LESSON 1. 
THE FIRST EXPLORERS. 
  A long time ago the people in Britain (the country that is now called England) thought that there was no other country in the world but theirs, and no other people but themselves.  Other people in different parts of the world used to think the same thing about their countries and themselves. They did not travel from country to country as we do now, so they could not get to know of far-off places and different people. 
  When they did begin to learn that the world had many different countries and many different peoples, they were as surprised as we should be if we suddenly discovered the air above to be full of islands and peoples.  People living where the weather is always warm could never imagine that there were such things as snow and ice.  Those who lived where the weather is always cold could not imagine that there were parts of the world where it is always summer. 
  The people of those early times did not find it easy to make their way about the world, and to discover other countries and people. 
  There were, of course, no railways or railway engines at that time, and there were very few roads.  There were no steamers and no large ships.  There was no gas or electric light, but only candles.  The compass had not been invented; there were scarcely any maps, and these maps were very poor and inaccurate.  Traveling was therefore very slow, difficult and dangerous, and therefore people disliked going on long journeys. 
  We see here one of the old maps that were used about the time that Columbus set out on his voyages of discovery.  You will see that the only part of it which is at all accurate is the part that shows the South of Europe and the North of Africa.  Neither China nor Japan is shown, nor any part of d Australian continents. At the time this map was made, it was thought that the earth was flat. 
  Still, little by little, people did learn their way about.  There were people living all round the Mediterranean Sea, and they began to go about from place to place, and to find that the world was larger than they thought. 
  There were wonderful people living in the North of Palestine called the Phoenicians.  They built tiny ships and began to explore this great sea; they went to Greece and Spain; they even went to Britain.  They found their way overland to India and China and Persia and parts of Africa. 
  Later all that was forgotten and, hundreds of years after that, the great nation of Rome, so proud to think herself mistress of the world, did not know that there was such a place as China!  And China had never heard of Rome!  Centuries passed, and Rome was conquered by barbarians, and then nearly all that had been learnt about the world was lost and forgotten.  Stupid men, who paid no attention to learning, destroyed all the writings that they could find, and so the world was divided off again much as it had been before, the people in one country knowing little or nothing about those in other countries. 
  Think what the world lost by this destruction of books.  If all the books in the world to-day were burnt, and no more printed for hundreds of years, people would not be able to read, and some day they would have to begin to learn all that we know now.  
  So as that sort of thing did happen in the old days, and people went for hundreds of rears without learning again what had been lost, we need not be surprised that the Emperors of Rome never heard of China, or that Shakespeare never knew that there was such a place as Australia. 

LESSON 2. 
THE BOY WHO WALKED TO CHINA. 
  It is a wonderful thing but, to a great extent, it was the doings of a boy which set men exploring the great seas to find their way about the world.  This boy's name was Marco Polo.  He was born in Venice, a beautiful Italian city, in the year 1254.  His father and uncle, who had already been to China and back, made up their minds to go there again and to take with them this brave boy Marco, who was now about fifteen years old.  
They had to go over mountains and across lonely deserts, through hot lands and places where the cold was terrible.  Poor Marco was made quite ill by the hardships, but he got better and kept bravely on. 
At last they came to China, where a great King, called Kublai Khan, was very pleased to see them. Marco grew up at the court, and became a great favorite of the King.  Marco learnt to speak several languages, and was so clever that the King sent him as his ambassador to the South of China, India and other countries.  Each time he came back, he was able to tell the King not, only the answer to the message with which he had been sent; but a great deal about the countries themselves; how the people lived, what their trades were, and what were the big cities, rivers and mountains.  The King had never had so clever an ambassador as this before; he praised and rewarded Marco and made him, his father and his uncle wealthy men. 
At length the three travelers wanted to get back to Venice, from which they had been absent for twenty-three years.  The King was very sorry to let them go, but at last consented, and they came back.  
Marco remembered all that he had seen and learnt, and afterwards he had it all written down.  For a long time people would not believe his story.  They thought it absurd.  They could not think it possible that there were such great lands as China and India with millions upon millions of people.  When he, with his father and uncle, got back to Venice, nobody knew them.  Nobody would believe that the little Marco Polo who had gone away as a boy had become a great traveler and come back a rich man. 
So the three returned travelers asked their old friends to a great feast.  First they appeared in robes of crimson silk; then they changed these for other robes, and at last they came into the room wearing the torn, dirty old clothes which they had worn in their wanderings.  Their friends stared in surprise, and were still more startled when the three men cut open the patches of the old clothes and showed that these were filled with jewels. 
Then the people believed that the strangers really were the Polos back from the far-off lands. Later, other people began to see that there must be some truth in their story.  Marco Polo's tales of strange countries and peoples, and of the wealth and greatness of other lands made others want to go where he had been.  His book told them how he had got there, so they were able to go by the same route, but it also caused them to make up their minds to go by sea in the countries which he had visited.  The consequence of Marco Polo's book was that it set men studying and making bold plans for discovery.  The great Christopher Columbus, who lived 200 years later, was one of those who studied the book, and it helped him greatly when he was making up his mind to try to find India by Sailing over the sea to it.

LESSON 3. 
THE YOUNG RAT. 
There was once a young rat, named Grip, who would not take the trouble to make up his mind.  When the other rats asked him if he would like to come out with them at night, he would say "I really don't know."  And when they said "Would you like to stop at home? " he still said "I really don't know."  He was too lazy to make a choice or to settle which he liked best.  
One day an old gray rat said to him: "Now look here, no one will ever care for you if you go on like this.  You are too lazy to decide anything; you have such a poor mind that you can't settle anything.  It may be good to give up one's own way sometimes, but it's not good to have no way of one's own at all." 
The young rat sat up and looked wise, but remained silent. 
"Don't you think so?" said the old gray rat rather angrily, for he could not bear to see the young rat so indifferent and so helpless. 
"I really don't know," was all the young rat said; and then he walked off with slow steps, to think for an hour whether he should stay at home in his hole or go out in the barn. 
One day there was a great noise in the barn.  It was a very old barn, and the roof let in the rain, and the woodwork was all rotten, so the place was not safe to live in.  At last one of the wooden supports gave way and fell on the floor.  The walls shook, and all the rats were terribly frightened. 
"This won't do," said the old rat.  "We must leave this place." After some discussion the other rats agreed, and so they sent out scouts to look for a new home.  In the night the scouts came back and said they had found a nice new barn where there would be plenty of room and plenty of food for them all. 
"Then we'd better go at once," said the old rat who was chief. Then he gave the order: " Form in line!"  The rats all came out of their holes, and stood on the floor in a long line.  
"Are you all here? " asked the old rat, and looked round.  "Have you all decided to go?  Make up your minds at once! " 
"Yes, yes," said all the rats in the line. "Let's go!" 
Just then the old rat caught sight of young Grip.  He was not in the line and he was not exactly outside it; he stood just by it. 
  "You didn't speak, Grip," said the old rat, "Of course you're coming, aren't you?"
"I really don't know," said Grip.  "The roof may not come down yet." 
"Well then, stay," said another rat, "and serve you right if you're killed!" 
"I don't know that I'll stay," said Grip, "the roof might come down at any time." 
"Well," said the old rat, "we cannot wait for you to made up your mind.  Left turn!"  And the rats' all turned to the left.  "March!"  And all the rats marched out of the barn one by one, while the young rat looked on. 
"I think I'll go," he said to himself.  "And yet I really don't know; it's nice and comfortable here, and it may be safe after all." 
The tail of the last rat was lost to sight as he spoke.  He went to the door and looked out.  Then he looked back.  "I'll go back to my hole for a bit," said he, "just to make up my mind." 
That night, while Grip was trying to make up his mind, the barn came crashing and smashing down; down came the supports, the walls and the roof. 
  The next day, some men came to look at the barn.  They thought it odd they didn't see any rats, but, at last one of them happened to move a big tile, and, looking down, he saw a young rat, quite dead, half in and half out of its hole.

LESSON 4. 
WHY DOES AN APPLE FALL? (PART ‡T) 
An English boy named Isaac Newton was once lying down under an apple tree.  As he lay there, an apple fell off the tree to the ground.  There does not seem to be anything particularly remarkable about that; it seems the most natural thing in the world that things should fall to the ground instead of remaining in the air.  On the contrary, people often wonder why, if the earth is a ball, people do not fall oft the sides and the bottom of the earth. 
But when young Newton saw the apple fall, he began to wonder why it fell and why all things fall when there is nothing to prevent them from falling.  He began thinking, and he thought deeply.
He knew, as everybody knew, that a magnet will attract a needle; in other words, the magnet pulls the needle to it by means of some force that we cannot see or understand.  He had probably noticed, too, that when we rub a piece of sealing-wax or amber, it attracts small pieces of paper or straw.  You have probably noticed, too, that the small bubbles in a cup of tea are attracted to the sides of the cup as if the sides of the cup were pulling them. 
Thinking of such things as these, Newton came to the conclusion that the earth had pulled the apple to itself by some sort of attraction.  He concluded that what we call falling is nothing other than being pulled or attracted to the earth, so it was no wonder that people could not fall off the earth. 
Then he began wondering why the earth did not pull the moon to it, that is to say, why the moon did not fall down to the earth.  Then he thought of something else.  If we tie a stone to a piece of string and whirl the string round and round, the stone will try to fly away from us, and it would fly away if the string were not there to hold it back.  This is because if an object turns very rapidly round another object, it tries to run away from the object around which it is turning.  "Now," Newton thought, "the moon is turning round the earth and so it ought to fly right away from the earth; there is no string to hold it back."  Then he saw that there was something holding the moon back; not a string, it is true, but this force of attraction.  "The earth attracts the moon, but the moon does riot fall; the moon, whirling round the earth, tries to fly away, but it does not fly away; it remains at just the same distance all the time."  So he concluded that the force of attraction was just equal to the contrary force.  Newton had discovered "the theory of gravitation." 
When he grew older, he studied the theory more and more deeply until he was able to prove its correctness; upon this theory almost the whole of our knowledge of the universe has been based and so the world of science owes a great debt to this genius. 
Newton lived in an age of ignorance.  As the monk, Roger Bacon, had said long before, people were not at all inclined to look at facts as they are; they preferred believing or discussing the words of old writers.  They did not care for observation and experiment; they trusted to authority.  "Authority" -- do you know what that means?  It means that when you asked a question about anything in the universe, you were answered, not by "Watch and find out," or "Try it and see," but "Here is what Aristotle (or some other writer dead a thousand years) said about it."  Only a few bold persons realized that the one great "authority" on Nature was Nature herself, and these men dared to put their questions to that greatest of teachers in the form of experiments. 
The method of observation and experiment, as used by Roger Bacon, is the scientific method.  It is the only true way of gaining accurate and precise knowledge.  Newton worked scientifically, and that is why he was successful in his work. 
Men of science (or 'scientists,' as they are called) work with extreme accuracy and precision, accuracy in observing facts, and accuracy in drawing conclusions from the facts.

LESSON 5. 
WHY DOES AN APPLE FALL? (Conclusion.) 
  You remember reading about Galileo and the way he explored the sky with his telescope, and how he had to suffer because of his new ideas and discoveries.  He died in the year 1642, and in this same year Newton was born. 
Here is a story about Galileo which shows us how incredibly foolish the people of the middle ages were.  At the time of this story, Galileo was a professor of the University of Pisa in Italy. 
Two thousand years before, the Greek philosopher, Aristotle, had declared that if you took two balls of the same material, one small and the other large, and dropped them at the same moment, the large one would reach the ground first.  If it was ten times as heavy as the small one, he said, it would fall ten times as quickly. 
Nowadays, when anyone says anything like this, we always make the experiment at once, and let Nature decide.  This is the scientific method.  But this was not so in the time of Galileo and Newton.  "If Aristotle said so, it must be true," people said. 
Well, Galileo did not believe that Aristotle was right in what he said about falling weights.  He said that two weights would fall in just the same time, even though one was heavy and the other light.  Everybody laughed at him, and refused to discuss the matter. 
"Very well," said Galileo, "come and watch me make the experiment."  So one morning he took the professors and students to the celebrated "Leaning Tower" of Pisa.  He went to the top of the tower, taking with him a ten-pound shot and a one-pound shot.  He let them go together.  Together they fell, and together they struck the ground. 
And so, you think, everyone praised Galileo for having found out a new truth, and he was famous ever afterwards.  But one of the terrible lessons we have to learn is that that is not what men usually do in eases like this.  What really happened was that everybody was angry with young Galileo for daring to differ from Aristotle.  His students were so angry with him that in a short time he had to leave the city; he was driven away for finding a truth. 
On another occasion, Galileo pointed out that there were more than seven planets.  This made his enemies angrier than ever.  One of them said: "There are only seven openings in the head -- two eyes, two ears, two nostrils, and one mouth; there are only seven metals, and seven days in the week, therefore there can be only seven planets." 
Galileo made them look through the telescope and there the newly-discovered planets were to be seen.  "Oh well," they said, "they are so small that they cannot have any influence on the earth; and being useless, they do not exist." 
That was the sort of world in which Newton lived.  To compare the age of Newton with the present age is like comparing a rough cart with a railway engine or a candle with an electric lamp.
We should be happy to think that Newton was fortunate enough to get people to believe in his work and to give him encouragement and support.  He not only discovered the theory of gravitation, but he made great discoveries connected with light and color and with mathematics.  He invented a new sort of telescope, and wrote a great work called "The Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy." 
One of the most famous of Newton's discoveries was perfectly simple and cost scarcely anything to make.  All that Newton did was to close the shutters of the window, make a slot m one so as to let a ray of sunlight through into the dark room, and then to take a prism (that is to say a three-sided piece of glass) -- and see what happened when the ray of light passed through it.  He found that the white light was broken up into a band of colors, which were the colors of the rainbow. 
This experiment proved what could never have been guessed or believed: that the ordinary white light that we know so well is a mixture of colors.
In 1703, he was made president of the Royal Society, the highest honor in science that can be given to an Englishman.  In 1705, he was made a knight, and so instead of speaking of him as "Mr. Newton" we speak of him as "Sir Isaac Newton."

LESSON 6. 
COMMONSENSE IS WORTH MORE THAN LEARNING. 
This is a story about four men, three of whom were learned men, the other having no great learning, but plenty of practical commonsense. 
These four men lived together in a house in a great forest.  In this house they had their workshop, where they carried out strange experiments and did many wonderful things.  The three learned men often talked and boasted about their wisdom.  The fourth man never said very much, and when he did say something, the others usually laughed at him, called him stupid. 
He would say: "I know I am rather dull; I can't talk about wonderful things as you can, and I cannot make the wonderful things that you do.  I have not studied philosophy as you have, and my hands are too clumsy to do fine and delicate work.  I am just a man of plain commonsense, and do not pretend to be wiser than I am." 
"Commonsense," the others would answer.  "What is commonsense when compared with great wisdom?  Commonsense is for common people and not for philosophers and great thinkers." 
One day, when they had been talking about the great things they could do, one of them said: "Let us prove to the world how very clever we are, so that everybody may know that we are the most marvelous men on earth." 
The others agreed, and then they began discussing what great thing they could do.  At last they decided that they should set to work and create an animal with life.  Then they began wondering what sort of animal with life.  Then they began wondering what sort of animal to make.  In the end they decided that as the lion was the king of beasts, this animal would be the most worthy of their skill. 
"Very well," they said, "we will make a lion." 
The fourth man, who had been listening to their discussion, here said: "If you are going to make a lion, there is a suggestion that I should like to offer."  But they would not listen to him.  One of them said: "Nonsense!  What do you know about creating animals?  Can you make bones and fit them together to make a skeleton?" 
The man said: "No, I can't, but --- " 
Here the second man interrupted rudely and said: "Are you clever enough to make a heart or a pair of lungs or blood?" 
The man said: "No, I'm not, but --- " 
Then the third man interrupted, saying: "Do you think that you are learned enough to put life into a dead body?" 
The man said: "No, I don't, but ---" 
At this point the three men told him to hold his tongue (which means to keep silent and stop talking).  And so the man held his tongue. 
The first of the three learned men set to work to manufacture the bones, to fit them together, and to attach muscles to them. 
The second man set to work to design the organs of the body, such as the heart, the lungs, the liver, the stomach, the kidneys and the brain.  It was also his part of the work to manufacture the skin and hair. 
After some time the first two men finished their share of the work and produced a full-sized lion, complete from head to tail, with powerful jaws and teeth that could bite, and terrible claws that could scratch and tear. 
The work of the third man was yet to be done.  As he was the wisest man of the three, the most difficult share of the work had been given to him, for it was he who should put life and the five senses into the body of this creature. 
As he went up to the great beast, which was standing just outside the workshop, the fourth man came forward and begged permission to gave a few words of advice.  He said: "I am not a clever man as you are.  I have not been able to take any part in creating this marvelous creature, but before you put life into it, there is just this that I want to advise you to do."
  But the three wise men were indignant at this interruption.  "Stand back!" they said.  
"Get out of the way!  What advice can a stupid ignorant man like you have to give us?  What nonsense!  Leave us to our work!" 
  And not another word would they hear from the man who had enough sense to see what would be the consequences of their creation. 
"Well," he said to himself, "I can do no more.  I have been wanting to warn them all the time, but they won't listen to me.  It is time for me to see to my own safety.  And so he climbed up a tall tree and watched what was taking place beneath him. 
He saw the third man passing his hands over the body of the lion; he saw him pressing and rubbing the veins and the arteries; and then saw him pumping air into the great lungs of the king of beasts. 
Then he saw the lion slowly open its eyes and stretch its great powerful limbs, he saw it open its mouth and yawn as when people wake up after they have been asleep for a long time. 
Then he saw the lion turn towards the men who had made it; he heard it roar savagely and saw it spring at the three wise men, seize them with its teeth, tear them with its claws, and start its first meal. 
The man in the tree waited until the lion had finished its meal and gone off into the forest, and then he climbed down, saying to himself: "I am certainly not clever enough to make a lion, but I am sensible enough not to wait to be eaten by a lion of my own creation.  There are times when a little commonsense is worth more than a great deal of learning."

