundred) an English professor discovered that a very large number of substances, such as diamond, glass, sealing-wax, etc. would produce static electricity when rubbed. 
Magnetism.  In various parts of the world is found a wonderful metal which has the power of attracting to itself pieces of iron.  No one knows who first noticed this power.  It is said that over 2.000 (two thousand) years ago a shepherd named Magnes who lived in Asia Minor found one day that some small hard black stones were clinging to the iron-tipped stick that he was carrying.  So the name of magnet was given to these stones, but for many hundreds of years this substance was of no use. 
It was found later that magnets could be made from steel.  One day it was discovered that if a small straight magnet is floated on water it will always point to the north and the south.  This discovery gave us the compass without which it would be impossible to find our way across the oceans. 
Current Electricity was discovered a little over a hundred years ago by an Italian profess or named Galvani who noticed that the legs of a dead frog would kick and move if the nerves along its body were connected to the leg muscles with a piece of metal.
Another Italian named Volta heard of this and found that the electricity was produced by the metal.  This led to the discovery of the electric cell and the electric battery.  A cell produces enough electric current to work small lights, bells, telegraphic instruments and telephones. 
Electric Waves.  The best-known use of these is in what we call radio.  As you know, we can now send telegrams without wires and, more wonderful still, we can telephone without wires.  Thanks to electric waves, we may listen to speeches, to concerts, to lectures, etc. which are given, even many hundreds of miles away.  The discovery of how electricity may be sent through the air without wires was made by Hertz, and Marconi discovered other things which made wireless or radio telegraphy possible. 
Radio is not only one of the most interesting branches of electricity, but it may become the most important branch.  Perhaps some day we may be able to send electric power without wires in large quantities from any place to any other.  Perhaps one of these days the electric trains of Japan may run with the electric power sent straight through the air from the great waterfalls of Africa or America. 

LESSON 25. 
THE STORY OF ROBINSON CRUSOE. PART I. 
Probably no story is better known all over the world than that of Robinson Crusoe.  It is just as interesting to the Japanese boy or girl as it is to the English boy or girl.  Not only children but also grown-up people love to hear or to read the adventures of the man who spent twenty-three years quite alone on an island. 
But we must remember that it is not a true story.  It was imagined and written about 250 (two hundred and fifty) years ago by an Englishman named Daniel Defoe.  He was the first man to tell a story in such a way as to make people believe it to be true.  Although the adventures of Robinson Crusoe are quite imaginary, they might have happened in real life. 
At the beginning of his story, Robinson Crusoe tells us that his father wanted him to become a lawyer, but that he himself wanted to become a sailor.  His father, a wise and rather stern man, gave him serious advice, telling him that adventures abroad were best fitted either for rough and uneducated men or for men of superior fortune. 
But young Robinson found it impossible to take his father's advice.  Without saying anything to his father or mother, he went away to sea.  A few days later, he had his first experience of a shipwreck, but was rescued, and he made his way to London. 
From here, he made a trading expedition to the African coast, and returned to London again after a voyage in which he gained experience as a sailor and merchant. 
Crusoe then set off on another voyage, but this time he had the misfortune to be taken prisoner by the Moorish pirates off the coast of Morocco, and became the slave of the pirate captain. 
After two years as a slave, he escaped in a small boat together with a faithful Moorish boy named Xury.  They spent a few weeks of sailing along the coast.  During this time they had adventures with wild animals and peaceable natives.  In the end they were rescued by a Portuguese ship bound for Brazil. 
In Brazil, Crusoe was lucky enough to make good friends.  With some of the money that he had left in London two years before, he set up as a planter and trader.  At the end of four years he found himself to be a comparatively rich man. 
But he was dissatisfied, and wished to become richer in as short a time as possible.  So he spoke to his friends the Portuguese merchants about his early voyage to Africa and how easy it was, in exchange for trifles, not only to get ivory, gold, etc., but also slaves for service in their own plantations. 
As a result of this talk, they decided to fit out a ship, in which Crusoe should go to Africa and start trading in the way he had suggested.  
The ship had been sailing only a few days when they were caught in a terrible storm which lasted twelve days.  It was impossible to manage the ship, and in the end it ran upon a sandbank close to an island and began to break to pieces. 
Crusoe with the other men got into a boat with the object of reaching the island.  But this boat was soon upset by the high waves and the men were at once swallowed up by the sea. 
The waves dashed Crusoe against a piece of rock from where he managed to climb up the low cliff where the water could not reach him.  He was the only one saved. 