LESSON 7. 
A GREAT EXPLORE 
  This is the story of a poor boy who came to be one of the world's greatest ocean explorers. 
His name was James Cook.  He was born in England in the year 1728.  When he was a boy, he was apprenticed to a shopkeeper.  But he did not care for the life of a shopkeeper; he longed for adventures, and wanted to know what foreign countries were like.  So one day he left the shop and went to work on a small ship.  When he was twenty-seven years old, he joined the British Navy. 
As he was a brave, honest, and clever man, he soon came to be a lieutenant.  Four years later, he became captain of a small ship, and took part in fighting the French in Canada. 
As he was a skilful navigator and very clever at making maps, the British government asked him to be the leader in scientific expeditions of exploration.  In 1769 he was sent to explore the islands of the Pacific Ocean.  He left England in a ship called the Endeavor with a crew of eighty-four.  Touching at Madeira, in the Atlantic Ocean, the ship reached the wild South American country called Tierra del Fuego (this is a Spanish name meaning "Land of Fire"), and a few days later passed round Cape Horn. 
About eight months after leaving England, he came to an island known to-day as Tahiti.  The natives were very friendly, and Captain Cook stayed among them for three months, studying the habits and customs of the people.  He was so kind and wise in his treatment of the natives that he won their friendship wherever he went.  One of the natives of Tahiti was so fond of Captain Cook that he joined the ship and went with him when he continued his voyage. 
Captain Cook then discovered several other large islands, and made maps of them.  Then one day he came to two very large islands called New Zealand.  These islands had been discovered in 1642 by the Dutch explorer Tasman, but his party were afraid to land there because the natives seemed so fierce and warlike.  Captain Cook, too, found the natives very warlike, and it was impossible to make friends with them.  He spent many months on the coast exploring and making maps of this beautiful country. 
It was known that twelve hundred miles to the west there was an enormously large but little known island, then called New Holland (now called Australia), and Captain Cook made up his mind to go and see what it was like.  So one day he passed through the strait separating the two islands of New Zealand (since known as Cook Strait) and sailed for the west.  His intention was to visit the southern part discovered by the Dutchman, Van Diemen (now known as the island of Tasmania).  On account of the strong winds however, he came in sight of the great island very much further to the north. 
All the earlier explorers had said that Australia was a country of deserts and wild rocks, and that no Europeans could live there.  To his surprise, however, he found a beautiful country of plains and hills covered with green woods.  As it reminded him of South Wales, in England, he called it New South Wales.  He explored the coast for many hundreds of miles and claimed all the country for England.  For this reason Captain Cook has been called "the real discoverer of Australia." 
While sailing along the coast of Australia, he had many adventures, often being attacked by the savage black natives, and often being shipwrecked on the dangerous rocks.  At last he came to the most northern point of Australia and from there passed through Torres Strait, reached the Dutch island of Java, and from there sailed home to England after a voyage which had lasted three years. 
The following year, he made a second voyage, which also lasted three years.  During this voyage he explored far to the south, among the ice of the Antarctic.  It had often been imagined that there was a large continent a little south of Australia, but Captain Cook found nothing but sea and ice.  He returned to the South Pacific, discovered many more islands, made the first correct maps of that part of the world, and then went back to England. 
Although he was now forty-eight years old, he started the next year on a third expedition.  On this third voyage, he rediscovered the Hawaiian Islands.  From there he went north along the coast of America to the Bering Sea.  He passed through the Bering Strait separating Asia from America, but was not able to get through the wall of ice to the north.
He returned to pass the winter in Hawaii.  As always, he had won the friendship of the natives by his kind and wise treatment.  One day, however, in 1779, there was a quarrel concerning a boat which had been stolen.  Captain Cook landed in order to make an enquiry, and while doing so was killed. 
Captain Cook explored a greater length of coast than any other man; he made the map of the Pacific; his explorations gave Australia and New Zealand to Britain.  He did not care for rewards, but had a great love of adventure and a great curiosity about distant countries and peoples.

LESSON 8. 
T‚gE LAND OF SCIENCE. 
Most boys are fond of adventures.  Like Robinson Crusoe, they want to go to new and strange places; they want to go to distant lands; they want to travel.  This is the spirit of adventure and discovery. 
In all ages there have been travelers in search of adventure.  Columbus was one; Captain Cook was another.  People like this leave everything behind them in order to push forward into the unknown lands before them. 
We cannot all travel to strange places and be explorers of distant countries.  You who read this cannot leave your homes to go to Africa or some other far-away place from where you may push into the great unknown beyond.  It is not even necessary.  There is, here at home, a wonderful land that needs exploring; it is the Land of Science.  Those who wander along the borders of this land have opportunities for adventure which are greater than almost any others that we can imagine. 
The great man of science, Isaac Newton, of whom we have already heard the story, once wrote: "I do not know what I may appear to the world, but to myself I seem to have been only like a boy playing on the seashore and amusing myself in now and then finding a prettier shell than usual, while the great ocean of truth lay all undiscovered before me." 
Newton was one of the first and greatest men of science.  He loved discovering new things about nature and the universe we live in.  Like Newton, we can all set out to explore this wonderful country of which so little is known.  Each one of us may discover something that has never been discovered before, for the land is so huge that no man can even imagine going to its farthest border. 
The entrance to this great country is quite close to us, and it is in such a strange place, that you would hardly believe it to be there.  It is wherever your toys or the things which you use for amusement may happen to be.  You may have a toy called a top, or you may have a magnet or a toy engine or boat.  These toys belong to the land of science, for they use and show us the forces of nature. 
When you spin your top, you notice that it stands up when spinning and falls on its side when it stops.  You have perhaps seen people selling in the streets a sort of top with the two ends supported inside a box.  When you set this top spinning, the box cannot fall over even if you stand it up on one of its corners.  A man once noticed this curious effect and invented an instrument called the gyroscope which will steer ships and aeroplanes. 
The men who studied the properties of the magnet were able to invent the telegraph and other wonderful electrical instruments.  The propeller of your boat is an invention of those men who discovered the best way to drive a boat through water. 
Two thousand years ago, the steam engine was a toy.  The ancient Greeks used to play with a toy in which steam caused a wheel to go round.  They never dreamed that this was the beginning of something which would replace slaves, and finally make possible great factories, railways, steamers and other such things. 
This world on which we live moves in a wonderful universe filled with many strange substances and astonishing events.  When we first wake up in the morning, we see light, then objects; we hear sounds and become conscious that we are touching things.  As the day goes on, our senses bring us into contact with all sorts of substances and with the different manners in which heat, light, electricity, chemistry, etc. show themselves. We are so familiar with such things that we do not stop to think why various things happen, how they take place and how they may be related to one another.  Things are attracted to each other or fly away from each other like the stone that falls to the ground, or is propelled from the hand that throws it.  Fire burns wood or makes metals red-hot or even liquid.  Water boils and becomes steam, or freezes and becomes ice.  Gunpowder explodes with a flash and a loud noise.  The sea rises and falls at each tide.  Thunder roars and lightning flashes.  Earthquakes make the ground tremble.  Volcanoes send out clouds of steam.  The moon turns round the earth, and the earth round the sun.  Huge trees grow from tiny seeds.  Electricity drives trams and lights our houses.  Balloons, aeroplanes and birds sail through the air without falling.  With cameras we take photographs.  With telescopes we see distant things as if they were quite close.  With microscopes we see tiny things as if they were large.  Radio carries voices and music almost from one end of the world to another. 
These are a few of the things belonging to the Land of Science.  Every day new discoveries are being made in this wonderful land; every day we learn something new about it.  Every time we observe a new fact or find out the relation between one fact and another we make a scientific discovery.  It is rare to find such great discoverers as Bacon, Edison, Galileo, or Newton, but any one of us may make a discovery that will show us a little more of the Land of Science.

LESSON 9. 
EVERYBODY'S BUSINESS IS NOBODY'S BUSINESS. 
According to an old legend, there was once a good King whose principal aim in life was to govern his people well and wisely.  He loved his people so much that he was always thinking of ways by which he could make them happier. 
One day he called his chief Minister to ask his advice.  "What can I do," he said, "to make my subjects happier? " 
The Minister remained silent. 
"Come," said the King.  "Don't be afraid to speak.  I really do want to know what my subjects think of my rule, and what I can do for their happiness." 
The Minister answered: "Your Majesty, it is because you do so much for your subjects that you do too little." 
"What do you mean?" asked the King. 
"You are talking nonsense.  If I do so much, how can it be that I do too little?  Explain yourself." 
The Minister said: "You have done so much for your people that they no longer rely on their own efforts.  They are wanting in self-reliance.  If there is anything to be done, instead of helping themselves, they look to somebody else to do it.  You treat your subjects as if they were children.  The wise father teaches his children to do things for themselves." 
The King was very surprised at this answer, and said: "Give me an example of what you mean, for I find it difficult to believe you." 
The Minister said: "Will Your Majesty come with me," and led the King to a place where one of the principal roads to the capital passed through a narrow valley.  On either side of the road were large rocks.  The Minister loosened one of these rocks, and rolled it into the middle of the road while the King watched him with astonishment. 
"Your Majesty," said the Minister.  "This rock will make it very difficult for people to pass; it will be an obstacle to carts, and dangerous for people who pass along here when it is dark.  But I am quite sure that nobody will think of moving it out of the way.  Everybody is so used to having things done by the Government or by people in authority that not a single person will think of using his own initiative.  If we pass here in a month's time, we shall see the rock still in the middle of the road. 
"I cannot believe you," said the King."  It stands to reason that the first person who is inconvenienced will remove the rock so that others will not be inconvenienced." 
"We shall see," answered the Minister. 
The King raised the rock, made a hollow in the road under it and in the hollow he placed a small packet which he took from his pocket.  Taking a pen and a piece of parchment he wrote: "This is a present from the King to the one who removes the rock," and fastening the paper to the packet, he replaced the rock so as to cover it. 
The next morning a farmer driving a flock of geese came that way.  When he saw the rock he was very indignant.  "The laziness of these people is terrible," he said.  Here is this big rock lying right in the middle of the road.  Why doesn't somebody move it?  But no! everyone is too lazy to attend to such a simple matter."  And he and the geese passed on their way.  
Presently down the road came a soldier.  He was singing merrily as he marched along, but his head was too far back for him to notice the rock, and he fell over it.  He got up, complaining about people's carelessness, and walked on.  But he left the stone lying there. 
Later some merchants, with horses carrying goods from the neighboring town, passed that way.  One said to another: "What a bad government we have!  I wonder how long that stone has been lying there.  Are there no officials to mind the roads and to keep them in good order?  It's a disgrace to the country."  And the company passed, some to the right and some to the left, but no one attempted to move the rock out of the way. 
And every day other people passed by.  Everyone complained and grumbled.  They said: "It's a disgrace!" or "It's a shame!" or "It's shameful!"  They said: "Why does the King allow the roads to be obstructed by rocks and stones?" or "What are the King's officials doing?"  Everybody blamed his neighbor for letting the stone lie there, but nobody had enough initiative to move it. 
In a month's time the King went with his Minister, and saw that the Minister had spoken the truth.  "You were quite right," he said, "What is everybody's business is nobody's business." 
So the King sent word to his people to meet him at that spot the next day.  
When they were all gathered together, he pointed to the rock and said: "For one month that rock has been lying there in the middle of the road, an obstacle to all who pass and a danger to traffic.  Why is it that no one has moved it away?"  He asked the question of farmers, of soldiers and of merchants and each one said: "It wasn't my business." 
"What is everybody's business is nobody's business," replied the King.  "That is the bad and worthless saying used by people who are lazy and wanting in public spirit.  Well, since my subjects have refused to perform a public service, your King must perform it." 
So saying, he raised the rock and rolled it to the side of the road.  And he continued: "And it is your King who claims the reward."  And to the astonishment of all present, he lifted the packet, showed the writing on the parchment, opened the packet, and a stream of golden coins fell out, which the King promptly put in his pocket. 
"If I'd only known," said the farmer. 
"If I'd only known," said the soldier. 
"If I'd only known," said the merchants.  But they had learnt their lesson, and from that day onwards, each of the King's subjects was prompt in performing any public service.  Instead of leaving work to be done by others, each man performed the service himself.  If a little child fell down and hurt himself, the nearest person picked him up and comforted him.  If a blind man was trying to cross a busy street, the one who saw him first took his arm and helped him across.  If anyone was in trouble or in difficulty, his neighbor came to offer assistance, and if there was ever a big rock in the middle of the road, you may be sure that people ran to remove it.  But they never found any bag of gold under it, nor did they wish for any reward for their work; they had realized that good and kind work wants no reward.

LESSON 10.
THE RISE OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE. (PART 1.)
You have often heard of the Romans, the people who in ancient times established a great Empire and one of the greatest civilizations that the world has ever known.
There are many legends and famous stories about the beginnings of this people, but all that we really know of their early history can be told in a very few words.
A few mils inland from the western coast of Italy is a group of seven hills with the River Tiber flowing among them.  About 2500 years ago, on one of these hills, called the Palatine Hill, there was a little city called Rome.  The people who lived in it were called Romans; they spoke Latin, and were ruled by the Etruscans, a neighboring people.  These Etruscans had probably come from Asia many centuries before.  They were more civilized than the people of Rome, but the Romans so disliked having foreign Kings that in the end they fought against the Etruscans and became an independent people.
The small city of Rome increased in size, it extended until it covered the seven hills, and a wall was built round it.  Some centuries later it became the most famous city in the world and the Romans one of the greatest peoples in the history of the world.
For about 500 years, Rome was a Republic, the chief officers of which were called consuls.  
It was a period of wars.  For many years the Romans fought against their old masters the Etruscans, sometimes winning, sometimes losing.  In the year 474 B. C. (four hundred and seventy four years before the birth of Christ) the Etruscan navy was destroyed by the Greeks, and a people called the Gauls attacked their country from the north.  Caught between the Gauls and the Romans, the Etruscan people were utterly defeated and we hear no more about them.
The fierce Gauls came to Rome.  The Roman soldiers could not resist them and were forced to retreat to the castle on the Capitoline Hill.  With the exception of this fortress, the Gauls captured and burnt the city.  In this fire everything was destroyed, including the city records which would have given us the actual facts about the early history of Rome.  Eventually, the Gauls were paid a large sum of money, and they went back to their own country.
According to an old legend, the Capitol was saved from the Gauls by a flock of geese.  The goose was the sacred bird of Rome, and it was thought to be wicked to kill or eat it.  One night a Roman soldier was asleep near the temple where the birds were kept.  Suddenly he was awakened by the cries of these geese.  He went to see what had disturbed them when he came face to face with a Gual who was the leader of an attacking party.  There was just time to call the soldiers and to beat back the attack.  
The Romans soon recovered from this terrible disaster, for within seventy years they extended their rule all over central Italy as far as Naples, successfully resisting the Gauls in the North and threatening the Greek colonies in the South.  But twenty years later, one of Alexander the Great's generals, named Pyrrhus, came from Greece and drove the Romans back towards Rome.  Defeat was once again followed by victory, and the Romans captured the whole of the Italian peninsula.
Those great explorers the Phoenician people that we read about in Lesson One, had established many colonies on the shores of the Mediterranean.  One of these colonies was at a place called Carthage, situated where we now find Tunis.  These Carthaginians became a great and powerful people, excellent sailors and bold soldiers.
When the Romans had captured all Italy, they found themselves to be neighbors of this people, and before long the first of the terrible wars between Rome and Carthage broke out.  These wars lasted about 120 years.  Hannibal, the famous Carthaginian general, defeated the Romans again and again, and it seemed that his side must win.  In this picture we see Hannibal's army crossing a river in France on his way to Italy.  In the end, however, it was the Romans who won.  They defeated and utterly destroyed the Carthaginians.
In the meantime, the Romans extended their empire over Greece, Egypt, and that part of Asia where the Turks now live.

LESSON 11. 
THE RISE OF THE ROMAN EMPTRE. (Conclusion) 
  In the year 60 B. C., one of the three consuls of Rome was Julius Cesar who became one of the greatest men in all history; great as a general, great as a ruler, and great as a writer.  He conquered the whole of the country then called Gaul, now called France and Belgium, and even went so far as the island of Britain, now called England.  By treating the Gauls kindly he made friends of them.  When, after many adventures in different parts of the growing empire, he returned to Rome, many people wanted to make him King.  Some of Cesar's old friends however, thinking it their duty to prevent Rome from coming under the rule of a single man, put him to death. 
  If ever you go to the theatre and see a performance of one of Shakespeare's most famous plays, called "Julius Cesar," or if you read this play, you will better understand the events which ended with the death of Cesar, and what happened afterwards.  The adopted son of Cesar, Octavius, slowly and carefully gathered all the power into his own hands till the Romans found that they could not do without him, and made him their chief.  He was, however, not to be called King, but Augustus Cesar, and he became the first of the Roman Emperors. 
Those who came after him ruled the Roman Empire for 300 years.  Some of these were great and good men, like the Emperor Marcus Aurelius; but others, such as Nero, were wicked and often foolish.  As time went on, the boundaries of the Empire crept forward, and eventually reached their utmost limits.  On this map, the shaded part shows the extent of the Roman dominions.  You see that it extended all the way from Scotland to the Persian Gulf, including, among others, the countries that are now called England, France, Spain, Portugal, Italy, Austria, Greece, Turkey and Egypt.  The Mediterranean Sea was practically a Roman lake. 
While Rome was gaining in power, there was a decline on the spiritual side.  The Romans were no longer the simple dignified people of the old days, they became idle and cruel and all the work was done by slaves.  
The amusements of the Romans, especially in later days, were sometimes very savage and cruel.  It was their delight to see men fighting and killing lions and tigers.  They also loved to see fierce battles between slaves who were kept specially as fighters. 
These terrible entertainments used to take place in an immense building like a circus.  Prisoners were brought to this place, sometimes women and children, and the people enjoyed seeing them torn to pieces by wild animals. 
The religion of the Romans was similar to that of the ancient Greeks; they had temples and worshipped gods, to whom they made sacrifices of animals and even of human beings.  The chief of their gods was Jupiter.  In later centuries of the Empire, Christianity became the official religion. 
The language of the Romans was Latin, and this spread to most of the countries under, the dominion of Rome.  The peoples conquered: by the Romans learnt to use this language, and indeed in many countries Latin almost entirely replaced the various national languages.  This was the language of the great literature of Rome.  In the time of Augustus, there were so many great writers, such as Virgil, Livy and Horace, that even now a period full of great writers is called an Augustan Age.  In the Rome of to-day we still find wonderful buildings designed by the old architects and the wonderful works of the old artists. 
There were, at this time, two great empires in the world: the Roman Empire and the Empire of China.  Rome extended as far as the River Tigris, but it was never able to get beyond that boundary.  China extended its power beyond Tibet, but there too it reached its limits.  China at this time was the greatest, the best organized and most civilized system of government in the world.  It was larger in size and population than the Roman Empire.  It is curious to think that it was possible for these two vast systems to exist in the same world at the same time in almost complete ignorance of each other. 
The Chinese Empire, in the form of a Republic, still exists.  The Roman Empire, a victim of its own greatness, has long since ceased to exist.  One of these days, we shall read about the events which brought about decline and fall of Rome and the end of Roman dominion.

LESSON 12. 
THE MAN WHO INVENTED PRINTING. 
What a wonderfully simple and easy thing it is to get something printed!  You want some visiting-cards (or "name-cards" as they call them in America), or you want a circular printed, or a programme, or a report or an announcement of any kind.  You just go to a printer and in a few hours he will print and deliver as many copies as you require. 
It is difficult to imagine that six hundred years ago printing was unknown in Europe.  Quite three hundred years before this, books were printed in China and Korea, but in Europe, if books were wanted, they had to be written by hand. 
The first printing was probably in the form of pictures, cut on fiat places of wood.  Then probably instead of pictures, words were cut, and from these blocks books were printed.  I took, you can see, a long time to carve page of words on a block of wood, and it would have been impossible to print many books for which every page of matter needed a separate block of wood. 
What was wanted was a number of movable letters that could be put together to form words, and then when the page was printed, these letters or types could be sorted out and set up again to form other pages. 
Nobody quite knows who it was who first used movable letters in Europe.  We can only say that the Germans claim that Gutenberg was the inventor, while the Dutch make the same claim for Coster, a native of Holland.  We certainly know more about Gutenberg than about Coster. 
It was not until Gutenberg was thirty-five years old that he turned his attention to printing.  He borrowed money from a merchant of Mainz, named Fust, in order to set up in business as a printer.  Gutenberg's first idea was to make each letter separately.  If he wanted a hundred copies of the letter A, he would set to work to carve 100 copies of the letter in wood.  But this was too slow; besides, the wooden letters were too soft to last.  It is said that one of Gutenberg's assistants had the idea of casting the types.  He carved the letter on a piece of metal.  Then all that remained to be done was to melt metal and pour it into the mould, and copies of the letter could be made as fast as the metal would harden. 
And now the work of Gutenberg's life was begun.  He had determined to print a copy of the Bible.  It took a long time to do it, and the cost was very heavy.  The printers had everything to do.  They had to make their types, they had to set them up and correct them.  Then they had to print the pages and set up and correct and print others. 
At last, in 1455 (fourteen fifty-five), or 1456 (fourteen fifty-six), the complete Bible in the Latin language was produced.  The triumph of printing was at once established.  Men agreed that it was as clear as handwriting, and that, as so many copies had been printed at the same time, the cost was far lighter than that of copying by hand, while the work was done more quickly. 
And now Gutenberg was to suffer a terrible misfortune.  The rich and unscrupulous merchant, Fust, claimed back all the money that he had lent.  He knew that Gutenberg could not repay him, and that was the reason why he claimed it.  As he could not have the money, he seized everything that was in the printing office.  Poor Gutenberg, in the very hour of his triumph, was turned out of his workshop, while he was poorer than when the idea of printing first came into his brain. 
A good friend, however, enabled him to set up another press, from which he printed one or two books.  But he was never successful.  Thirteen years after completing the work which made him one of the world's great men, he died, almost unknown. 
Shortly after that, the art of printing was being practiced in the principal cities of Germany and Italy.  It was introduced into England about ten years after Gutenberg's death, and within the next hundred years, it was used all over Europe. From that time to this, improvements have been constantly made, but probably no printing has ever looked more beautiful or has been better in quality than the first books printed by Gutenberg and those who followed him. 
It is sad to think how many great inventors and discoverers have been left to die in poverty.  At the same time, we may be happy to think that those men who have done the most for the good of the world have done it not as a means of getting rich but simply because they felt that it was their mission and duty to do it.

LESSON 13. 
MATTER, ETHER AND ENERGY. 
If somebody asked you to explain the meaning of the word matter, you would probably stop and think for a moment and then say that matter is "stuff."  This would be a poor sort of answer, but the reason that you probably could not give a better one is not because you do not recognize matter when you see it or feel it, but rather because you do not really know what it is when you have recognized it.  And it is only fair to tell you that nobody knows exactly what matter really is. 
We may nevertheless consider matter to be something which occupies space and possesses weight.  Thus, wood, air, iron, water, etc. are matter because they occupy space and can be weighed or measured. 
It may seem to us that everything must be matter, but light, heat, electricity, magnetism, etc. cannot be considered to occupy space or to have weight.  Therefore they are not matter. 
There is practically an endless number of forms of matter.  Two hundred and fifty thousand would probably be an underestimate of the number of things having properties that make them different from any other thing. 
All these many forms of matter may exist in three states: solid, liquid, or as gas.  Water is one of the most common forms of matter known to us in these three states.  When it is frozen into ice it is a solid; when melted it is a liquid, and when boiled into steam it is an invisible gas. 
The air that we breathe may be made so cold that it becomes a liquid like water or even a solid like ice.  Air or water as gases are just as real and are just as much matter as liquid air or liquid water.  But steam and air are invisible and are good examples of why we should not think that anything which we cannot see or cannot feel is not real.  If you put your hand against the wall, you can feel it; but when you look at the wall, you cannot see that the space between is filled with matter which is just as real as that of which the wall is made.  But this is a fact.  It is filled with air. 
There is a great and most important fact known about matter.  We call it a law of nature.  It is this, that no particle of matter can be destroyed either by man or by nature.  Consider a small chip of wood.  You can crush it, burn it with fire, or dissolve it in acid, and yet the matter of which that chip of wood is composed will exist somewhere, either as gas or liquid or as tiny specks of solid matter. 
When you burn a candle it disappears.  The grease or wax is first in a solid state.  It melts and becomes a liquid.  The liquid burns and becomes a gas.  Before the candle was burned it might have rested on your table or desk.  After it has burned up, the matter of which it was composed still exists, floating around in the air about you. 
Just as matter cannot be destroyed, so it cannot be created.  You cannot create something out of nothing.  If the creation or destruction of matter is taking place, it is unknown to us. 
What is ether?  This is a more difficult question to answer.  If it is matter, it is a very strange and exceptional sort of matter, quite unlike all other kinds.  We cannot see it, we are unable to measure it or weigh it.  The chief reason for which we know that ether must exist is this.  We know that heat and light are nothing other than waves.  But waves must exist in something.  This something cannot be any of those forms of matter of which we are familiar; it cannot be the air.  The sun sends us waves of light and heat.  These waves travel through the ninety-three million miles between us and the sun.  But we know that this space is not filled with air, for the air is only a comparatively thin envelope surrounding the earth.  But in this space there must be something or else the waves of light and heat could not come to us from the sun.  So we have to suppose that this space is filled with something which is not air, and we call it ether. 
In every corner of the universe there must be this ether; wherever a star shines, or in the center of the earth, or in a bar of iron, or in our own bodies, the ether exists.  It is as if everything lay in an ocean of ether not only surrounded by it, but soaking it up as a sponge lies soaking in a pail of water.  The waves of radio that we listen to every day are waves in the ether. 
Just as there is no such thing as perfect emptiness, so there is no such thing as perfect rest.  A bar of iron or a block of wood is not the solid thing that it seems, but is made up of an enormous number of extremely small pieces, too small to be seen with the eye or the most powerful microscope.  We will call these small things particles.  These little particles do not remain still they are not in a state of rest but are in a state of continual movement.  Sometimes they move more quickly and sometimes less quickly.  Now nothing happens without a cause.  In this case the thing that causes the speed of these particles to change is called energy.  
Just as there are different forms of matter, so there are different forms of energy.  There is, for instance, that form of energy called heat, there is also chemical energy and mechanical energy and electrical energy.  Now any form of energy can be changed into another form.  If we burn coal to make steam the burning of the coal is a chemical energy which supplies heat energy to water in a steam-boiler.  The steam may pass into an engine producing mechanical energy.  This in its turn may drive a dynamo which produces electrical energy.  This electrical energy may be finally changed into the radiant energy of an electric lamp. 
Just as matter can be neither created nor destroyed, so can we neither create nor destroy energy. 
As far as we know or understand the physical universe to-day, there is nothing beyond these three things: matter, ether and energy.

LESSON 14. 
THE KING WHO TURNED THINGS INTO GOLD. 
According to an ancient legend there was once a King named Midas.  Now Midas loved gold, not because of what he could buy with it, but because he was a miser.  Even when he worked among the rose-trees in his beautiful garden, he wished that he could turn all the roses into gold. 
There was only one thing in the world that he loved more than gold, and that was his little blue-eyed golden-haired daughter.  In spite of his great wealth, in spite of his great palace, of his lovely gardens and dear little daughter, Midas was not happy.  He was discontented.  Rich as he was, he wanted to be still richer. 
In that country there was a powerful god-like youth named Dionysus.  He was the spirit of the springtime, the spirit of youth and gladness.  He wanted to make everybody happy, as he was himself.  He saw that Midas was unhappy and made up his mind to do what he could to cheer him. 
So one day Dionysus went to the King.  He said: "With all your wealth you must be a very happy man."  
The King sighed. "I know I ought to be happy but I am not." 
"What can I do to make you happy?" asked the god.  What would you like above anything else in the world?" 
The King said: "I should be perfectly happy if I had as much gold as I wanted." 
Dionysus was sorry to hear this answer, for he thought that the King, like himself, would wish above all to make other people happy. 
"Are you sure that is all you wish for?" he asked.  "Think. Think well, for I am ready to give you whatever you ask for." 
"If I had the power of turning into gold everything I touched, I should be the happiest man on earth," answered the King. 
Dionysus looked at the King with sadness, and said; "Very well; since that is your wish.  I give you the power of the Golden Touch," and walked slowly away.  
"The Golden Touch," repeated Midas, and as he was thinking of his great good fortune, he sat down on a chair.  No sooner had he touched the seat than it turned into gold.  He looked at it with delight.  There was no doubt about it.  It was gold, pure gold.  With growing excitement he walked about the hall, touching things here and there as he went, and every time he touched something, it turned into gold. 
He walked out into the garden, leaving golden footsteps behind him as he went. The garden was a lovely spot.  There were roses on every side, the tiny white roses that his little girl loved so well, the flowers of the palest pink, and the great crimson roses with rich yellow hearts.  The air was filled with their lovely smell.  It was early in the morning; the birds were singing and the bees were flying from flower to flower in search for honey. 
But Midas cared for none of these things.  He went from bush to bush touching each one as he went.  At length his work was done, and as he turned away, the sounds made by the flowers and leaves as they waved in the breeze seemed to him the sweetest music he had ever heard. 
In his excitement over his new gift, he had forgotten to eat breakfast, and as he began to feel hungry and thirsty, he went back to his golden hall, and called to his slaves to bring him food.  They did so, and he sat down with a good appetite.  But as each piece of food touched his lips, it turned to gold, and the wine and the water flowed back into the cups and became solid masses of gold. 
The King sat and looked with terror at his golden treasure, for what is the use of golden cups and golden plates if he must die of hunger? 
Just then his little daughter came running into the hall crying bitterly and holding a bunch of golden roses in her hand. 
"Oh father," she cried "some one has killed all our beautiful roses!" 
I turned them into gold, dear," said Midas gently; they are far more beautiful like that."  "Oh no," said the little girl.  "Put them back, I don't like these nasty, heavy, gold flowers."  And as she said this she threw herself into her father's arms.  Lovingly he put his hand on her head and began: "Listen to me, dear," when he felt her grow stiff and heavy in his arms, and in a moment he held only a golden statue. 
In horror he laid her down on a couch and cried aloud for help, but all his servants had run away in terror, and he was left alone. 
All through that day, the father sat in that silent house beside the lifeless statue that had been his child, hoping only that death would come soon, and take him too. 
As the sun set, Dionysus once more appeared, and as he came he seemed to bring new life and joy into the lonely palace.  But his face was stern as he said to Midas: "Are you still satisfied? " 
And Midas answered humbly: "I was wrong.  There are many gifts that are far better than gold.  I had them, and I did not know it.  Is it too late?  Will you take back the terrible gift?  For myself, I ask nothing, but bring my little girl back to life, and let me see her and hear her once more before I die." 
Then Dionysus said: "If I do, you will lose not only the Golden Touch, but all the gold you have made to-day. 
Midas started to his feet.  "You will do it?" he cried. 
And as Dionysus pointed towards the couch he turned and saw his little daughter sitting on the edge, looking at the bunch of roses in her hand. 
"Father," she said.  I had a nasty dream.  I thought that someone had turned our lovely roses into ugly things of gold." 
"Shall we go," said Midas, "and make sure that it is not true?" 
With a grateful heart, he turned to thank the god, but Dionysus, happy in the happiness he had given, had gone away. 
Then hand in hand, Midas and his little daughter went out into the silver moonlight,  across the grass and into the garden where the roses were, no longer roses of gold but once again tender, delicate flowers waving gently in the breeze. 
"It was only a horrible dream," the little girl said merrily.  And her father answered, "Yes, dear; it was all a horrible dream."

LESSON 15. 
A TALK ABOUT SPORTS. 
A. I say, have you the time on you? 
B. I make it twenty to three, but I'm about five minutes fast, I think. 
A. Is it as late as all that?  How time does fly!  I promised to be down at Yamamoto's by four for tennis; I shall have to hurry along, or I shall be late. 
B. I'm going that way, too, so we may as well go together. 
A. That's good.  Will you just excuse me a moment while I run off and change. 
B. Certainly. I'll wait here you haven't been long.  
A. No, it doesn't take me a long time to change.  I know some fellows who take quite half an hour every time they dress.  They can't make up their mind which tie or socks to wear, or what sort of shirt or collar to put on.  I'm not like that. 
B. Shall we ride or walk? 
A. I think there's time to walk.  I never like riding short distances if I can help it.  What with waiting for a tram and being crushed in it when it's crowded, riding on a tram isn't a very pleasant experience. 
B. So you're quite an expert tennis player.  
A. I shouldn't like to say that.  I know how to play and an occasional game does me good, especially as I don't take any other sort of exercise. 
B. You say you're playing with Yamamoto.  Is he a good player? 
A. Yes, he's pretty good; very quick on his feet and bas a good eye. 
B. Why do they use soft balls in Japan? 
A. I can't quite say, but I suppose, it's on account of the hard courts.  In Europe we usually play on grass lawns.  
B. Don't you sometimes play on hard courts in Europe? 
A. Yes, sometimes, but the other's more usual. 
B. What's golf?  I've often heard of it, but I don't know how it's played. Is it anything like tennis? 
A. Not in the least.  Well, the game consists essentially of hitting a hard little ball with a stick and then walking after it. 
B. Well, that doesn't sound very exciting. 
A. To be more exact, there are nine or eighteen holes made in the ground about a hundred yards apart from each other.  Around each hole there's a smooth flat lawn.  You hit the ball from hole to hole, and the player who reaches the last hole with the fewest strokes wins the game. 
B. Have you ever played? 
A. Yes, frequently.  It's really an awfully exciting game, and requires great skill. Some people get so enthusiastic about golf that they think of nothing else.  The only literature they read is golf literature, and they have only one subject of conversation. 
B. What's polo? 
A. Polo's quite different.  It's like football in a way, because each side has to drive the ball into the enemy's goal.  But the players are on horseback, and they hit the ball with long clubs which look like hammers.  Hockey's another game of the same type? 
B. Jockey? 
A. No, hockey.  A jockey's a man who rides in horse races.  Jockeys are generally very small men. 
B. What's the difference between hockey, polo and football? 
A. Hockey's played on foot and not on horseback, and the shape of the club's different. 
B. Why do they call it polo?  Has it anything to do with Marco Polo? 
A. What's Marco Polo? 
B. He was a great traveler, one of the first Europeans to visit China. 
A. Oh yes, of course.  Marco Polo.  I didn't quite recognize the name when you said it first.  Oh no, the game of polo has nothing to do with Marco Polo. 
B. The English are very fond of sports, aren't they? 
A. Yes, very.  But people seem to be getting fond of sports all over the world. I was in Kobe the other day and was shown over a rubber factory.  I saw them making the inner balloons of footballs; they told me that they turn out about five thousand a day. 
B. Five thousand? 
A. Or else five hundred; I forget which.  Anyhow it seems a tremendous quantity.  I can't imagine five hundred people in Japan each buying a new football every day.  But perhaps they're made for export. 
B. I beg your pardon? 
A. I said: perhaps they're made for export -- to send to other countries.
B. Oh I see I thought you said "Reck-sport " and I was wondering what sort of sport that was. 
A. Do you play football? 
B. Yes, I'm very fond of it. 
A. More than baseball? 
B. Yes. I don't know much about baseball. 
A. People are very interested in football in England.  But it seems to me that it's played mostly by Professional players -- people who have made a profession of it. They are paid to play, and people pay to see them play. 
B. I thought that cricket was the national game in England. 
A. So it is.  But they only play cricket during the summer. 
B. It has always seemed to me rather a complicated game. How is it played? 
A. It's rather difficult to describe. In fact it's too difficult for me to describe; you have to see it played. One game may last two days. 
B. Two days!  That must be very tiring. 
A. Oh the players don't all play at the same time; and there are always nine players waiting for their turn to play.  There are eleven players on each side and the players on one side go and play in pairs, while eleven on the other side are trying to beat them.  It's eleven against two all the time. 
B. That sounds rather unfair. 
A. No, it isn't unfair.  Cricket's supposed to be the fairest game in the world. The players must never lose their temper or com-plain even if there has been a mistake is not to their favor.  Cricket's a good game for training people in courteous and loyal behavior; it teaches them how to lose a game without losing their temper, and to avoid selfish actions or mean tricks.  If a man does something that is not fair, we often say of him, "He isn't playing cricket." 
B. That's very interesting. 
A. Well, here we are at Yamamoto's.  I shall have to leave you now.  I hope I haven't brought you out of your way. 
B. No, not at all.  I generally go home this way. Good-bye.
A. Good-bye. 