For twenty-three years he saw no other human being and it was twenty-eight years before he was able to leave the island. 
The greater part of the book tells us how Crusoe found shelter and food, how he built his "castle," how he made his furniture and clothes, and how he taught himself many trades and became expert in doing all sorts of useful things.

LESSON 26. 
THE STORY OF ROBINSON CRUSOE. (Conclusion.) 
Twenty-three years after Robinson Crusoe had landed on the island, a party of savages came to the island to have a cannibal feast.  Crusoe, as you may well imagine, was very frightened, for he thought that they would come and find him, and he would be eaten as well as the prisoners. 
He went up to the top of a hill among the trees where he could not be seen, and watched the savages through his telescope.  He saw one of the prisoners get up and run away.  The others ran after him to fetch him back, but Crusoe managed to rescue him and bring him to safety.  This native became Crusoe's faithful servant, companion and friend.  Crusoe called him " Friday " because it was on a Friday that he had found him.  Crusoe taught him to speak English, and afterwards to read. 
After a few years of this happy life together, Crusoe and Friday saw another party of cannibals land with two prisoners.  They made up their minds to rescue the poor prisoners, and they did so just when the savages were preparing to eat them.  One of these prisoners proved to be Friday's father. The other was a Spanish captain.
This Spaniard with sixteen companions had been shipwrecked on the mainland some time before.  They had been kindly treated by the natives but in a fight against an enemy nation the Spanish captain had been taken prisoner. 
The following year the Spaniard and Friday's father went back to the mainland with the object of bringing over to the island the six-teen other Spaniards.  While they were away, an English ship came in sight.  From this ship a number of men landed near Crusoe's castle.  They brought three prisoners with them. In the evening while the men were sleep, Crusoe crept up to the prisoners and found that they were the officers of the ship.  There had been a mutiny on board. 
Crusoe set the three men free, and after some exciting adventures the captain became master of his ship again.  Shortly after, leaving on the island the men who had led the mutiny, Crusoe, taking Friday with him left the island.  He arrived in England six months later, after an absence of thirty five years. 
From there he went without delay to Lisbon, in Portugal, to find out what had become of his plantations in Brazil.  He soon received good news, for he heard that these had been so well managed that he was now a rich man with a fortune of ��5,000 and an estate worth over ��1, 000 a year. He was then able to reward those friends who had been so kind to him when he was young. 
Returning to England, Crusoe married and settled down on a farm. �@But the old spirit of adventure came over him again, and after his wife died, he started out once more. �@He visited his island again, now a fairly prosperous colony. 
He had many other adventures in China and Russian Tartary. �@Eventually he reached London again after another absence of over ten years.�@"And here," he says, " I resolved to prepare for a longer journey than all these, having lived a life of infinite variety seventy-two years, and learned sufficiently to know the value of retirement and the blessing of ending our days in peace."

LESSON 27. 
ROBIN HOOD AND HIS MERRY MEN. PART I. 
Do you remember reading about Robin, the son of Hugh Fitzooth, about the bad Earl of Huntingdon, and how Robin became an outlaw in the forest of Sherwood? 
Now in this forest there were a number of men who, like himself, had been badly and unjustly treated.  Robin gathered some of these men together and, taking the name of Robin Hood, he became the leader of this band of brave fellows.  They were afraid of nothing, they loved bold and merry adventures, and they lived in the open air among the great trees of the forest. 
They saw no harm in robbing rich nobles, greedy merchants, money lenders, and selfish priests, for such people were, the enemies of the poor.  In this way, Robin and his men lived merrily, helping themselves to the King's deer, playing amusing tricks on proud and selfish people, but always helping those who were poor or in trouble. 
The name of Robin Hood came to be known all over England.  People whom he stopped and robbed told strange stories of how they had been carried far into the forest, given a feast worthy of a king, treated with politeness and kindness, and after having "paid for their entertainment" had been pleasantly led back and set on their road again. 
They told how Robin had dressed all his men in suits of green, how these cheerful fellows sang the old English songs, and how they amused themselves at archery contests and other sports.  They told how one of the members of the band called "Little John" was seven feet tall, how another called "Much" was a very small man, and how a fat and, jolly priest was called "Friar Tuck."  No wonder that the Sheriff of Nottingham, when he heard these stories, made up his mind to catch Robin Hood and put an end to his band.  
The outlaws however were not afraid.  Little John actually became a servant in the house of the Sheriff himself where he played several tricks and finally stole the silver plates and ran off to the forest with them.  Once the outlaws came into Nottingham in disguise to take part in an archery contest, for a prize offered by the Sheriff.  Robin won the prize, but the Sheriff tried to arrest him.  In the fight that followed, Little John was wounded, and the outlaws escaped only with great difficulty, little Much carrying big Little John for some distance on his back. 