LESSON 16. 
THE LARGEST MONUMENT IN THE WORLD. 
A few miles away from Cairo, the capital of Egypt, stands the greatest monument ever set up on the earth, and the only monument on the earth which looks to-day almost exactly as it must have looked 6000 years ago.  It was built by a hundred thousand slaves working hard for thirty years.  It is said to be the building which has cost more than any other building in the world.  It was designed to be the tomb of a King.
We are speaking of the great Pyramid of Egypt.  It is nearly three times as large as the huge cathedral of St. Peter's in Rome, and fifty feet higher.  The stone that it contains is enough to make a pathway, a foot wide, two-thirds of the distance round the earth. 
Each block of stone of which it is composed is higher than a man.  Can you imagine how heavy these stones are?  Can you imagine how many of these stones there must be in this immense artificial mountain?  The traveler may climb to the top.  It takes him many hours, and the climber generally needs the help of two or three men.  It is a tiring climb, and not without danger.  But each one of these huge stones was once placed by men in the positron that it now occupies.  Each one of these stones had to be cut out of a quarry several hundreds of miles away and brought to this place by water and by land.  To do this and to raise the blocks of stone and fit them to the others must have been extremely difficult. 
For in those far-off days they had no machinery, no system of steel cranes, no system of pulleys and engines such as we have to-day.  
The way it was done was probably like this.  When the first stones had been fixed in their place, a sloping bank was made up to the top.  Up this slope the next great stones were dragged and pushed, and when these had been fixed the slope was built up to the top of them.  So, as the pyramid grew higher, the sloping way grew higher and longer too, until it became a wonderful road for thousands of slaves to walk along, pushing and dragging the blocks upwards and onwards.  Possibly the road was covered with grease to make the dragging of the stones easier, or possibly rollers of wood were used, and behind each stone there must have been slaves with great levers to help.  By the time the pyramid was finished, this roadway must have been miles long.
When at last the pyramid stood complete, and the final stone had been placed on the top, the inclined road was taken away.  That is the only way that we can imagine the pyramid to have been built, and we are not astonished at the immense amount of time and of labor that the building of the pyramid must have required.  And not only time and labor but great skill and precision.  The angles of the pyramid face the four sides of the compass.  Inside the pyramid are long and complicated passages leading to the tomb of the King in whose honor it was built. 
The Great Pyramid, as it is called, is only one of many, for about forty of these great monuments still stand in Egypt, the best-known group being a few miles north of Cairo. 
Quite close to the Great Pyramid stands an immense stone figure called the Sphinx.  It has the head of a man and the body of a lion.  It was not built with stones as the pyramids were, but was carved out of the solid rock, probably before the Great Pyramid was built.  
The pyramids and the Sphinx are probably over 6000 years old.  The ancient Egyptians of those days were a highly civilized people.  They had a system of writing, and to-day we are able to read the words that they carved in the stone of their monuments or painted on the woodwork of their tombs.  They were artists, architects and engineers.  They understood a great deal about astronomy and must have been clever at mathematics.  They had priests, temples, sacred writings, and worshipped the sun, which they considered as their god.  At the time of these ancient Egyptians, the people living in Europe were quite uncivilized and lived as the lowest savages do to-day. 
The Egyptians were a highly civilized people long, long before the time of the Pyramids.  Probably two thousand years before the Great Pyramid was built, the Egyptians must have known how to read and write, how to express numbers and how to calculate.  They must have known how to build boats and houses, and they were probably good artists. 
But the Egyptians were not the only civilized people in that part of the world.  About the time of which we are speaking there were in that country we now call Mesopotamia a race called the Sumerians, who were also far from being savages.  Then we are just beginning to learn that in Crete and other islands of the Mediterranean there were people who could build magnificent cities and palaces.  These people used a system of writing that we are not yet able to read.  It is probably these people who first carried civilization into Greece. 
But whereas the Sumerians and these people of the Mediterranean disappeared before history began to be written, the Egyptians are still a living people with their own country.  They are the only people whose history we can follow back for 7000 years.  Egypt appears to have been a more or less independent country up to the sixth century before Christ when they were conquered by the Persians, and formed part of the Persian Empire. 
Alexander the Great drove out the Persians and made Egypt a Greek province.  About 170 years before Christ it was joined to the Roman Empire.  When the Roman Empire came to an end, Egypt was occupied first by the Arabs and later by the Turks.  It is only a few years since Egypt, protected by England, broke away from Turkey, and now after nearly 2500 years, it is an independent country again. 

LESSON 17. 
REVENGE BY KINDNESS. (PART I.) 
You remember the Hebrew story of Joseph, and how his cruel brothers sold him to the Egyptian slave-merchants.  In this story we shall see how he revenged himself on his brothers by being kind to them.  That is the best sort of revenge. 
Joseph was bought from the merchants by one of the high officers of Pharaoh (for this was the title of the old Kings of Egypt).  After some years of sad trouble, he prospered so well that he became one of the chief officials of the King.  His chief duty was to take charge of the royal storehouse of corn. 
For Joseph, who was very wise and thoughtful had had great storehouses built in all the cities, and had told the people to put in them one-tenth of each year's harvest.  In this way, even in times of famine there would always be enough corn for everybody.  This was done for seven years, and after that there came a great famine that lasted seven years, not only in Egypt, but in all the neighboring countries. 
Thanks to the wisdom of Joseph, Egypt had plenty of corn for everybody.  The King made Joseph the Chief Ruler and ordered everybody to obey him.  So Joseph opened the storehouses and sold corn to all who wanted it. 
Far away in Palestine, Jacob and his sons were suffering from the famine, until at last Jacob came to hear that there was corn in Egypt.  So he sent his ten sons with empty sacks and asses to buy corn.  They wanted to take their young brother Benjamin with them, but their father would not allow this.  He had lost Joseph, he said, and he would not risk losing Benjamin. 
For many days they traveled across the sand and rock of the deserts, and for many days they traveled by the side of the great river Nile, along the road to Memphis, where the King's stores were.  At last they reached the city, and went up the long road towards the office of the Ruler.  
Their names and business were written and taken to the keeper of the granaries.
After some time they were warned to be careful what they said and how they behaved, for they were go before the Ruler himself, and they were then taken to his palace.
They walked up the broad stone steps, and found themselves in an immense hall lined by massive pillars of granite.  In all their lives they had never seen or imagined such a splendid building. 
On a raised platform of stone, sitting in a richly carved chair, they saw a handsome young Egyptian, dressed in his robes of state.  Below him sat the secretaries writing down the orders that he gave.  On each side were the guards in their brilliant uniforms with long shining spears in their hands. 
One of these soldiers told the sons of Jacob to go forward.  They went and knelt down humbly before the young Egyptian.  He looked at them and frowned, and they felt very afraid. 
"Where do you come from?" asked the young Egyptian, who was none other than Joseph the Ruler. 
"From a place called Hebron, in the country called Canaan," was the humble answer.
"What are you?" 
"We are shepherds, the sons of one old man." 
"What are you doing in Egypt?"  
"We have come to buy corn." 
"No," said the great official, "You are spies you are enemies of Egypt."  He said this calmly but with a terrible voice, and the sons of Jacob trembled before it, and bowed down again, just as, in Joseph's dream, the sheaves of corn bowed down to Joseph's sheaf. 
"Indeed we are not spies.  We are honest men.  We belong to a family of twelve brothers," Judah answered. "We have a father, an old man, and another brother, the child of his old age, and he alone is left of his mother's children, and his father loves him dearly.
"Twelve brothers," said the official thoughtfully, "Where is the twelfth?"  
The brothers felt uneasy. After a pause, Judah said "He is dead." 
The Ruler noted the pause and said, but this time in a softer voice: 
"In this way I shall find out whether you are telling the truth.  Send one among you to bring back your younger brother, and the rest of you will remain in prison until he returns.  If you do not consent to do this, or if you cannot do this, then I shall know that you are spies." 
He made a sign to the guards, who at once seized them and took them away to prison. 
As they sat on the floor of the prison looking at each other in silence, they felt sad at the thought that perhaps they would never see their home again.  For they did not know that the King's officer was their own brother Joseph, and that instead of being angry, he was really filled with joy at seeing them after so many years of separation.

LESSON 18. 
REVENGE BY KINDNESS. (PART ‡U) 
Joseph's brothers were to be kept in prison until they settled who should ride back in haste to Hebron to bring Benjamin back to Egypt. 
But Joseph on thinking the matter over began to see that he had perhaps been too severe.  One roan, after all, could not carry enough corn to feed all the starving families in Hebron.  His old father, too, would be anxious.  So he sent word to the prison that the brothers might all go home except Simeon, who must stay in prison until the rest came back with their young brother. 
He gave orders that they were to have their sacks filled with corn, and that each man's money was to be secretly tied up again in the mouth of the sack. 
All the brothers were glad but Simeon, who begged them to come back as quickly as they could; and riding on their high camels, with their asses carrying the sacks, they left the Egyptian city thankful to get away, and went back to their old father in Hebron. 
Jacob was delighted to see them again, and greeted them with joy; but he would not believe their story about Simeon being left behind; and he refused to let them have Benjamin, for he said that Joseph was once taken and never came back, and that the same thing would happen to the other of his young sons. 
They told their father that the Egyptian Ruler had ordered them to bring their young brother.  Their father asked angrily why they had told the Egyptian that they had another brother.  Jacob did not believe them, and this made him all the more determined not to trust Benjamin with them.  They argued with him, but the father remained obstinate in his decision. 
At length, however, the corn which they had brought was finished, and there was a scarcity of food.  The old man urged his sons to go back to Egypt for more.  They refused to do so unless they could take Benjamin with them; and after holding out for a long time, at last their father consented.  He told them to make up a little present of honey, dates, cakes, and suchlike simple country things for the terrible Egyptian, hoping that the great man would not be unkind to his youngest son. 
Mounted on strong camels, and followed by a string of asses with the empty sacks on their backs, the ten brothers left Hebron and rode slowly across the hot desert again.  Once more they arrived at Memphis, and once more they were taken into the presence of the Lord Ruler. 
When they came and knelt before him, it was upon the young man Benjamin that Joseph fixed his eyes.  His brother had grown so much that he could hardly imagine that he was indeed the little boy who used to run about the camp holding his hand. 
"Take these men to my house, for I shall dine with them to-day," was all Joseph said.  The brothers were astonished when the meaning of the Egyptian words was made known to them. 
When they were again called before the Ruler in his beautiful house, they knelt and laid their presents at his feet. 
"Is your father well?" the great man asked in a kind voice.  "The old man of whom you spoke --is he still alive?" 
"He is alive and in good health" they answered. 
"Is this your younger brother, of whom you spoke?" he asked again. 
Benjamin answered with a low bow.  Joseph felt the tears coming into his eyes; and rising from his chair, he left the hall.  The brothers wondered at this, but if they had seen their host in his own room weeping for joy like a child, they would have been more astonished still.  
The meal was served, and the eleven brothers (for Simeon had now joined them) were surprised when the Egyptian Ruler set them at table all in the order of their ages; but even yet they had not the faintest notion as to who he was. 
The next morning, they were sent home, with their asses carrying well-filled corn-sacks.  They wondered why the great Egyptian had been so kind and hospitable to them, treating them as honored guests. 

LESSON 19. 
REVENGE BY KINDNESS. (Conclusion.) 
Now Joseph had told the superintendent that as he filled the brothers' sacks, he was to put their money into them again, and also to take his own beautiful silver cup and put it into the mouth of Benjamin's sack.  This was done for a purpose, as we shall see. 
The next day, when the brothers had started on their journey, the superintendent was ordered by Joseph to ride after the Hebrews and to accuse them of having stolen his master's silver cup. 
The Egyptian drove off in his splendid red chariot, and soon over took the returning travelers.  In a stern voice he reproached them, and asked why they had been so un-grateful as to steal his master's precious silver cup.  They answered in voices of fear that they knew nothing of the cup, and that they were innocent. 
He did not believe them, he said, and accused them once more of theft. 
They replied that he could search the sacks at once, and that if he found it with any one of them, he could put that man to death and make all the rest of them the slaves of his master.  
To their bewilderment and alarm the silver cup was found in Benjamin's sack; and pointing to the youngest brother, the Egyptian said that he would take him back to be his master's slave but as for the rest f the men, they could go on their journey home. 
At these terrible words the brothers tore their clothes with grief, Judah being the first to take hold of his coat and to tear it down from top to bottom, for it was he who had promised his father that he would bring Benjamin back again safe and sound. 
They could not return to their old father without him.  They would go back to the Egyptian city, they said, and all go to prison together rather than part with Benjamin.  And so they all returned to Memphis in sorrow and despair. 
Once again they were received by the Egyptian Lord.  Sternly he spoke to them with his voice full of reproach.  
"I know what you have done, for I am one who knows secret things.  You have been guilty of theft." 
As a matter of fact, he was relieved to see that his brothers were kinder now than on that day so long ago when they sold him to the Egyptian merchants.  But he concealed his real feelings and said that he wanted only the man who had stolen his cup; the others could return their father. 
Then Judah held up his hands for mercy; he told the story of how they had begged their old father to let Benjamin come; adding that if they went back without him, the old man would die of grief.  He begged that Joseph would let him stay behind and be his slave for ever instead of his young brother, and let Benjamin go back to his father. 
Then indeed Joseph knew that his brothers had become better men.  While Judah was speaking, Joseph looked at Benjamin, and sometimes he turned away his head for fear, that they should see the tears in his eyes.  But when his older brother offered to be his slave for ever, the young Egyptian suddenly ordered everyone to leave the room but the Hebrews; and he remained silent, with his head turned away, while his Egyptian friends and servants went slowly out. 
As soon as they had all gone, he stood up, moved towards his brothers and held out his hands to them, calling to them in the Hebrew language - 
"I am Joseph.  I am Joseph, your brother!" 
The bewildered men gazed at him in astonishment and could not even then realize the truth. 
"Come nearer to me and look at me."  It was the voice of Joseph.  They came nearer and looked closely at him.  His face was not an Egyptian face, and his eyes were not Egyptian eyes; they were the eyes of their brother Joseph. 
"Yes, I am Joseph, your brother, whom you sold to the Egyptians!" 
They could no longer doubt that he spoke the truth to them; and as they came forward, he took them in his arms one by one, weeping for joy.  Then seeing in their eyes the deep sorrow for their past unkindness, he added: 
"Do not be sorry nor angry that you sold me here to save many lives in the years of famine.  I am Lord of the King's palace and Ruler of all Egypt.  Have no regret for the past." 
Then he took his brothers home with him to his fine house, where his Egyptian wife an their little children lived; and after a time he sent them away with loads of present and with wagons to bring their children and their old father Jacob to Egypt.  For the were all to come, he said, and live in the fruitful land of Egypt, and he would take care of them there. 

LESSON 20. 
MOLECULES AND ATOMS.
We have already read that the number of difficult things that fill space and that we can weigh would probably reach the astonishing total of two hundred and fifty thousand.  Most of these substances are known as compounds because they are made up of more than one substance. 
Ordinary water is a compound substance, for it is made up of two invisible gases called oxygen and hydrogen.  Common salt, such as we use for cooking, is made up of a metal that floats on water, called sodium, and a greenish yellow gas called chlorine.  In fact almost every one of the vast number of different substances may be broken (or "decomposed" into the simpler substances of which they are composed.  These simple bodies, such as the oxygen and (the) hydrogen of the water, and the sodium and chorine of the salt are things that we cannot decompose; they appear to be simple substances.  There are about eighty of these and the chemist calls them the elements of matter. 
Some of these elements may exist quite alone in a pure state unmixed with any other elements.  Among there are iron, copper, gold, sodium, chlorine, hydrogen, oxygen, and nitrogen.  Others such as calcium are always combined with some other substance and are never found alone.  Some elements are as common as dirt, while others are a thousand those scarcer and more precious than gold.  
The important thing to remember is that these eighty elements combine (or join together) in different ways and in different quantities to intake up all the matter that there is, whether here on earth or on the sun, moon, and stars. 
If we take a small heap of salt and a knife we can easily divide it in half.  We can divide this again and continue dividing it until we have only a single grain of salt left.  And we could split the grain of salt in half and keep on dividing its pieces into halves if we had eyes and instruments fine enough, until we arrived at a piece so mall that if it were broken in two, we should no longer have two pieces of salt but two pieces of two different elements, namely a piece of metallic sodium and a bit of the as chlorine. 
This small piece of salt, so tiny that if it were broken in half, it would no longer be salt, is called a molecule of salt.  A grain of salt is simply a large quantity of molecules of salt. 
The little pieces or particles of sodium and chlorine which we obtained when the molecule was broken are called atoms.  Molecules are made of atoms.  There are as many different atoms as there are elements.  Instead therefore of considering a compound to be a substance composed of elements, the chemist considers it to be a substance, the molecules of which are made up of particles or atoms of the elements.
A molecule, therefore, is the smallest piece of a substance that can exist without being divided into atoms. 
An atom, therefore, is the smallest part of an element that exists in any molecule. 
An element, therefore, is a substance of which the molecule contains only one kind of atom. 
A compound, therefore, is a substance of which the molecule contains two or more kinds of atoms. 
In this diagram we see a tiny fraction of a grain of salt.  It is far far too small to see even with the most powerful microscope.  This bit of salt contains eight molecules, represented here as rings.  Each of these has in it one atom of sodium and one atom of chlorine. 
Atoms have been called the bricks of the universe, for out of them everything is built.  Chemists have given names to the eighty or so elements.  Most of these names are quite unfamiliar to people who are not chemists, but some of them, such as aluminum, copper, gold, iron, lead, mercury, nickel, carbon silver, sulphur, tin and zinc, are well-known names. 
Some elements, like iron, are so common that they are very cheap.  Others are so rare that their price is very high.  Radium is thousands of times rarer than gold.  Others are so exceedingly rare that they cannot be bought at all.  The silvery metal calcium is worth more than forty yen for a mere spoonful, but lies disguised on the surface of every street.  The high cost of calcium is not due to its scarcity, for it is as common as dirt, but to the difficulty in separating it from some of the other elements with which it is combined. 
Some chemical substances, such as calcium and sodium, do not like to be alone but always join company with certain other elements as soon as possible.  Such elements are said to have a strong chemical affinity for each other. 
Another property of the elements is that they always like a certain definite amount of company, and have the habit of combining with each other m definite numbers.  An atom of oxygen does not like to be alone, but tries to combine with another atom of oxygen.  Hydrogen is a lonely atom which travels about by itself, but if it joins company with an atom of oxygen, it much prefers that another one of its fellows should be included in the group.  Two atoms of hydrogen and one atom of oxygen in company with each other form one molecule of water. 