One day, Robin met by chance Maid Marian, the beautiful girl friend of his former days.  She had come in search of him, preferring to live with him in the forest than to live at the court of the King.  So Robin blew on his horn to call his men together, and the jolly old fat Friar Tuck came up and married them there under the trees of the forest. 
One day, Robin stopped an unhappy young man named Allan-a-Dale, who told him that after waiting long for a beautiful woman who loved him, he had heard that her greedy and selfish father had promised her in marriage a rich man who was ugly and very old.  The marriage was to take place the next day, and poor Allan-a-Dale was broken-hearted.  Robin advised him what to do and told him to cheer up.  "You may depend upon me," he said, for he was determined to prevent the wedding.  The next day he set off for the church with his merry men following behind.  He arrived at the church at midday, stopped the wedding, blew his horn, and his men, with Allan-a-Dale and Friar Tuck, all came into the church. 
"This bridegroom is unsuitable," said Robin Hood, "he is too old."  He then asked the bride if she could not choose anyone more suitable as a husband.  Of course she was delighted and chose Allan-a-Dale, and then and there Friar Tuck married them.

LESSON 28. 
ROBIN HOOD AND HIS MERRY MEN. (Conclusion.) 
King Richard was absent from England for many years, but when he came back from the wars in Palestine, he came to hear about the doings of Robin Hood and his merry men. 
As he was a brave man himself and fond of adventure, he did not feel angry with the bold outlaw.  He determined to meet him and see what he was like.  And so one day, disguised as a monk, he went alone into Sherwood Forest. After some time, he was captured by the band, who, not knowing who he was, offered him their usual entertainment and feast. 
The King enjoyed himself very much and had a delightful time.  He joined in their games and laughed as heartily as the rest. 
Later he asked them many questions about their way of living and the reasons why they had become outlaws.  He was very interested in their replies and he saw that these men were all thoroughly good fellows. 
At the end of the feast King Richard told them who he was.  Robin Hood and all his men were exceedingly astonished.  They stood up and cried "God save the King" and declared themselves to be his faithful and devoted subjects, and begged forgiveness for their behavior.  The King pardoned them and the next morning returned to Nottingham, where he made known what had happened.  Robin Hood and half of his men were made Royal Archers and guarded the King in London.  Little John, it is said, was made Sheriff of Nottingham, and the rest of them became Royal Foresters. 
But King Richard died, and his cruel and foolish brother John was made King in his place.  The new King had never forgiven the outlaw for rebelling against him, and Robin and his men, in order to escape from his anger, were obliged to go back to the forest and hide themselves again.  They were not sorry, for they loved the freedom of the wild life.  Here they spent many more happy years. 
One day when Robin was an old man, he was taken ill.  He took refuge with a relative of his, an Abbess.  This woman really hated Robin because he had so often robbed the high Church officials and priests.  So, pretending to cure him of his fever, she cut one of his veins and let him bleed.  
Very weak and faint, he blew three notes on his horn.  Little John, who happened to be near, heard the well-known signal and made haste to go to his master.  But it was too late; Robin was dying. 
"Give me my bow," he said.  "I will shoot an arrow for the last time.  Where it falls let my body be buried."  Then he shot the arrow through the window of his room, and exhausted with this effort lay back and died in the arms of his faithful follower.
We do not know how true these stories are about Robin Hood and his men, but for the last 700 (seven hundred) years English children, yes and grown-up people too, have admired Robin Hood as Japanese children admired Yoshitsune.  All we know about him is what we read in the popular songs which have been handed down to us and repeated from generation to generation.  Even if these stories are not true, they are interesting to read, for they tell us what conditions in England were like 700 years ago.


LESSON 29.
THE MERCHANT OF VENICE. PART I. 
The greatest and most celebrated poet and writer of plays that England has ever known was William Shakespeare.  He was born in the year 1564 (fifteen sixty-four) at a place called Stratford.  The house in which he was born is still standing, and thousands of people from all over the world go to visit the place where Shakespeare lived when he was young. 
One day he left Stratford and went to London to be an actor.  We do not know much about his life in London nor how he came to write his wonderful plays.  They are all the more marvelous when we consider that Shakespeare was a self-educated man having had very few years at school and no opportunity for traveling. 
The following story, "The Merchant of Venice," is one of Shakespeare's best-known works. 