LESSON 21. 
THE DECLINE OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE. (PART I.) 
Some time ago, we read how Rome started by being a tiny city in central Italy, and finished by becoming the capital of a huge Empire stretching from Scotland to Persia. 
When we think about Rome or read about the doings of its great men, we must bear in mind the very great changes that went on throughout the period of Roman dominion. 
Those who speak and write about Japan must distinguish between the Japan of to-day and the Japan of the time before the Emperor Meiji.  The Japan of the beginning of the Meiji period is different from the Japan of the times when Taira and Minamoto struggled for mastery, or from the ages long before. 
Similarly, the English people of to-day is not the same people as that which landed on the shores of Britain fifteen hundred years ago.  What comparison can we make between Tokyo in this present year and the Yedo of the early Shoguns?  Or between London of to-day and the London which existed when Julius Cesar came? 
This history of Rome from the time of its, humble beginnings until the time of its greatest prosperity covered a period of about 900 years.  We may conveniently divide this period into five stages.  The first stage of about 350 years, we may call "The Beginnings of Rome."  It started with the Romans under the Etruscan rule and finished with the invasion of the Gauls. 
H. G. Wells, the famous writer, calls the four remaining stages respectively: 
(2) The Assimilative Republic, 
(3) The Republic of Adventurous Rich Men, 
(4) The Republic of the Military Commanders, 
(5) The Early Empire. 
The second stage lasted 150 years.  It was perhaps the finest stage in Roman history.  The people had nothing more to fear from the Etruscans or the Gauls.  No one was very rich and no one was very poor.  It was a republic of free farmers.  They fought against the neighboring peoples, not to destroy them, but to bring them into unity. 
During the third stage, countries like Sicily were seized and their populations treated as conquered peoples.  Instead of being assimilated to Rome, the countries and their inhabitants were used to make Rome rich, and the ruling classes secured the greatest share of the wealth.  The prisoners captured by the Roman armies were sent to Rome as slaves, and these now took the place of the free citizen farmers.  This stage lasted about 140 years. 
The fourth stage rather reminds us of conditions in China at the present day, for now began a period of about 60 years in which the leaders of the paid soldiers fought among themselves for the mastery of the Roman world.  Each leader in turn rose and fell; the government belonged to the man who was strong enough to hold it.  Julius Cesar was the last of the great military commanders, and with him this stage came to an end, for Octavius, his adopted son, became the first of the Roman Emperors.
The fifth stage, that of the Early Empire, may be considered to have come to an end 150 years after the time of Julius Cesar, for at this moment the Empire reached its greatest extent. 
The rest of the history of Rome is a story of gradual decline until, about 400 years after it was at its maximum of power and glory, the Roman Empire finally broke up and came Ito an end. 
During the third century that is to say, between the years 200 A.D. and 300 A.D.), various peoples, called the Barbarians, moved from their homes in the North and East of Europe towards the European frontiers of Rome.  One of these peoples, called the Goths, who came originally from Sweden, had occupied the plains of what is now Russia.  In the year 247 A.D., they crossed the River Danube and defeated and killed the Roman Emperor. 
In the meantime, another of these peoples, the Franks, had crossed the River Danube, but were beaten back again.  But the Goths came again and again, and Rome was no longer able to hold her territory beyond the Danube. 
In 270 A.D., the city of Rome, which had been open and secure for three centuries, was fortified; the time of conquest and domination was over; the time had come for defense.  Throughout the third century, the Roman Empire, growing weaker as a state and as military power, faced the barbarians.  All along the imperial frontier, marked by the Rhine and Danube, enemies were now pressing.  The Franks and other German peoples had come up to the Rhine.  In North Hungary were the Vandals, the West Goths occupied what is now Roumania, behind these, in South Russia were the East Goths.  In Asia the Roman frontiers were being pushed back b the armies of a new Persian dominion. 
Whenever we read the history of civilizations and of empires, we always read the same sort of story.  We read of young peoples, full of vigor and initiative, firs struggling for their independence, for the right to live in security and freedom.  Then we see them growing stronger and becoming more ambitious.  We see them raising armies and building navies.  We see them getting richer and more powerful; we see then dominating other weaker peoples, we see them as proud masters of subject peoples.  And then we see them at the height of their power beginning to decline.  We see newer and more vigorous peoples in their turn struggling to be free, and in their turn succeeding in their struggle.  We see the rise of Rome, and we see its decline, just as we see the rise and fall of the empire of Alexander, the rise and fall of the Persian Empire, and just as in more recent times we see the rise and fall of the Arabs, the Turks, and all those people who try to secure too big a domination. 
In the next lesson, we shall read of the Romans again; we shall see how their slow and gradual rise to power and dominion was followed by a slow and gradual loss of power, and how Rome, weakened by its own success, sank and sank until the great Empire fell to pieces.

LESSON 22. 
THE DECLINE OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE (Conclusion.) 
If you look at the map which is shown a few pages back, you will see in what manner and from where the Empire was threatened.  The river Danube comes down to within a couple of hundred miles of the Adriatic Sea, and makes an angle there.  The Romans never kept their sea communications in good order, and this two hundred mile neck of land was their line of communication between the western Latin-speaking part of the Empire and the eastern Greek-speaking part.  If the barbarians broke through to the sea at this place, the Empire would be split into two parts. 
The Emperor Constantine was reigning at this period.  It was he who made Christianity the official religion of the Empire.  He was able to beat back the Goths when I they crossed the Danube, but was unable to carry the Roman frontier to the other side of the river. 
Finding that Rome was no longer suitable as the center of the Empire, he decided to shift the capital to the East.  He chose a spot called Byzantium, situated on the narrow neck of land that separates Europe from Asia Minor, and there he began building the city called, after his name, Constantinople. 
Towards the end of the reign of Constantine, a remarkable thing happened.  The Vandals, being troubled by the Goths, asked to be received as a member of the Roman Empire.  Instead of being one of the enemies of Rome they wanted to join Rome and to be protected by Rome.  They were admitted.  They joined the Roman Empire, but did not become part of it.  Rome was too weak to digest them in the same way that Rome had digested the Gauls, or the people of Britain, Greece or Carthage.  Just as we may swallow an indigestible food, so Rome had to swallow the Vandals, and we shall see later how indigestible they were and the great harm that they did to Rome. 
Then the West Goths made a similar contract with Rome.  They had broken through the Roman frontiers not far from Constantinople and had defeated the Roman armies.  They, too, washed to become part of the Roman Empire and were allowed to settle in that part of Europe now called Bulgaria.  In name they were supposed to be subjects of Rome; in realty, they were conquerors. 
Later these Roman Goths fought against these Roman Vandals, and in the course of the struggle the Goths captured Rome and did much damage to it.  
From this we may learn that it is perhaps better to have enemies than to have rough friends. 
In the meantime another and greater danger to civilization was threatening.  From Central Asia there had come a wild savage Mongolian people, the Huns, who had pushed before them the various barbarian peoples of Europe.  They settled down on the plains of Hungary and threatened alike the Goths, Franks, Vandals and Romans.  By the second quarter of the fifth century a great war chief named Attila ruled over the Huns.  So powerful was he that his dominions extended from the Rhine right across the plains into Central Asia.  His armies invaded the Roman territory.  His soldiers robbed, burnt and massacred almost down to the walls of Constantinople.  It is said that he destroyed over seventy cities in that part of Europe.  In 451 he turned his attention to the West and invaded Gaul.  Nearly every town in Northern Gaul was destroyed by his savage followers. 
In face of this terror, Goths, Franks and Romans united to resist the advancing Huns.  A great battle took place in the north of France.  In this battle it is said that 300,000 (three hundred thousand) men were killed.  But Attila was defeated.  This was one of the most decisive battles of the world, for if Attila had won, these Mongolians might have become the masters of Europe.  Although he had been defeated in France, Attila the next year made raids into Italy and terrified all the people who lived there. 
But this was not all. A worse disaster was to come to the wretched inhabitants of the proud city of Rome.  The Vandals, who had settled in Spain, made their way to Africa, captured the Roman colonies there, built a fleet, and became a sea power.  They did just what the Carthaginians had done many centuries before.  Like the Carthaginians, the Vandals realized what the Romans had never realized: the importance of sea power. 
The fleet of the Vandals came to Rome, and the rough barbarian soldiers destroyed many of the most precious works of art.  On account of this act of barbarity we are in the habit of calling "Vandals" all those who destroy beautiful things.  Terrible things like this occur in modern times.  During the great European war, many beautiful towns, ancient cathedrals and monuments, and libraries of precious books were utterly destroyed. 
These raids and conquests by the Franks, Goths, Vandals and Huns proved fatal to the Roman Empire, and in 493 a Goth became King of Rome.  All over western and central Europe barbarian chiefs were now reigning as kings, dukes and the like.  There were hundreds, and perhaps thousands, of practically independent rulers, who were little better than robber chiefs.  Nobody's life was secure, and property was held by force. 
Why had the Roman Empire grown, and why had it so completely failed?  It grew because first the idea of loyalty held it together; everybody felt it a noble thing and an obligation to be a Roman citizen, and was willing to make sacrifices in the name of Rome.  It failed because its rulers did not educate; they did not explain themselves to their citizens and did not invite their co-operation in their decisions. There were no schools and no newspapers.  There remained no will in the Roman Empire, and so it came to an end. 

LESSON 23. 
THE DARK CONTINENT. 
Why do men call Africa the Dark Continent?  It is not because the sun does not shine there.  The reason is that for hundreds and hundreds of years, thousands and thousands of miles of the land of Africa were unknown to Europeans and were unexplored by them.  Why was it unknown?  A glance at this map will show you the reason.  The north coast of Africa and also Egypt lie close to the Mediterranean Sea.  They were among the first countries to be civilized.  But between these places and the rich and fertile lands to the south, there lies the Great Desert, an immense region where there is no water, where little else is to be seen than sand; a region difficult to cross.  To the south of this desert, too, the country is difficult and dangerous, a country of savage peoples, of wild beasts and of poisonous insects, a land of fever and plague.
 It is said that six hundred years before Christ, men in tiny ships sailed right down one coast of Africa, round by what we now call the Cape of Good Hope, and up on the other side.  But men did not dare go right into the country.  The Phoenicians were great explorers, the Greeks were very learned, the Romans were very powerful, but none of these peoples dared venture into the heart of this continent of Africa. 
One of the first men to explore Africa was a Scot named James Bruce (possibly a descendant of King Bruce who took a lesson from a spider).  In 1770, he went through a part of Africa called Abyssinia.  The people there became his friends when they saw the strange things that he could do, curing people with his medicine, or shooting down birds with his gun.  One of the things that the first explorers of Africa wished to do was to discover the source of the great river Nile.  Bruce discovered the source of the Blue Nile, which is the largest of the small rivers flowing into the great White Nile itself. 
When Bruce got back to England, he wrote a book describing his travels and adventures.  Do you remember how the friends of Marco Polo made fun of Polo's book and would not believe his stories of his travels to China and India?  Well, the same thing happened to Bruce.  People laughed at his stories.  They did not believe that there could be such things and such people in the world as he described.  Forty years passed before people would believe him.  Then another traveler went to Abyssinia, and found that all that Bruce had written was true. 
Just as Marco Polo's book made people want to explore the parts of the world to which he had been, so Bruce's book made people want to know more about Africa. 
Mungo Park was the next man to do anything important.  He was a young Scottish doctor. He was captured by savages, who kept him a prisoner.  He escaped and set off with forty-five followers.  By the time he reached the river Niger, there were only seven left.  He wrote an account of his travels and sent this back to England.  One day his boat got upset in a river, and while he was trying to get it right again, the savages came up and killed him.  
Other bold men followed, but many of them died of disease or were killed by the natives.  One man, named Moffatt, settled in the country of the Bechuana people as a missionary, and did good work among the Bechuanas.  
About this time there was a poor boy named Livingstone who worked in a factory in Scotland.  But he rose early and worked late, and studied so hard and well that he was able to become a missionary.  He went to Africa and there he joined Moffatt and married his daughter. 
Later, young Livingstone traveled towards the north of Bechuanaland and the Transvaal (the country of the Boers), and in his journey saw so many new places that he determined to explore the country from side to side.  It took him nearly four years to do this.  He walked from the Atlantic Ocean on the West to the Indian Ocean on the East.  He was often ill, and short of food and medicine, but he never lost courage. 
He went back to England once or twice for rest, but he spent most of his life exploring Africa and preaching Christianity.  He traced the course of important rivers; he discovered great lakes in the middle of enormous forests, and he searched for parts of the country most likely to suit white men. 
At last he could go no further, but settled down, almost starving and almost dead from illness, at a place called Ujiji. 
In the meantime, Livingstone's friends in England had been getting anxious about him.  In America, too, people wanted to know what had become of this brave and good man.  So the owner of an American newspaper asked a man named Stanley whether he could go to Africa to find Livingstone.  So Stanley set out and, after many adventures, found Livingstone at Ujiji just in time to save his life.  It was a wonderful meeting.  There stood Livingstone in front of his hut, pale and thin and ill, with natives all around him.  Stanley could not show how great was his joy.  All he could say was:
"Dr. Livingstone, I presume?"  This sounded so strange and formal a greeting under such circumstances that Livingstone could not help smiling.  And for days after that the two men talked to each other, Livingstone listening to Stanley's news of the outer world, and telling Stanley the story of his own adventures. 
Stanley had to go back to America, and his wonderful story made him famous.  Livingstone remained in Africa, and died there. 
Later, Stanley went back to Africa and explored more of the country, tracing the course of the river Congo to its source.  It was Stanley who told the King of the Belgians about the richness of Central Africa, and to-day the part that Stanley explored has become a colony of Belgium.  
One of the best men that King Leopold sent to explore the Congo region was a major of artillery named Lemaire.  He surveyed the unknown regions and made many maps.  He now lives m Antwerp and, as head of the Colonial school, is engaged in training young men to be good and wise administrators of the Belgian Congo. 
We are getting to know more of the Dark Continent, but we do not know all.  Africa is three times as big as Europe, and in some parts of it men can only travel a few miles in a day.

LESSON 24. 
THE MAN WHO SAVED THE UNION. 
A little over a hundred years ago, in a house of rough logs in the American State of Indiana, a little boy might have been seen lying on the floor in front of the fire writing his compositions with a piece of charcoal on a wooden shovel.  He used the charcoal and the shovel because he was too poor to buy pencils and paper.  He used the firelight because there was no other light in the room. 
During the day, he generally worked hard on his father's farm.  There was so much farm work to be done that the boy seldom went to school.  But he loved learning.  He would walk many miles to borrow a book, and would study far into the night. 
Fifty years later, this poor student was the President of the United States.  His name was Abraham Lincoln.  Not only in America, but all over the world, he is looked upon as having been the best and greatest President that America has known.  He is admired, not so much because he became the head of his country, not so much because he succeeded in overcoming his enemies, but because he was a good man, gentle and generous, humble and honest, and yet firm, determined and courageous in his acts.
His life was one of hardship and sorrow.  Only his great strength of character enabled him to perform the duties and to accomplish the tasks which would have been too heavy for any other man. 
He passed his boyhood in conditions of great poverty.  His father was a careless man; it was the influence of his good mother that gave Abraham Lincoln his beautiful character.  He said in later years: "All that I am or ever hope to be.  I owe to my mother." 
It was his mother who first sent him to school.  "You must learn to read and write," she said.  "You must get knowledge, so that when you grow up you will be wise and good."  His father did not like the idea of hrs son going to school, he wanted him to work on the farm.  Indeed, it is probable that the boy attended school for hardly more than a year. 
For some time, he was a clerk, and later bought a little shop, or store, as they say in America.  About this time he was a tall awkward-looking fellow, wearing cheap and shabby clothes that did not fit him.  Strangers, thought when they looked at him: "This man must be a fool."  But directly he began to, speak, they forgot his clumsy appearance and listened to his beautiful words. 
When he was 25 years old, he was elected as a member of the governing body of the State of Illinois.  Meanwhile, he studied law, and became a lawyer two years later.  The people had so much confidence in him that they elected him as a member of the Congress, that is, the parliament of the United States. 
At the age of 43, he began to speak against the system of slavery that was practiced in some of the States.  It was unjust to employ slaves, and it was a bad thing for the State, he said.  But he did not succeed at that time in convincing people that he was right.  After the elections that were held a few years later, however, he was made President of the United States.  This meant that most of the people had the same ideas as Lincoln, and that they favored the abolition of slavery. 
Directly the news of Lincoln's election was made public, the country formed itself into two parties, one favoring slavery and the other bitterly opposed to it.  The states that favored slavery declared that they would not abolish the system and would not obey the laws abolishing it.  First one state broke off t from the Union and then another until there were eleven states resisting the authority of Congress and the President. 
These eleven states, all in the southern part of the country, were called the Confederate States.  The other states, all in the northern part, were called the Federal States.  The task of Lincoln was indeed a heavy one, for he was determined to save the Union, that is, he was determined that the United States should not be split up into two different countries.  In the beginning, he did not have the support of all in the North.  Many were opposed to keeping states in the Union by force.  These people thought that the country was in the care of a man who could not save it.  Lincoln had a grave responsibility. 
Then started the Civil War that lasted four years.  Of all wars, a civil war is the most terrible, for it is a war between people of the same race and speaking the same language.  Brother may fight against brother, and father against son.  Men fell by the thousand on the field of battle, the armies marched, destroyed and burnt.  But Lincoln held fast to his purpose to keep North and South united.  He felt that he was responsible for the future welfare of his country.  Writing to a friend he said: "If I could save the Union without freeing any slave, I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves, I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone, I would do that." 
In the first years of the war, the Con-federate troops had the advantage, and it looked as if they would win.  But as time went on, the Federals gradually gained the advantage, and in 1865, General Lee, commanding the Confederate armies, surrendered, and the war was at an end.  The President's purpose was accomplished: the Union was saved, and slavery would be abolished. 
You may easily imagine the joy of the people at the conclusion of the great struggle.  Bells were rung; and the people shouted the good news to each other, laughing as they told it.  But now an awful thing happened; something which made the hearts of the people as heavy as they had been light.  While attending the theater in Washington, the President was shot in the head by one of his enemies.  He died at once. 
The assassin escaped, but only for a few days.  He was found hiding in a barn, and was shot when he refused to surrender. 
It was difficult at first for the people to realize how great was their loss. "This was a Man," they said.  And indeed Lincoln was a man, of whom any country might well be proud. 