In the beautiful city of Venice, in Italy, there lived a rich merchant called Antonio, who was loved and respected by everybody -- except one, a money-lending Jew called Shylock. 
Now this Shylock hated Antonio, for the merchant was always saying nasty things about the Jews, and particularly about Shylock. 
At this time, there was living near Venice at a place called Belmont, a very beautiful and wealthy lady named Portia.  Her father had died a short time previously and had left a most extraordinary will.  Knowing that whoever married his daughter would also gain possession of her huge fortune, he made what he thought was a wise plan.  In his will, he said that whoever wanted to marry his daughter would first of all have to choose one of three caskets.  One of these was made of gold, another of silver, and a third of lead. In one of the three caskets was to be a picture of Portia, and whoever chose this one was to marry her.  Already many admirers of Portia had tried, but none of them had chosen the right one. 
One of Portia's admirers was a handsome and elegant young man called Bassanio, who was a dear friend of Antonio's.  One day he made up his mind to try his fortune with the three caskets for he felt sure that he would be successful. 
But he would have to buy fine clothes, horses and presents, and he could not afford these things, for he was by no means rich.  On previous occasions Antonio had lent him large sums of money, and so without the slightest hesitation he decided to go again to his friend for help. 
Antonio would have been delighted to lend him the money, but at that time he had invested all he possessed in ships with rich cargoes going to different parts of the world.  But Antonio suggested that Bassanio should go to a money-lender and borrow the necessary sum.  He himself would give the security and repay the debt when his ships returned to Venice again. 
As they could think of no one else who had enough money to lend, they went to ask Shylock for the required amount.  
When Shylock heard this, he thought that this would be a splendid chance for revenge on Antonio. 
For some time, Shylock gave no answer, and the two friends imagined that he was going to refuse.  But suddenly, to their surprise he consented not only to lend the money but to lend it without interest.  As for the security, Shylock made a sporting offer, namely that if the debt were not repaid by a certain date, he would have the right to cut off a pound of flesh from any part of Antonio's body. 
Bassanio would not hear of his friend taking such a terrible risk, but Antonio, knowing perfectly well that his ships would be back long before that date, accepted the sporting offer.  He probably wished to show that he was not afraid of Shylock, and sighed the contract just as if it were an ordinary one. 
After a good deal of preparation, Bassanio set out for Belmont, and there he was shown the three caskets.  You can imagine how excited Portia was, for she was as anxious for Bassanio to choose the right one as he was himself. 
He first of all came to the casket made of gold, but he considered this as being too showy, and turned to the silver one.  But he considered silver to be too suggestive of commerce and turned away from this one.  He then saw the casket of lead, and stood looking at it for a few minutes.  Admiring its simplicity, he chose it and raised the lid.  To Bassanio's great joy, and to Portia's relief, he found inside a picture of her with words that proved that he had chosen rightly. 

LESSON 30. 
THE MERCHANT OF VENICE. (Conclusion.) 
During this time of happiness, a messenger arrived with a letter from Antonio saying that his ships were lost, and that as the date of repayment was past, Shylock had demanded his pound of flesh. 
Portia and Bassanio were hastily married, after which Bassanio returned to Venice with enough money to repay the loan twelve times over. 
Since that time when Antonio had borrowed the money, something had occurred which made Shylock hate Antonio even more.  His young and pretty daughter, Jessica, had run away with and married one of Antonio's friends, a Christian, and had also taken with her some of her father's jewels and gold. 
Bassanio came before the court of the Duke of Venice and offered the old Jew twice the sum borrowed, but Shylock was so determined to have his revenge that he would accept nothing except the pound of flesh. 
The Duke was puzzled. �@He did not know how to act.  There seemed nothing to do but to tell Shylock to carry out the contract with his knife, and yet he was unwilling to consent to such a terrible judgment. 
At this moment, there appeared in court a young doctor of law by the name of Balthasar who said that he had been sent to the defense of Antonio.  People looked at him in astonishment, for he looked too young to be a lawyer.  But all the same, he was told the facts of the case, and the enquiry began. 
Balthasar, finding that Shylock was deter-mined not to take any money, pleaded with him for mercy.  But this, too, failed, so the young lawyer said that according to the law, Shylock had every right to cut off a pound of flesh from Antonio's body.  On hearing this, the old Jew brought out his knife and scales, and called upon Antonio to prepare. 
But, just as Shylock's triumph and revenge seemed certain, the young lawyer dashed his hopes to the ground by pointing out that the contrast gave him no right to a single drop of blood, and that he must cut exactly a pound of flesh, neither more nor less.