LESSON 25. 
AIR.
The commonest of all substances is one that we cannot see, smell, or taste.  We find it everywhere.  The earth is surrounded by it.  We breathe it, and at every breath we fill our lungs with it.  If it did not exist, we should die at once.  The name of this substance is air.  Since we cannot see it, and because it seems so light compared with other substances, we do not think of it as a substance. 
As air is so important in every way, and especially of importance to us as human beings, let us read about what it is, what it is made of, and how we can decompose it.  There are many simple facts about air which are very interesting to know. 
When air moves, we call it wind; for wind is nothing other than air in movement.  Air in movement raises dust and blows it about; it moves trees, and we can feel it blowing against us.  Sometimes the movement is so great that we can hardly walk against it.  It is even difficult to stand upright when there is a strong wind. 
When air is not in movement we cannot feel it, but it exists, nevertheless, even in the stillest places. 
We often speak of bottles, boxes etc. as being empty, when in reality they are full of air.  The presence of air in a bottle can be very simply shown by trying to pour water into a bottle having a narrow neck.  The water will not run in easily.  The bottle which we thought to be empty is in reality filled with air, and it is this air which prevents the water from going in easily.
Pure air is tasteless and odorless.  Small quantities are colorless, but when in large masses, as in the sky on a clear day, it appears blue.  
However, the real question which we are interested in is, of what is air composed?  We can get some valuable information on this point by trying a simple experiment.
Place the lighted stump of a candle on a flat cork or block of wood floating in a shallow bowl of water.  Then set a drinking glass or fruit jar upside-down over the candle.  The candle wall burn for a short time, and then go out.  If you allow the glass or jar to cool, you will find that the water has risen in the glass, and there is much less air in the jar than there was in the beginning. 
Why did the candle go out, and what happened to part of the air which was in the jar?  Something necessary for the candle flame to exist must have become exhausted, and something originally in the air must have disappeared in order for the water to rise and take its place.  How does the air remaining in the jar differ from that which was there before the candle went out? 
This something is oxygen and that which remains in the jar is principally nitrogen.  Air is largely a mixture of these two gases. 
Oxygen is a transparent, colorless gas which cannot by its appearance be distinguished from ordinary air.  It is probably the most widely distributed element in nature.  It exists in very large quantities.  It forms nearly one half of the solid crust of the earth, about eight-ninths of the water and about one-fifth of the arr.  Oxygen is absolutely necessary to all animal and plant life. 
When things burn, they combine with oxygen.  This is what burning means.  When a stick burns, the carbon and hydrogen, etc. in the wood combine with oxygen.  The compounds which are formed by the union of oxygen with other elements are called oxides. 
The reason that the lighted candle under the jar went out is because the oxygen in the air became used up. Now a place without air is called a vacuum.  If we could suck all the air out of a bottle, the bottle would contain a complete vacuum.  But it is very difficult to suck or to pump all the air out of anything.  But if we can take out some of the air, we create what is called a partial vacuum, viz. (namely) a place from which the air has been partially exhausted. 
So as the oxygen in the glass was used up, the quantity of air in the glass became smaller; in other words, the disappearance of the oxygen created a partial vacuum, and the vacuum sucked the water in.  
Nitrogen is also a transparent, colorless, odorless, and tasteless gas.  Like oxygen, it is widely distributed in nature and constitutes an important part of all animal and vegetable life.  But in its chemical behavior towards other substances, it is remarkably unlike oxygen.  Oxygen has a strong chemical affinity, that is, it is active and tries to combine with other substances, while nitrogen, at least when in the condition in which it exists in air, is quite inactive and indifferent as regards entering into combination with other bodies.  It puts out flames and destroys life.  Animals, plants, and fire cannot have in pure nitrogen.  It is not poisonous however, for if it were, it could not be breathed in such large quantities as exist in air.  Animals, plants, and fire are killed in an atmosphere of nitrogen, simply for want of oxygen. 
The gases in air besides oxygen and nitrogen are in such small quantities that we need only mention one, viz. (namely) carbon dioxide. Pure country air contains about three parts in ten thousand of this gas. The other gases that we have named have all been elements, but carbon dioxide is a compound.  In the cities there are from six to seven parts of carbon in every ten thousand of air, while in the air of a crowded room there may be nearly ten times as much. 
At each breath, we draw air into our lungs at the rate of about fourteen cubic feet in an hour.  The oxygen of this air is partly used, being taken up by the blood, the remainder passing out again with the breath.  This air that we breathe out contains a considerable quantity of carbon dioxide, which is formed when oxygen combines with carbon.  This is another example of the strong affinity of oxygen.  When it goes into the lungs, it combines with some of the carbon of the body.  Two atoms of oxygen join with one atom of carbon to form a molecule of carbon dioxide.

LESSON 26.
THE STONE THAT GATHERED NO MOSS.
A boy came home from school one day, and said to his mother: "Mother, the teacher told me this morning that it wasn't worth while coming to school any more, as I seemed to have nothing more to learn, so I don't want to go any more." 
"Very well," replied the mother, " if you have done with school, you must go to work.  I know of a tinman who is in want of a boy; you can go and work for him."
The boy was delighted, and set out the next morning to learn how to mend kettles, saucepans, pots, and pans, and how to grind knives and scissors.  It was summer-time, and for a while he was quite happy going about the country with his master.  But winter came, with ice and snow, and he found that the life of a traveling tinman was not as pleasant as he had thought.  So he decided to look for other work. 
A few days later, as he was passing along a street, he saw a tailor sitting in a shop window making clothes.  "That's the sort of work I should like," he thought.
"I will learn to be a tailor."  So he left his master and started to learn how to use a needle and thread, how to cut cloth and sew.  For a little while all went well. 
"I am lucky to have got work that I like," he thought.  "I shall not have to suffer from the cold winds or from storms of rain and snow.  Instead of picking up wet, cold knives and scissors, I shall pick up nice, dry cloth.  Instead of walking along cold, wet roads for hours and hours, I shall have nothing to do but sit in a cosy, warm room."
Once more he became discontented.  Not all at once, of course, for one never becomes discontented suddenly.  But first he found one little thing unpleasant, and then another, till before very long he was as unhappy as before. 
"It's all very well to be a tailor in the winter-time," he said to himself, "though sitting on an uncomfortable board hour after hour makes one's legs ache and grow stiff; but in the hot summer days it's fearfully hard to stay indoors with the heat from the irons.  No, I can't stand it any longer. I must go and find some other sort of work." 
That afternoon, there came down the street a regiment of soldiers.  They really did look fine in their smart uniforms.
"That's the sort of life for me," thought the boy.  And then and there he decided to become a soldier. 
Very soon, he found that he had made a mistake.  A soldier's life was quite different from what he had imagined.  There was daily drill and constant work.  The swords which looked so fine had to be cleaned and polished; the horses had to be washed and combed; the uniforms had to be folded and kept in order.  It was not the cosy life that he had imagined, but a life of work and effort.  Sometimes, when he was very tired, he had to go on guard instead of having the rest and sleep that he longed for.
To make matters worse, he could not give up his work as he had done before.  He was bound to serve his country for three years and, whether he liked it or not, he had to obey his officers and do all that he was told to do.
At length his period of service came to an end, and he was able to leave the army.  He made up his mind to go back to his native village. 
He was practically penniless, and so began to wonder what he was going to do to earn his living.  On his way home, he heard of a farmer who wanted men to help him cut the corn.  So he went to the farm, saw the farmer, and asked for work. 
The farmer asked him what sort of work he could do.
"I can do almost anything," he answered.  "I have been a tinman and a tailor and a soldier." 
"I see," said the farmer.  "I'm afraid you are not the sort of man I want.  I have no use for a tinman; I don't want a tailor, and a soldier is no use for cutting corn or milking the cows.  I'm looking for a laborer who knows all about farming.  I want a man who can use a plough, sow seeds, make hay and cut corn.  I want a man who is willing to learn a trade thoroughly. If you were a good workman, you would not have changed your trade so many times.  You would be no use on a farm."
And so the young man went here and there, trying to find work, but wherever he went, he heard the same thing; nobody wanted to employ a man who had done a little of everything, but had learnt nothing well.
And for the rest of his life, he had difficulty in earning his living. 
This story illustrates the meaning of two proverbs.  The first is "A rolling stone gathers no moss."  This means that stones which remain for a long time in the same place become covered with beautiful moss, but if they roll from one place to another, as in a river or stream, moss will not grow on them. 
The other proverb is "Jack of all trades, and master of none."  This means that anyone who is constantly changing his trade learns a little about many trades, but does not become really expert in any of them. 
Both of these proverbs are true to a certain extent, but they are not perfect guides for our behavior.  A rolling stone gathers no moss, it is true, but it may gain something which is worth more than moss; it may gain experience.  By rolling, the stone wears off its sharp corners and it becomes round and polished.  If people always stay in the same place, they do not gain experience, and they learn nothing new.  People like Marco Polo, Columbus, and Captain Cook were like "rolling stones; "but they gathered something more valuable than "moss," and did a greater service to the human race than those who stayed at home.  And they were probably happier.
To be "a man of all trades, and master of none" is not a good thing, it is true.  But to know a lot about one thing and to be entirely ignorant of other things is not a good thing either.  One of the best maxims for our behavior is this: to know a little about everything and everything about something. 
If Robinson Crusoe had known nothing except navigation or trading, he would not have been able to live in comfort on his island.  He had to become a builder, a farmer, a potter, a tailor, a boat-builder, a carpenter, and a soldier. 
If Columbus had understood as much about colonizing as he did about navigation and geography, his life would have been happier, and he would not have died in poverty.
There is much truth in proverbs, and in popular maxims, but it is well for us not to interpret them in too narrow a manner, but to look at all problems in life from more than one point of view. 

LESSON 27.
AT THE SEASIDE.
A. Hadn't you better get up now?  It's getting late. 
B. Have you ordered breakfast? 
A. Yes. 
B. That's all right.  I'll be down in ten minutes.  When we've had breakfast, we'll go out and look for lodgings; I'm afraid this hotel'll be rather expensive. 
A. Are you ready? 
B. I shall be ready in a minute; I've only got to get my boots on.  Have you been up a long time?
A. About two hours.  I woke up quite early this morning and couldn't get to sleep again, so I got up and had a bath.  After that, seeing that it was still early I started writing some letters, and the time went by so quickly that I didn't notice how late it was getting.
B. Well, that's a funny idea -- to have a bath instead of a bathe.  What's the good of coming to the seaside and not bathing?
A. Having a bath and having a bathe are two different things.  You have a bath just for the same reason that you have a wash -- to get clean.  But you go for a bathe just as you go for a walk or for a ride -- as a sort of healthy exercise. 
B. I am ready now.  Let's go down to the dining-room and see what they're giving us for breakfast. 
A. I wonder which is the way to the sea.  This must be it, I think.
B. There's the sea -- why we're quite close to it!  There are some boats; what do you say to a row?  Sailing-boats too; Let's go for a sail.
A. We haven't time now; we've got to find lodgings. 
B. We may as well have a bathe, though; that won't take long.
A. I shan't bathe; it's too cold for me. 
B. Well look here.  I'll bathe and you can go and look for lodgings.  You understand that sort of thing better than I do.  You'll find me here when you come back. 

A. How did you like your bathe?  Was the water warm?  
B. Never had a better bathe in my life; the water was rather cold, but I don't mind that.
A. Well, I've got some rooms for us in that little house up there on the terrace; two pounds a week, no extras, no other lodgers, no children, perfect quiet inside and outside the house. 
B. You've been a long time about it.
A. Yes, I couldn't get away from the old woman; she talked so.  She says we can come whenever we like; the rooms are all ready. 
B. Then we'll go there this afternoon.  I hope the people are honest; I can't bear to always suspecting people of dishonesty. 
A. Oh, the old woman looked honest enough; but I wish she wouldn't talk so much. 

B. I say, I feel awfully lazy after my bathe and that good lunch they gave us at the hotel.  I should be awfully grateful if you'd go back to the hotel and see about moving our things.  And you might order tea at the same time, and tell Mrs. What's-her-name to get a pot of strawberry jam, and some shrimps.  I haven't had a shrimp tea for ever so long.  Or better still, some prawns.  It's rather cool of me putting everything on you like this, but I know you don't mind. 
A. Well, I promised your mother I'd look after you, and see that you didn't eat anything that would make you ill.  I don't know what she'd say to strawberry jam and prawns though. 

A. Oh, here you are; I couldn't find you.  I've settled everything.
B. Have you ordered tea?
A. Yes.  At half past five.  She says prawns are not to be got.  She'll try and get some shrimps, but everything in the way of fish gets sent up to London, so you can't get any unless you look sharp. 
B. By the way, who do you think I saw Just now?
A. Who?
B. Sharp and Tavistock.  They came down day before yesterday, which happened to be a holiday, and the place was full of excursionists from London.  Sharp's in a great temper about it; he says he hates the place and will never come here again. 
A. I wonder he ever came here -- an unsociable fellow like that.
B. Oh, it was all Tavistock's idea.  He delights in a crowd; and the rougher and more noisy it is, the more he's pleased.  He says he has unlimited confidence in the future of British democracy. 
A. What does he mean by that?  Or perhaps he doesn't mean anything at all; Tavistock's fond of using elegant language. 
B. Oh, Tavistock's sincere enough.  "He really has got a very high opinion of the British working classes and believes in them.  He has a lot to say about "the idle rich," as he calls them.  Personally, I think that the wealthy classes work just as hard as everybody else.  They certainly have more responsibility.  But I don't agree with Tavistock on the subject; I don't care for arguments, and once he starts talking on his favorite subject it's almost impossible to get him to stop. 
A. It's astonishing that those two should be such good friends, and yet they never seem to agree.  Tavistock abuses Sharp, and says he's a wretched old aristocratic pessimist, and Sharp calls Tavistock a shallow-minded optimist. The curious thing is that Tavistock is really much more of an aristocrat than Sharp; I believe he belongs to a very good family.  I should like to see Tavistock.  Are they going to stop here long?
B. They're going away tomorrow, but I asked them to come in and have tea with us this evening. 
A. That's right.  When did you tell 'em to come? 
B. About five. 
A. Well then, we'd better be going back, or they'll be there before us. 

LESSON 28.
WATER.
The great quantity of water which occurs in nature makes it one of the most familiar chemical substances.  Three-fourths of the earth's surface is covered with it.  The bodies of both animals and plants, and many mineral substances contain large amounts.  A world without water would not only be a world without life, but would be utterly different from anything that we know.  If we were to attempt to learn all there is to be known about this wonderful liquid, we should have to study nearly everything there is on the earth, because the question of water comes into very nearly everything.
When you drink a glass of water, you swallow something that is probably older than anything else in the world.  It existed before there was any grass, and before there was a living creature on the earth.  Since it is such an important substance, and the one which chemists use most, it will be interesting for us to learn a few facts about it. 
A good supply of pure water is one of the most important things from the point of view of public health.  Water in large quantities is also required in factories.  In fact, we can hardly imagine what it would be like if we had not a constant supply of water. 
In villages, those who want water have to fetch it in pails or buckets from the nearest stream, spring, or well.  Above a well we generally find a horizontal roller round which is wound a chain or a rope to which a bucket is fastened.  The roller is provided with a handle.  By turning the handle we let the bucket down, or draw it up. 
To-day in our towns and cities we have water in all our houses.  By turning a tap we can get as much as we want, and at any time of the day or night.  The local government or some public company undertake to provide us with as many gallons of water as we require.  They get the water from some river and store it in great reservoirs, or they build a dam across a valley so as to make an artificial lake.  Then they purify the water by means of filters, and bring it through many miles of pipes to our houses. 
At the ordinary temperature of the air, pure water is a transparent liquid substance without taste or smell.  When in thin layers, it appears to be colourless, but large masses of it are blue. 
When the temperature is below the point marked O (zero) on the Centigrade thermometer, and 32 degrees on the Fahrenheit thermometer, water becomes solid, and we call it ice.  Above 100 degrees Centigrade or 212 degrees Fahrenheit, it becomes a gas that we call steam.  Real steam is quite invisible, but what we are in the habit of calling steam is made up of drops of water so fine that they float in the air and look like a cloud.  What we see coming out of the spout of a kettle or from the chimney of a railway engine is not real steam, but steam which has already cooled into water. 
Each molecule of water is composed of two atoms of hydrogen and one atom of oxygen. It is quite easy to break up, or decompose, water into these two gases.  One way of doing it is to pass an electric current through a bowl of water, for if an electric current is caused to flow through water, the force that holds these gases together is broken down.  This picture shows a very simple arrangement for proving that water is oxygen and hydrogen gas.  It consists of a bottle with the bottom broken off and provided with a cork fitted into the neck.  Two small pieces of platinum wire pass through the cork.  The platinum wires are connected to copper wires leading to a small flashlight battery. 
If the bottle is turned upside down and filled with water to which a small quantity of sulphuric acid has been added, the current from the battery will decompose the water.  The reason why we have to use the sulphuric acid is that pure water is not a conductor of electricity, and the sulphuric acid is added to form a liquid which will conduct the electricity from one wire to the other.
As soon as we connect the battery, we notice small bubbles rising from the platinum wires.  You can collect the gas by filling two test-tubes full of some of the water containing the sulphuric acid and holding them upside down over each wire, as in the picture.  As the gas rises in the tubes, it will be found that twice as much gas collects in one tube as in the other. 
Now let us take the test-tube containing the larger quantity of gas, closing the open end with the thumb.  We turn the tube the right way up, remove our thumb and touch the gas with a lighted match.  This gas, which is hydrogen, will take fire and burn.
Hydrogen is a transparent, colorless, tasteless and odorless gas.  It is one of the lightest substances known, being 141/2 (fourteen and a half) times lighter than air.  That is why we fill balloons and airships with hydrogen.  As it is lighter than the air, the balloon goes up. 
The tube containing the smaller amount of gas is filled with oxygen.  Oxygen will not catch fire and burn as hydrogen does, but if we hold the tube with mouth upwards and put into it a piece of wood, such as a match or a toothpick which has a spark of fire at the end, the wood will instantly burn more brightly and burst into flames. 
In this way, we can prove that water contains two parts of hydrogen and one part of oxygen. 

LESSON 29.
RUBBER.
A long time ago, a brown-skinned native of South America happened by accident to cut a tree with his knife.  From the cut he made in this tree came a milky sort of stuff which grew hard and firm when it was exposed to the air.  He found that this stuff was not affected by water, and that it was a good thing to put on wounds. 
When Columbus went to America, he found the people of Haiti playing with balls made of this same substance and, four hundred years ago, a traveler noticed that the natives of Mexico used this substance for making their cloaks waterproof. 
But neither the Spanish conquerors of Mexico nor the Portuguese conquerors of Brazil had any idea of how valuable this wonderful substance would be to men.  Towards the end of the eighteenth century, somebody discovered that when rubbed upon pencil-marks, it would remove these pencil-marks from paper.  And so they called it "rubber" or "Indiarubber."  While artists were using it for this purpose, a Scot named Maclntosh put it to the use which the American Indians had made of it; he used it to give us the first waterproof coats, and these coats, called after his name, were known as mackintoshes. 
Then surgeons came to realize that this substance was waterproof, and had it made into thin sheets and tubes for surgical purposes. 
But the disadvantage of rubber was that it became sticky and soft in warm weather or whenever it was exposed to heat.  An American named Goodyear discovered that if a stuff called sulphur were mixed with rubber, it would make it hard and durable.  The adding of sulphur to rubber is a process called vulcanizing.  Gramophone records are made of this vulcanized rubber, as are many useful objects, such as surfaces for roads, tires for bicycles and motorcars and, in fact, many hundreds of things. 
Of course, the man who discovered the process of vulcanizing was laughed at, but by the year 1844, he was able to prove that his discovery was practical.  A man in England had the same idea, so that two different men, in two different parts of the world, were working at the same idea at the same time. 
Think of all the things that vulcanized rubber is used for.  We use it so much now that it is hard to understand how people ever got along without it.  Millions of pairs of boots and shoes are made of it every year, and besides this, we fit rubber soles and heels to ordinary boots and shoes.  Rubber sheets are much used; water and gas often flow through rubber tubes. When rubber is made into thin bands or strings, we call it elastic.  Rubber rings are used for all sorts of purposes.  Hot water bags and air cushions are made of this same wonderful substance. 
The first bicycle tires were made of solid rubber.  Then one day an Irishman, Mr. Dunlop, had the idea of making hollow tires and filling them with air.  The wheels of the bicycle or the car, instead of touching the ground, actually run on the air in the tube. 
The cover that fits over the thin tube is strong and hard, and protects it from damage.  It was this invention that made cycling popular.  It also made the motorcar possible. 
Rubber can be made so hard that it is no longer elastic.  The chief difference between making hard rubber and elastic rubber is the amount of sulphur and the degree of heat used.  With this hard rubber, we make things like gramophone records, combs or buttons.
Rubber, as we have read, is the juice of the rubber plant.  This tree grows in hot climates, particularly in the Malay States, in Ceylon, in Africa, and in South America.  At first this juice was obtained from trees growing wild in their natural state, but in recent years, the rubber tree has been cultivated and planted in different parts of the world. 
Just as that sticky stuff called gum flows from certain trees, so does the juice of rubber flow from others.  In fact, rubber is a sort of gum, and for that reason the French call rubber "gomme", and the Japanese call it "gomu." 
This sticky stuff is collected from the trunks of trees and is sent to the factory.  There it is heated and purified.  It is passed between hot rollers in machines, and it comes out in thin layers, and when still hot, may be made into sheets or tubes.  It may be passed into moulds of various shapes so as to make footballs, or shoes, or tires.  While it is being heated and rolled, various chemicals, such as sulphur, are mixed with it in order to make it strong and durable or to give it the required color. 
It was an Englishman, Captain Wickham, who first brought the seeds of the rubber plant to England.  He took them to the famous Kew Gardens near London.  The properties of these seeds and this plant were studied, and the tree was planted first in Ceylon, and then in the country near Singapore.  The sort of rubber which is cultivated from seeds is called "plantation rubber."  It is cleaner and purer than what is called "wild rubber," and yet the latter possesses greater strength and elasticity. 
'Most of the rubber we use to-day comes from the rubber plantations of the Malay States.  Wild rubber comes mostly from the Congo State in Africa, and Brazil in South America. 
The rubber plant is one of the most important plants that we know.  More and more uses for rubber are being found every day.  Let us be thankful to those who discovered the rubber plant and its possibilities.

LESSON 30.
A PEOPLE WITHOUT A COUNTRY.
PART I.
You remember reading the story of Joseph, how his brothers sold him as a slave to the Egyptians, and how, many years afterwards, he became the most important of the officers of the King of Egypt.  Now Joseph was a Hebrew, and the Hebrews were a people who lived in a country now called Palestine, on the borders of the Mediterranean Sea.  It will be interesting to learn something about these Hebrews, because from them are descended the Jews, who may be called "a people without a country." 
There is another reason for which it is interesting to read about the Hebrews; it is because their early history, legends, traditions and beliefs form the first of the two parts of the Bible, which is the sacred book of the Christians.  Indeed, Jesus Christ, who is worshipped by the Christians as the Son of God, was a Hebrew. 
According to the Hebrew literature, these people are descended from a man named Abraham who lived in the country about Babylon, probably about 4,500 years ago in the time of Hammurabi, the great and wise ruler of the Babylonian people.  He traveled from there to the land of Canaan, now called Palestine, and the God of Abraham, according to the Bible story, promised that this land should belong to him and to his descendants. 
His son, Isaac, was the father of Jacob, and this Jacob was the father of Joseph and his brothers who settled in Egypt, as we have read. 
The descendants of this family, in later years, were made slaves by the Egyptians, and were treated very cruelly.  At length one of their number, named Moses, became their leader.  He was a man of immense will and authority, and succeeded in making his people free, and in bringing them away from Egypt.  We are told that they lived for forty years in the wild northern parts of Arabia from where, in the end, they invaded Canaan, which they considered to belong to them.  From the records that we obtain from the Bible they were a fierce and cruel people, destroying and burning towns, and killing even innocent women and children, just as the Goths, Vandals, and Huns did in Europe many centuries later.  All this may have happened between 3,300 and 3,600 years ago.
But they did not succeed in conquering more than the hilly country of the East, for the Philistine people on the coast were successful in defending their towns against the Hebrew attacks.  Nor did the Hebrews succeed in their fights against the other peoples by whom they were surrounded.  In the Bible we find a record of their struggles and disasters during this period.  For very largely it is a record of disasters and failures very frankly told. 
They were ruled by judges and priests.  Probably in the hope of greater military success they chose a King, Saul, to lead them in battle.  But this was no great improvement, and Saul was defeated and killed in battle by the Philistines.  The king who came after him was a young man named David, who in his early life was a shepherd.  With David came the only period of prosperity that the Hebrew people ever enjoyed, for he was wise enough to form an alliance with the Phoenician city of Tyre, which lay on the coast to the north.  David was able to make his frontiers secure, and established his capital at Jerusalem. 
Solomon, the son of David, completed the work of his father by building the walls, palace, and temple of the capital.  Maintaining friendly relations with the King of Tyre, he made the Hebrew people prosperous.  He has the reputation of being one of the wisest men, but it is clear that Solomon was too fond of luxury, and that he overworked and overtaxed his people.  At his death, the northern part of his kingdom broke off from Jerusalem and became the independent country of Israel.  Jerusalem remained the capital of Judah.  Those Hebrews who lived in Judah were descended from that one of Joseph's brothers whose name was Judah, and in the end came to be called the Jews or the Jewish people. 
The period of prosperity did not last long.  The friendly King of Tyre died, and Egypt grew strong again.  According to H. G. Wells in his "Short History of the World": 
"The history of the kings of Israel and the kings of Judah becomes a history of two little states ground between, first, Syria, then Assyria, and then Babylon to the north, and Egypt to the south.  It is a tale of disasters and of deliverances that only delayed disaster.  It is a tale of barbaric kings ruling a barbaric people.  In 721 B.C., the kingdom of Israel was swept away and its people utterly lost to history.  Judah struggled on until in 604 B.G. it shared the fate of Israel.  There may be details open to criticism in the Bible story of Hebrew history from the days of the Judges onward, but on the whole, it is a true story." 
The Jewish people were carried off to Babylon as prisoners, and so for the second time in their history, they were a people without a country.  Unlike the people of Israel, however, the Jews remained a separate people, never mixing with the conquerors, and always holding to their customs. 

LESSON 31.
A PEOPLE WITHOUT A COUNTRY.
(Conclusion)
  When the Jews had been in captivity about 40 years, the Emperor Cyrus of Persia conquered Babylon and made it part of the Persian Empire.  He allowed the Jews to return to their country, and to rebuild Jerusalem.  But the people who came back to Jerusalem were a very different people in spirit and knowledge from those who had gone into captivity.  They had learnt civilization.  They had come to realize that their God was invisible and far away.  All other peoples had national gods, in the form of images, that lived in temples.  If the image was smashed and the temple destroyed, that god died.  But this was a new idea, this God of the Jews, in Heaven, high above priests and sacrifices.  The Jews were held together by the Bible and by the reading of the Bible. 
  Two hundred years after the return to Jerusalem under the protection of the Persians, the Persian Empire broke up before the victorious forces of Alexander the Great, who invited many of the Jews to settle in his new city of Alexandria.  Another two centuries passed, a period of struggles, rebellions and quarrels; and finally the Romans in 63 B.C. took Jerusalem and subsequently added Judah (or Judea, as they called it) to the Roman Empire. 
  It was when Judea was under the domination of the Romans, under Augustus Cesar, that Jesus Christ was born.  He spent his early life with his parents in a village called Nazareth, where he obtained the usual education of the time, and learned the trade of a carpenter. 
  At the age of thirty, he started his mission of preaching the religion which has become associated with his name.  He attracted followers, and filled them with love and courage.  He lived a life of poverty, and claimed that poverty was essential for those who wished to follow him. 
  The Jews considered themselves to be the chosen people of their God.  They believed that their God had made a sort of contract with Abraham, by which they would become the greatest people on earth.  They were very angry when they heard Jesus sweeping away their beliefs.  He told them that God was the loving father of all life without any chosen or favorite people.  He told them that men were all brothers and formed the great human family. 
  Even his own followers expected him to set up a new kingdom, and they were disappointed when he refused to be tempted to do so. 
  The priests found his words and acts offensive, and Christ was arrested as a person whose ideas were dangerous, and after a trial before the Roman authorities and Jewish priests, was cruelly put to death.  It was little imagined at the time that this humble wandering preacher had founded a religion which was to have a greater effect than any other on the subsequent history of the world, and that future Emperors of Rome would bow down and worship one who had been executed as a common criminal. 
  In the year 66 A.D., the Jews rebelled against Rome.  The Emperor Nero sent his 1 general, Vespasian, to put down the rebellion.  Terrible fighting followed, but before Jerusalem had fallen, Vespasian became Emperor and left his son to complete the work.  After a long and dreadful siege, the Romans broke down the walls, destroyed the city and the temple, and all who were left alive were sold as slaves.
  This was in the year 70 A.D.  The Jews were once more scattered and without a country.  When the Roman Empire in its turn fell to pieces, Judea was held first by the Persians, then by Arabs, and Turks.  Like so many other old countries, such as Assyria and Babylon, the kingdom of the Jews was destroyed and swept away.  Here is the strange and wonderful difference between Judea and the rest.  The peoples of Assyria, Babylon, and many other ancient kingdoms and empires were swept out of existence.  Nobody knows what became of them, but the Jews are still a living people to-day.  Never in history have there been so many of them, never have they been so influential and so powerful as to-day.  We find them as great bankers and business men, as lawyers, as musicians, as writers, as philosophers, and as statesmen. 
  We find English Jews. French Jews. German Jews, Russian Jews -- we find Jews all over Europe and America.  They are rightly proud of their race, their history and traditions, and at the same time are loyal citizens of the countries to which they belong.  Many Jews are immensely rich, but they are generous givers to charity and education.  They obey the old law of Moses which declares that a man must give a tenth of all he earns to works of charity and religion.  In 1917, during the Great War, Jerusalem was captured from the Turks by the British.  Palestine, as the country is now called, is being governed by the British for the League of Nations.  Under their government, the Jews are being invited to settle once again in the country from which they have been driven so many times, and it may be that Palestine will one day become once again a Jewish state, and the Jews, if they so wish it, will no longer be a people without a country. 

LESSON 32
OBSERVE THE THINGS THAT MATTER.
  You go to school every day, don't you?  And you have walked from your house to the school every day perhaps for some years past, haven't you?  But if I were to ask you how many steps you take between your house and the school, you would probably answer: "I've never noticed." 
  If I were to ask you how many houses there are in the street you live in, or how many windows there are in a railway carriage, you would probably give me the same answer, for we are not in the habit of noticing things that have no importance for us, or no interest for us.  Indeed, it would be foolish and harmful for us to notice things that are not worth noticing, for it would prevent us from paying attention to things that really are of importance. 
  If somebody put salt instead of sugar in your coffee, you would notice it directly you began to drink it.  If you saw an elephant one day walking down your street, you would certainly notice that, for we always do notice unusual or uncommon things. 
One day an artist, a geologist and a botanist went out for a walk in the country.  On their return, somebody asked them what they had noticed.  The artist said he had noticed the color of the clouds, the effect of the sunlight on the distant hills, and the contrast between the dark green of the pine-trees and the brightness of the yellow sand.
The geologist said that he had not noticed any of these things.  He had however noticed the nature and composition of all the rocks that they had passed during the walk.  He had noticed that the large, round stones in the stream were of granite, and that the high cliffs on either side of the valley were of yellowish sandstone. 
  The botanist had noticed neither the beauty of the scenery nor the composition of the rocks.  But he had paid attention to all the plants that were growing by the side of the road.  He had noticed a peculiar kind of fern, the different varieties of moss, grass and flowers.  Each of the three men had noticed the things that interested him most, and nothing else. 
  To notice something means about the same thing as to observe something, and observation is one of the most important, if not the most important of our mental habits.  All knowledge and all skill is based upon observation.  Sir Isaac Newton observed the apple fall -- and discovered the theory of gravitation.  Galvani noticed the legs of a dead frog jumping when they touched a piece of metal -- and discovered the principle of electric currents.  The man who noticed that hot air is lighter than cold air invented the first balloon.  Every discovery in science is due to some act of observation, or "noticing."
  Whether we notice a thing or not depends upon the sort of interests we have.  All things that affect our welfare are interesting.  If our home is in Tokyo or London, we are not particularly interested in a piece of news concerning Chinese bandits, but if we are living in a lonely part of Manchuria, such a piece of news is of the greatest interest to us, for it may affect our welfare.  The weather is generally of greater interest to a sailor than to one who lives on the land, for often the safety or the life of a sailor may depend on the weather. 
  This is why we notice those things that may have an influence on our lives, our safety, our success, or our comfort.  If you see your name in a newspaper or report, you notice it immediately, and read the paragraph in which it occurs with attention and interest. 
  If you have read the stories of Sherlock Holmes, you know that the success of this detective was due to his habit of noticing things.  He noticed things that other people did not notice, and so he was able to find out things that other people could not find out.
  Those who are successful in study owe their success, above all, to the habit of observing the things that are of importance in their particular branch of study.  If you are a good student of English, it is because you notice the right sort of facts concerning the English language.  You notice whether a word is singular or plural, you notice whether in a certain sentence the article is definite or indefinite; you notice when the infinitive is used, or the present participle; you notice the order of words; you notice how the various sounds are pronounced and how words are spelt.  And in noticing these things you remember them.  It is very difficult to re-member things that you have not noticed.
  The student who makes many mistakes in reading or writing English is the one who does not notice the things that he ought to notice.  He learns a new word without noticing whether it is an adjective or a noun.  He learns a new noun, but does not notice whether it is used in the singular or in the plural.  He learns a new verb, but does not take the trouble to notice in what form it is used.  A student who pays no attention to these important things will never learn English successfully. 
  A professor of chemistry used to say to his students: "Gentlemen, you should always observe; you should always use your powers of observation."  One day he took a cup, and poured into it all sorts of bitter drugs.  "Now, gentlemen, please observe," he said.  Then he dipped one of his fingers into the horrible mixture, and a moment later he was seen to be sucking his finger.  "Come, gentlemen," said the professor."  Do exactly as I did."  And he passed the cup round.  Each student dipped a finger into the cup and made a grimace as he sucked the stuff off his finger, and some of them were nearly sick. 
  "Gentlemen," said the professor, "I told you to observe, but you didn't observe, otherwise you would have noticed that the finger I dipped into the cup was not the 
finger that I put into my mouth afterwards! " 

LESSON 33.
WIND.
  People who are in the habit of studying the weather (or "weather-prophets," as we call them), can very often tell us whether we are going to have a fine day or not.  They can often tell us what the weather is going to be like the next day.  They will say to us "I don't think it's going to rain," or "You'd better take your umbrella with you to-day, because we're quite likely to have some showers."  They will tell us whether to expect a cold or warm day, or whether it is likely to be dry or showery. 
  When these people want to know what the weather is going to be like, the first thing they do is to see where the wind is coming from.  When the wind comes from the north, we know that the weather is likely to be cold; when it comes from the south, the weather is likely to be warm. 
  During a storm, the wind usually changes, blowing sometimes from one side and sometimes from another.  This change in the wind will often give us an indication as to how long the storm is going to last.  An east wind may bring a storm, but if it begins to change its direction, we may expect an increase or a decrease of the storm according to the way in which the wind changes. 
  Winds are currents of air moving in various directions and at different speeds.  We may ask ourselves why there are such things as winds or what is the cause of them.  The cause is this: in one part of a country or of the world, the air may become warmer; now warm air becomes lighter, and so it spreads; it moves upwards and outwards for it is trying to occupy more space.  As a consequence of this, the colder air from the outside spreads downwards and inwards. 
  There are three sorts of winds: those which blow regularly all the year round in practically the same direction; these are called the regular winds.  The second sort of winds blow regularly in the same direction at the same seasons of the year and at the same hours of the day; these are called the periodical winds.  The third sort of winds are those which blow sometimes in one direction and sometimes in another without any apparent cause; these are called the variable winds. 
The regular winds are also known as trade winds.  They blow from the northeast to the southwest in the Northern Hemisphere (that is, the northern half of the earth), and from the southeast to the northwest in the Southern Hemisphere (that is, in the southern half of the earth).  They are caused by the hot sun at the equator.  The equator is that part of the earth which is midway between the North Pole and the South Pole.
The heated air rises as the sun passes from east to west, and its place is occupied by the colder air from the north and south. 
  The periodical winds have different names according to the parts of the world in which they occur.  One of these is the monsoon, which blows from the sea towards the land for six months in the summer around the Red Sea, Arabian Gulf and the Indian Ocean, and in the opposite direction for six months in the winter. 
  In the United States and other parts of the world, the breeze blows towards the land during the day, and from the land to the sea during the night.  These are called the "land and sea breezes."  In the daytime, the land becomes more heated than the sea, and therefore it spreads upwards and outwards, and its place is taken by the cold air flowing from the sea towards the land.  During the night, after the sun has set, the land cools more quickly than the sea, and therefore winds in the opposite direction are produced.
  Some periodical winds are very violent and destructive.  One of them is the simoom, which blows on the hot deserts of Asia and Africa.  The air becomes dark and full of sand.
  Strong winds that blow with a circular, whirling movement are generally called cyclones.  A cyclone will sometimes blow houses down, tear up trees by the roots, and throw people into the air.  The sort of cyclone that occurs in the East is called a typhoon.  Typhoons are very frequent in Japan and off the coast of China. 
  Although the variable winds do not apparently obey any regular laws, there is a tendency for them to change according to the movement of the sun, that is, to pass from the north to the northeast, from the east to the southeast, and so on.  The wind rarely or never changes in the opposite direction. 
  We have notably two sorts of instruments to give us information about the wind; an instrument which tells us from what direction the wind is blowing, and one to tell us how fast the wind is blowing.  You may imagine how important it is for sailors to know about the wind, for it is the wind which makes the sea rough or calm.  With a good wind, the ship has a good voyage, and may arrive quickly at its destination.  With a bad wind, the voyage may be a dangerous one, and the arrival of the ship may be delayed many days. 