 "If you spill a single drop of blood," he said, "your lands aid your wealth will, by the law of Venice, belong to the state." 
So now the triumph was all on the other side.  Shylock found that not only had he lost his money, but that for plotting against the life of citizen of Venice, he must give half his wealth to that citizen, and half to the state, while his life was at the mercy of the Duke. 
The Duke, acting on Antonio's suggestion, pardoned Shylock and gave him back one half of his wealth.  But to obtain this however, the Jew was forced to agree to certain conditions.  According to this agreement, he was to become a Christian, and also to leave his property to his daughter and her husband.  Antonio, on his part, promised to give them his half of Shylock's wealth on the Jew's death. 
The Duke, after congratulating Antonio, left the court and then Bassanio begged the young lawyer to accept a large sum of money in payment for his services.  But as his reward, he would accept nothing except a ring which he saw on Bassanio's finger.  Now this was precisely a ring that his wife had given him after making him promise that he would never part with it.  But at the earnest request of Antonio, he consented to the lawyer's curious wish, and handed him the ring.  A few hours later, Bassanio and Antonio, filled with relief and happiness, set out for Belmont.  
When Bassanio had introduced his friend to his wife and told her the happy news, Portia noticed that her husband was no longer wearing her ring.  When he explained that he had given it to the lawyer, she seemed very angry. 
Antonio begged her, for his sake, to forgive her husband, declaring that Bassanio would never break any other promise. 
"Very well," said Portia, "then give him this ring, and tell him to keep it better than the other."
When Bassanio looked at this ring, he found to his surprise that it was the one that he had given to the lawyer.  Then Portia, to the astonishment and delight of her husband, told him that the learned lawyer Balthasar was none other than herself, that she had borrowed lawyer's robes and had disguised herself in order to come and save Antonio by her clever defense. 
But this was not all.  By some curious chance, she had received letters stating that Antonio's ships, instead of being lost, had safely arrived in harbor.

LESSON 31. 
WHERE DOES MUD COME FROM? PART �T.
We have been having very rough weather lately.  The wind has been blowing, the rain has been pouring down, filling the hollow places with water and turning dust into mud. 
But to-day the sun is shining and our walk has made us feel that we should like a short rest.  Let us sit down here on the bank of the river and watch the water flowing past our feet on its long journey from the mountains down to the sea. 
Our walk has made us rather thirsty.  The water looks cool and refreshing, but we should not like to drink it.  Instead of being clear like water from the well, the water in the river is all brown and yellow.  We can't see the bed of the river; the water is thick and muddy. 
If we filled a bowl with this water and let it stand for a few hours, what should we find in our bowl?   We should most probably find a bowlful of clear and transparent water, the fine grains of earth would have all settled down at the bottom in a thin layer.  This thin layer at the bottom is called sediment.  If we stirred up the water in this bowl, the layer of sediment would disappear and the water would become all muddy again. 
There would not be much mud in the bowl after all; it would not be more than we could hold in a spoon.  But if in our little bowl we have collected a spoonful of mud what an enormous quantity of mud there must be in all the water that is running past us every second! 
Once during a very hot and dry summer I was walking over the nearly dry bed of a lake.  There was no water at all in one part of it.  The surface was quite hard and firm, but under this hard surface there was more mud than t had ever seen in my life.  It was nice clean mud all arranged in neat layers.  Some of it was as fine as paste, but in other places it was coarse and sandy.  In some places indeed the grains of sand were almost as large as grains of rice.  All this mass of sediment had gradually collected in the lake just as we might collect our spoonful of sediment in a bowl.
On the bed of this river there is certainly a lot of muddy sediment, but not nearly as much as we should find at the bottom of a lake.  The rapid current of this river does not give the mud a chance to settle down properly. 
"Move on, move on" says the impatient water, and so the mud moves on and on, and we see it passing us now almost as rapidly as the water itself.  And indeed when the river is very high, dashing along between its banks, it carries along with it not only thy fine mud that we should see in our bowl, but also large grains of sand and even stones. 
Where does all this stuff come from?  Look at this river bank here, look at the dirt, the earth, the grains of sand, the loose stones and the dust.  The next time it rains, much of this will be washed down into the river and be told to "move on." If we had been here the other day when it was pouring with rain, we should have seen thousands and thousands of tiny muddy streams all bringing down their share of liquid dirt and pouring it into the river.  Much of the mud, then, comes from the banks of the river itself. 
Look over there half a mile away, where the hillsides come right down to the edge of the water.  Think of all the tiny streams of ram water sweeping along all the surface dirt and carrying it all down into the river.  Think of all these hillsides being washed and washed by every shower of rain.  Remember that every drop of rain sends a grain of earth a little further down, and then think how much dirt is washed into the river on each rainy day! 
Look along there to the left.  Do you see that little stream pouring into the river? Well, that little stream and every other stream, little and big, receives mud from its own banks and hillsides and each one brings its share into the river.  No wonder the river here looks muddy and brown!

LESSON 32. 
WHERE DOES MUD COME FROM? (Conclusion). 
But in the end, won't the hillsides and river banks be washed quite clean?  What will happen when the last grains of dirt have been washed away? 
Now that's just the point I was coming to.  As fast as the dust and dirt is swept away, its place is taken by fresh soft earthy matter.  Look at that sand-pit over there.  All that part of the hill is one mass of hardened sand called sandstone, but just as fast as the rain washes down the very top layer, the layer underneath it is exposed and loosened by the weather.  It will be many thousands of years, before all that immense heap of sandy earth is washed down the hillside into the river, but you may be quite certain that in the end it will all be washed away.  Let's go over to that stone-quarry and look at it.  
Now this isn't dust, dirt or sand.  It's hard, solid rock, so hard that we can scarcely knock pieces off with a hammer.  It's rather difficult to imagine this turning into loose earthy matter, but you may be certain that one day every bit of this will be washed down the slope into the river.  Look at this piece of rock; take out your knife and scratch the surface.  There, you see the surface is rotten and is very easily scratched off.  You have heard the proverb that constant dripping will wear away a stone.  It is quite true; wherever water drips on a stone, it will in the end wear it away. 
Look at this rock again.  The rain, snow and frost have already attacked it, and the surface is already crumbling into dust; when the outer surface is worn, a new inner surface will be exposed and that in its turn will be attacked and decomposed by the weather. 
All the rock you see, in this part of the quarry, however, is fairly fresh because the men are always working at it and exposing fresh surfaces. 
But look up there at the top of the wall of rock.  A few feet below the grass at the edge of the quarry the rock is much softer, we can break it easily with a hammer.  A foot or two higher we can hardly call it rock at all, it has all crumbled into soft earthy matter.  Look at the deep roots of those bushes, how they have forced their way into the cracks; they all help to split up the rock into smaller pieces.  
Every winter all the moisture in the rock freezes into ice, and this splits the rock until it is ready to fall to pieces.  Come over here and look at these heaps of crumbled stones; they are as soft as crumbs, but a few years ago they were all solid rock.  The next time it rains, if you happen to be here you will see the muddy water running down the slope, and in the end it will find its way into the river.
By the time these heaps are washed away, there will be plenty more rotten rock waiting for the next storm to wash it away like the last. 
No, there is no mystery about the way in which mud is formed; it is simply rotten or decomposed rock.  The hills are always wearing down.  The surface is washed away and exposes a new surface which, in its turn, is decomposed and washed away too, and all the hard rocks underneath begin to get soft as soon as the moisture and frost reaches them.  This process is called denudation. 
One of these days all these hills will have been washed down into the river, but it will be a long time in the future, some hundreds of thousands of years, and we shall not be here to see the result. 
Yes, it is difficult to realize that by the process of denudation a whole chain of mountains, a whole land surface, may in the course of time be carried into the sea.  But think: if only a millimeter of matter is cared away every year (and that is really very little indeed), it means that every ten years the land surface will be worn down one centimeter, that in a hundred years' time the whole country is ten centimeters lower, that in a thousand years' time it is one meter lower, and that a million years of denudation is Sufficient to remove a mountain a thousand meteres high by turning it into mud!

LESSON 33.
A GREAT INVENTOR. PART �T.
This is the story of a man who by hard work and perseverance became the greatest inventor that the world has ever known.  Whenever we think of telegraphy, of gramophones, of electric lights or of moving pictures we should think of Thomas Alva Edison. 
He was born in a little village in America in 1847 (eighteen forty-seven).  When he was young he was a quiet little boy but very fond of learning; he always wanted to know how things were done and how things were made.  He was not very strong, however, and was not sent to school until he was quite big.  When he did go, his teacher thought him stupid because he asked so many questions.  His teacher could not have been very wise, because it is not stupid children who ask questions, but clever children, who want to learn. 
So Edison's mother took him away from (school and taught him at home.  With such a kind and loving teacher, he made rapid progress.  He soon learnt to read and, what is more Important still, he learnt to think.  Some people read many books, they read about what other people think but not how to think for themselves.  One of the first books that he studied was an encyclopedia.  An encyclopedia is a book which gives us information about all things.  It was probably through this book that he first learnt to take an interest in chemistry.  He made a laboratory in the cellar of his home and there he used to make experiments and in so doing to lay the foundation for his knowledge of chemistry. 
His parents were poor people, so Edison soon had to earn his own living.  At the age of twelve, he used to sell newspapers on a train.  He lived in a corner of the luggage van (what the Americans call a baggage car) and there he kept his stock of newspapers and the other things that he used to sell.  In this van he had his little laboratory and library.
As he had not much to do he bought a printing press and used to publish a newspaper every week filled with news, stories of things that happened on the railway, and other information. 
One day an unfortunate thing occurred.  One of his bottles with a dangerous chemical substance in it fell on the floor, broke, and set fire to the van.  Edison's chief was so angry at the damage done to his train and at the danger that he not only put the boy off the train but also struck him on the head.  That was the most unfortunate part of the accident, for as a result of the blow Edison gradually lost his hearing, and eventually became almost completely deaf. 
Shortly after this, a fortunate thing happened to Edison.  One day he was standing on the platform of a station, watching a train coming in, when he saw a little boy playing right in front of it.  Another moment and the child would have been knocked over and killed, but Edison, at the risk of his own life, sprang forward, caught hold of the child and rolled with him on one side just in time to escape the wheels, and so saved the life of the little boy.  To show his gratitude, the child's father offered to teach Edison telegraphy.  Edison accepted the offer gratefully, and turned his attention to telegraphy as a means of earning his living.  He soon learnt how to work telegraphic instruments and became expert in receiving and sending messages. 
He worked as a telegraph clerk for some years in different parts of the United States and Canada.  He spent all his spare time in the study of chemistry and electricity, and in making experiments in order to improve telegraphic instruments. 
When he was twenty-two years old he went to New York.  He arrived in this great city without any money, but he was a good telegraphist and was not afraid of the future.  He knew that he could always earn his living, but like most inventors and discoverers he thought less about earning his living than about trying to find better ways of doing things.  We find the same thing in most stories of great inventors, and of all people who have new ideas.  Without men like Edison, Columbus, Copernicus, Galileo, or Socrates, progress would be very slow and the world would be very much poorer.  We should be grateful to such men.

LESSON 34. 
A GREAT INVENTOR (Conclusion.) 
One day he went to the offices of an important telegraph company in order to apply for a situation.  While he was waiting for a reply, a part of the apparatus broke down. Nobody knew what was the matter, and everything was in confusion until Edison said he could set the machine to work again.  Permission was given him to try.  He set to work to find out what was wrong and at the end of two hours was able to mend the broken part.  The chief was so astonished at the cleverness of this young man that he offered him a situation at a salary of $300 (three hundred dollars) a month, and needless to say, he accepted the offer. 
His new situation gave him the money and the opportunity that he wanted.  He set to work inventing new instruments and processes, and in a little over a year he sold his inventions for a large sum of money.  This made it possible for him once more to set up in business for himself.  He built a factory for the manufacture of telegraphic apparatus, and since then his chief business has been that of making inventions. 
He improved the telephone, which had been invented a few years previously, and this improvement made it much easier for the sound waves to travel.  It was about this time that he invented the phonograph (or gramophone, as it is now usually called).  His idea was to make an instrument that would "write sounds."  He had no idea that it would really work until one day he heard it repeat the sounds that he had shouted into it.  He says that when the instrument shouted back to him the words "Mary had a little lamb," he was more astonished than he had ever been in all his life. 
The whole world, too, was astonished.  Nobody could imagine how it was possible for anyone to store up his voice in a box, and to make the box reproduce the voice at any time.  But to-day, we have gramophones in almost every home, and the youngest children take it as a matter of course to put on gramophone records and to hear the voices of singers and orators, the music of bands and orchestras and the performances of the greatest musicians. 
Edison turned his attention to the question of electric lighting.  The first electric lights that had been invented were very imperfect.  The lamps made a lot of noise and gave an unpleasant sort of light, so that electricity could be used only for lighting streets and large halls.  Edison believed that it was possible to use electricity in a different way for giving light.  He thought that instead of making brilliant sparks it should be possible to make a thin wire white hot, and so give a gentle soft light without noise.  He invented the present system of electric lamps which are used everywhere.  He invented a whole system by which electricity might be used for lighting, heating, and driving machines. 
While he was inventing the new electric lamp, Edison turned his attention to another great idea: that of driving trams and railway trams by means of electricity.  He was not the first man to think of this, but his work made people interested m the idea and it is largely through his inventions that it was carried into effect. 
Edison is one of those men who are able to take an idea and to bring it from a state of theory into practice.  There was the idea of making "moving pictures."  For many years people had been trying to find a way of showing pictures of things in movement, but without much success.  Edison thought about this a good deal, and invented the first machine.  This was a sort of box with a hole in front.  By looking through this hole and turning a wheel it was possible to see a moving picture, but the picture lasted only for about twenty seconds, and only one person at a time could see it.  It is true that Edison did not invent moving pictures such as we see to-day in halls all over the world, but it was he who first started the practical realization of the idea.  
These inventions are only a small part of the performances of this wonderful man.  He is the greatest inventor that the world has ever seen.  Let us remember how much we owe to this great American, and let us be glad that there are such men who can spend their lives and their efforts in thinking of and in making such useful and marvelous things.

LESSON 35. 
A GREAT THINKER. 
The name of Edison reminds us of another great thinker and inventor.  This was a monk or friar who lived in England about 700 (seven hundred) years ago.  His name was Roger Bacon.  He was one of the most marvelous men of the age.  He was said to know everything.  This is, of course, an exaggeration, but by comparison with the people of that age his knowledge and his power of original thought were extraordinary. 
For many centuries people in Europe had made no progress.  They did not want to learn new things; they were quite satisfied with the state of things that existed at the time. 
But towards the end of the twelfth century people began to wish for new knowledge, and by the thirteenth century, men were no longer satisfied with what had been handed down to them by their fathers and grandfathers, and they began to search for further knowledge. 
At this period very few people could read and write, and almost the only scholars were the priests and monks.  Roger Bacon was one of these.  He wrote a book about every sort of knowledge, in which he speaks of geography, grammar, music, language, arithmetic, chemistry, and many other subjects. 
He was a philosopher and inventor.  We must not confuse him with another great philosopher, Francis Bacon, who lived three hundred years later.  He may be called the father of modern science.  Since the time of the great Greek philosopher Aristotle there had been no one to call attention to the need for exact knowledge. 
He was the enemy of ignorance.  During the whole of his life he told people that they were ignorant, and this was a bold thing to do.  To-day a man may tell the world that it is ignorant, and may urge people to learn and to obtain exact knowledge, whereas in those days this was a dangerous thing to do.  The people of the middle ages were quite sure that they were wise, that everything was known and that nothing remained to be learnt.  And so they were very angry and indignant when Bacon told them that they knew practically nothing. 
While attacking ignorance he was always making suggestions for the increase of knowledge.  Like Aristotle, he insisted on the need for experiments and the collecting of information. 
He said that instead of following the methods which Aristotle had urged, and of turning to facts, men did nothing except read the bad Latin translations of the works of this old master. 
"If I had my way" he wrote, "I should burn all the books of Aristotle, for the study of them can lead only to a loss of time, produce error and increase ignorance." Possibly Aristotle would have said the same thing if he could have returned to a world in which his books were not so much studied as worshipped. 
"Do not be ruled by superstition and ignorance," he said.  " Look at the world!  Look at facts as they are!"  He used very strong words when he spoke of those who paid too much respect to foolish customs, to the opinions of ignorant people, or of those who were too proud to learn. 
He considered this sort of respect as an obstacle to progress.  If these could be overcome, all sorts of wonderful things would be possible.  He said "It is possible to make machines by which great ships suitable for rivers and oceans, guided by one man, may be carried more rapidly than if they were full of men.  Also cars may be made so that without animals to pull them they may be moved at a great speed.  And flying machines are possible, so that a man may sit in the middle turning some wheel by which artificial wings may beat the air like the wings of a bird." 
That is what Friar Bacon wrote, but many centuries passed before any of these ideas were realized. 
It is said that Bacon invented gunpowder, although of course he did not give it that name, for he did not know that it could be used to shoot with. 
Some people were so indignant at the works of Bacon that they put him into prison at Paris.  After some time he was set free and he was given permission to return to England.  But, later on, he was again put into prison and kept there for the greater part of the rest of his life. 
The story of how hard he worked, how poor he was, how kind he was in teaching others as poor as himself is of great interest.  But it is sad to think how little his genius was appreciated, and how cruelly he was treated.  In this respect his life was like those of Galileo, Bruno, Socrates, Columbus and all the other brave and wise men who have had to suffer for their goodness and wisdom, who have been punished instead of being rewarded, and who have spent much of their lives in prison.