LESSON 34.
FARTHEST NORTH AND FARTHEST SOUTH.
  More than a thousand years ago, there was a man named Othere who often wondered what the world in the far North might be like.  He probably lived in one of the countries that we now call the Scandinavian countries: Denmark, Norway or Sweden.  He seems to have been a rich man, but he left his farm, and went as far north as he could, and came to those seas where there are mountains of ice and where the nights are six months long. 
  When he returned, he told his story to Alfred, the King of the Saxons, and Alfred, who was a man of learning and understanding, wrote down the adventures of Othere, and made a book of them. 
  Ever since that time, men have wanted to travel to the North to see what it is like in the country of ice.  It is difficult for us to understand what life must be in those northern regions.  No fruits, no vegetables, no trees, no rice, no cornfields, no towns, no way of getting about except in small boats made of skins, or on sledges drawn by dogs or reindeer.  For food, clothing, and oil, to give heat and light, the people who live there depend on the seals, whales, foxes, bears, and fish. 
  One of the most famous expeditions of discovery was that of Sir John Franklin, who in 1847, tried to find a way from Europe to Asia by way of the north of the American continent.  No one ever returned from that expedition, but many years later it was found that they had all died of hunger and cold. 
  One of the things which people were particularly anxious to do was to go to the North Pole itself, to go to the very top of the world, the most northern point.  If you could stand at this point, in whatever direction you went, you would be going towards the South, for there, there is neither East nor West.  If you examine a globe, you will understand what this means. 
Most of those who set out to explore the North, hoped to reach the North Pole.  Dr. Nansen, a Norwegian, tried to get there in 1893.  He spent three years on his voyage.  He did not reach the North Pole, but he got nearer than anybody else had done. 
In 1897, a bravo Swede named Andree, tried to reach the North Pole by going in a balloon.  He was last seen floating away to the North, but nothing has been heard of him since. 
  In 1903, a Norwegian named Amundsen, during a voyage which lasted three years, succeeded in sailing from the Atlantic to the Pacific by way of the sea, north of America.
  An American named Peary had explored the country called Greenland, and found that it was an immense island.  In 1908, Peary made up his mind that he would go as far as the North Pole.  He went as far as he could go by boat, and then with 23 men, 19 sledges, and 133 dogs went forward over the ice.  After they had gone a certain distance, a smaller party loaded most of the remaining food on a smaller number of sledges, and went forward again.  Then a smaller party still loaded a still smaller quantity of food on a still smaller number of sledges, and went forward once more. 
  The plan succeeded, for in the end Peary, with five other men, started on a rush for the Pole, and on April 6th, 1909, their instruments showed that they had reached the northernmost point of the earth.  They had got to that curious point where you can go to the West only by walking round in a circle with the same movement as the hands of a clock, and can go to the East only by walking round in a circle in the opposite direction. 
  The question then arose: how to get back to the ship.  The day after their arrival at the Pole, they started to return, and in sixteen days, they reached land; for you must remember that they had been travelling not over land, but over the ice that covered the Polar (or Arctic) Sea.  The North Pole is frozen sea, and not land.  Two days later, they found their ship and, two months later, came back to America to announce that the North Pole had been discovered!  
  Seventeen years later, in May 1926, the North Pole was reached for the second time, also by an American, Commander Byrd.  But this time, instead of a year's difficult journey, the trip there and back lasted only fourteen hours, and was made in an aeroplane.  A few days after this, Amundsen (who was the first man to reach the South Pole, as we shall see later) succeeded in reaching the North Pole in an airship. 
  During the same year in which Peary had set out to discover the North Pole, an Englishman, named Shackleton, tried to get to the South Pole, and his journey was still more difficult, for the South Polar region is one of high mountains.  Instead of dogs, he used a motorcar and ponies.  The car was of little use, but with the horses he got within a hundred miles of the South Pole. 
  Next came a race between the English and the Norwegians to see who could first reach the South Pole.  The Norwegian, Captain Amundsen, who had been so successful in the North, started first. 
  His ship was the same vessel as the one that Nansen had used eighteen years before.  His party used dogs and sledges, and in the warmest season, they made a dash for the Pole.  They crossed the mountains, and on December the 16th, 1911, their instruments showed that they were at the South Pole, the southernmost point of the world.  They raised the Norwegian flag.  The North and South Poles had been reached, and the work of Othere completed. 
  The Englishman, Captain Scott, arrived at the South Pole almost exactly a month later.  He found the Norwegian flag there, and Captain Amundsen's tent.  This we know only from the diary of Captain Scott which was found many months later, for he and his party never returned.  Their bodies were found; these brave men had died from hunger and cold on their return journey when they were only a few miles from the camp where there was food and fire. 
  Here are some of the differences between the Arctic (or Northern) and the Antarctic (or Southern) Polar regions.  The former is a great sea of ice; the latter is a great continent with high mountains.  It is colder in the South than in the North.  This South Continent was once a warm country, for we find coal there, and fossils of creatures that can only live in a warm country, but no animal life is to be found there to-day.

LESSON 35.
ABRAHAM LNCOLN
PART I.
  A few years ago in London a play was performed at one of the theatres.  It represented the life of Abraham Lincoln, the great President of America, whose life we have already read. 
  Although the play is not altogether true to the actual historical facts, it gives us a good idea of the time of the American Civil War and of the way that Lincoln must have spoken and behaved. 
  In the following pages we will read some of the most interesting and dramatic parts of the play. 
  Let us now imagine ourselves on an April evening in 1865 in a room of a farmhouse not far from the place where the last battle of the war was being fought.  This farmhouse is the headquarters of the Federal army commanded by General Grant.  It seems certain that the Federals will succeed in surrounding the Confederate army under General Lee.  News has just come that the President has arrived. 
We see Grant sitting at a table with one of his officers, Captain Malins, and Dennis, an orderly, sitting at another table as Abraham Lincoln comes in.  The President is wearing top boots and an old tall hat.  He shakes hands with Grant, and takes Malins' salute.  He is accompanied by an attendant, Slaney. 
Grant. I wasn't expecting you, sir. 
  Lincoln. No; but I couldn't keep away.  How's it going? 
  (They sit.)
  Grant. Meade sent word an hour and a half ago that Lee was surrounded all but two miles. 
  Lincoln. That ought to settle it, eh? 
  Grant. Unless anything goes wrong in those two miles, sir.  I'm expecting a further report from Meade every minute. 
  Lincoln. Would there be more fighting? 
  Grant. It will probably mean fighting through the night, more or less.  But Lee must realize it's hopeless by the morning. 
  An Orderly (entering). A dispatch, sir. 
  (The Orderly goes and a young officer comes in.  He salutes and hands a dispatch to 
Grant.) 
  Officer. From General Meade, sir. 
  Grant (taking it). Thank you. 
  (He opens it and reads.) 
  You needn't wait. 
  (The Officer salutes and goes.) 
  Yes, they've closed the ring.  Meade gives them ten hours. 
  It's timed at eight.  That's six o'clock in the morning. 
  (He hands the dispatch to Lincoln.) 
  Lincoln. We must be merciful.  Bob Lee has been a gallant fellow. 
  Grant (taking a paper). Perhaps you'll look through this list, sir.  I hope it's the last we shall have. 
  (This paper is a list of the names of soldiers who are to be punished for various military offences.  In one case a soldier has been found asleep while on sentry duty and so, according to military law, he is to be shot.) 
  Lincoln (taking the paper). It's a horrible part of the business, Grant.  Any shootings? 
  Grant. One. 
  Lincoln. Damn it, Grant, why can't you do without it?  No, no, of course not!  Who is it?  
  Grant. Who is it, Malins? 
  Malins (opening a book). William Scott, sir.  It's rather a hard case. 
  Lincoln. What is it? 
  Malins. He had just done a heavy march, sir, and volunteered for double guard duty to relieve a sick friend.  He was found asleep at his post. 
  (He shuts the book.) 
  Grant. I was anxious to spare him.  But it couldn't be done.  It was a critical place, at a gravely critical time. 
  Lincoln. When is it to be? 
  Malins. To-morrow, at daybreak, sir. 
  Lincoln. I don't see that it will do him any good to be shot.  Where is he? 
  Malins.. Here, sir. 
  Lincoln, Can I go and see him? 
  Grant. Where is he ? 
  Malins. In the barn, I believe, sir. 
  Grant. Dennis. 
  Dennis (coming from his table). Yes, sir. 
  Grant. Ask them to bring Scott in here. 
  (Dennis goes). I want to see Colonel West.  Malins, ask Templeman if those figures are ready yet. 
  (He goes, and Malins follows.) 
  (Lincoln wishes to be alone when the prisoner comes, so he asks Slaney to go out, and Slaney does so. 
  After a moment, in which Lincoln takes the book that Malins has been reading from, and looks into it, William Scott is brought in under guard.  He is a boy of twenty.)
  Lincoln (to the guard). Thank you.  Wait outside, will you? 
  (The men salute and retire.) 
  Are you William Scott? 
  Scott.  Yes, sir. 
  Lincoln.  You know who I am? 
  Scott. Yes, sir. 
  Lincoln. The General tells me you've been court-martialled. 
  Scott. Yes, sir. 
  Lincoln. Asleep on guard? 
  Scott. Yes, sir. 
  Lincoln. It's a very serious offence. 
  Scott. I know, sir. 
  Lincoln. What was it? 
  Scott (a pause). I couldn't keep awake, sir.
  Lincoln. You'd had a long march? 
  Scott. Twenty-three miles, sir. 
  Lincoln. You were doing double guard? 
  Scott. Yes, sir. 
  Lincoln. Who ordered you? 
  Scott. Well, sir, I offered. 
  Lincoln. Why? 
  Scott. Enoch White -- he was sick, sir.  We come from the same place. 
  Lincoln. Where's that? 
  Scott. Vermont, sir. 
  Lincoln. You live there? 
  Scott. Yes, sir.  My . . . we've got a farm down there, sir. 
  Lincoln. Who has? 
  Scott. My mother, sir.  I've got her photograph, sir. 
  (He takes it from his pocket.) 
  Lincoln (taking it). Does she know about this? 
  Scott. For God's sake, don't, sir. 
  Lincoln. There, there, my boy.  You're no going to be shot. 
  Scott (after a pause). Not going to be shot sir ? 
  Lincoln. No, no.
  Scott. Not -- going -- to -- be -- shot. 
  (He breaks down, sobbing.) 
  Lincoln (rising and going to him). There, there.  I believe you when you tell me that you couldn't keep awake.  I'm going to trust you, and send you back to your regiment. 
  (He goes back to his seat.) 
  Scott. When may I go back, sir? 
  Lincoln. You can go back to-morrow.  I expect the fighting will be over, though. 
  Scott. Is it over yet, sir? 
  Lincoln. Not quite. 
  Scott. Please, sir, let me go back to-night -- let me go back to-night. 
  Lincoln. Very well. 
  (He writes.) 
  Do you know where General Meade is ? 
  Scott. No, sir. 
  Lincoln. Ask one of those men to come here. 
  (Scott calls one of his guards in.) 
  Lincoln. Your prisoner is discharged.  Take him at once to General Meade with this. 
  (He hands a note to the man.) 
  The Soldier. Yes, sir. 
  Scott. Thank you, sir. 
  (He salutes and goes out with the soldier.) 
  Lincoln. Slaney. 
  Slaney (outside). Yes, sir. 
  (He comes in.) 
  Lincoln. What's the time? 
  Slaney (looking at the watch on the table). Just on half-past nine, sir. 
  Lincoln. I shall sleep here for a little.  You'd better have a little sleep too.  They'll wake us if there's any news. 
  (Lincoln wraps himself up on two chairs.  Slaney does the same thing on a bench.  After a few moments Grant comes to the door, sees what has happened, blows out the candles quietly, and goes away.) 

LESSON 36.
ABRAHAM LINCOLN.
(Conclusion.)
(The curtain rises on the same scene.  We see Lincoln and Slaney still lying asleep. It is the early morning and it is just getting light.  The order1y comes in with two cups of coffee and some biscuits.  Lincoln wakes.) 
Lincoln. Good-morning. 
Orderly. Good-morning, sir. 
Lincoln (taking coffee and biscuits) Thank you. 
(The Orderly turns to Slaney, who sleeps on.) 
Lincoln. Slaney. (Shouting.) Slaney. 
Slaney (starting up). Hallo!  What the devil is it?  I beg your pardon, sir. 
Lincoln. Not at all.  Take a little coffee. 
Slaney. Thank you, sir. 
(He takes coffee and biscuits.  The Orderly goes.) 
Lincoln. Slept well.  Slaney? 
Slaney. I feel a little rested, sir.�@ I think I fell off to sleep once. 
Lincoln. What's the time? 
Slaney (looking at the watch). Six o'clock, sir. 
(Grant comes in.)  
Grant. Good-morning, sir, good-morning, Slaney.
Lincoln. Good-morning, general. 
Slaney. Good-morning, sir. 
Grant. I didn't disturb you last night.�@ A message has just come from Meade. �@Lee asked for an armistice at four o'clock.
Lincoln (after a silence.) For four years life has been but the hope of this moment.�@ It is strange how simple it is when it comes.  Grant, you've served the country very faithfully.  And you've made my work possible. 
(He takes his hand.) 
Thank you. 
Grant. Had I failed, the fault would not have been yours, sir.  I succeeded because you believed in me. 
Lincoln. Where's Lee? 
Grant. He's coming here.  Meade should arrive directly. 
Lincoln. Where will Lee wait? 
Grant. There's a room ready for him.  Will you receive him, sir? 
Lincoln. No, no, Grant.  That's your affair.  You are to mention no political matters.  Be generous.  But I needn't say that. 
Grant (taking a paper from his pocket). Those are the terms I suggest. 
Lincoln (reading.) Yes, yes.  They do you honor.
(He places the paper on the table.  An Orderly comes in.) 
Orderly. General Meade is here, sir. 
Grant. Ask him to come here. 
Orderly. Yes, sir. 
(He goes.) 
Grant. I learnt a good deal from Robert Lee in early days.  He's a better man than most of us.  This business will go pretty near the heart, sir. 
Lincoln. I'm glad it's to be done by a brave gentleman, Grant. 
(General Meade comes in. Meade salutes.) 
Lincoln. Congratulations, Meade.  You've done well. 
Meade. Thank you, sir. 
Grant. Was there much more fighting? 
Meade. Pretty hot for an hour or two. 
Grant. How long will Lee be? 
Meade. Only a few minutes, I should say, sir. 
Grant. You said nothing about terms? 
Meade. No, sir. 
Lincoln. Did a boy Scott come to you? 
Meade. Yes, sir.  He went into action and was killed at once. 
Lincoln. Killed?  It's a queer world, Grant. 
Meade. Is there any proclamation to be made, sir, about the rebels?
Grant. I --  
Lincoln. No, no.  I'll have nothing of hanging or shooting these men, even the worst of them.  Good-bye, Grant.  Send a report to me at Washington as soon as you can. 
(He shakes hands with him.) 
Good-bye, gentlemen.  Come along, Slaney. 
(Meade salutes and Lincoln goes, followed by Slaney.) 
Grant. Well, Meade, it's been a big job. 
Meade. Yes, sir. 
Grant. We've had courage and will.  And we've had wits, to beat a great soldier. I'd say that to any man.  But it's Abraham Lincoln, Meade, who has kept us a great cause clean to fight for.  It does a man's heart good to know he's given victory to such a man. A glass, Meade? 
(Pouring out whiskey.) No?  (Drinking.)
(Malins comes in.) 
Malins. General Lee is here, sir. 
Grant. Meade, will General Lee do me the honor of meeting me here? 
(Meade salutes and goes.)  
Grant. Where the devil's my hat, Malins?  And sword? 
Malins. Here, sir. 
(Malins gets them for him.  Meade comes in, and stands by the door at attention.  
Robert Lee, General-in-Chief of the Confederate forces, comes in, followed by one of his staff.  The two commanders face each other.  Grant salutes, and Lee replies.) 
Grant. Sir, you have given me occasion to be proud of my opponent. 
Lee. I have not spared my strength.  I acknowledge its defeat. 
Grant. You have come -- 
Lee. To ask upon what terms you will accept surrender.  Yes. 
Grant (taking the paper from the table and handing it to Lee.) They are simple.  I hope you will not find them ungenerous. 
Lee (having read the terms). You are magnanimous, sir.  May I make one suggestion?
Grant. It would be an honor if I could consider it. 
Lee. You allow our officers to keep their horses.  That is good of you.  Our cavalry troopers' horses also are their own. 
Grant. I understand.  They will be needed on the farms.  It shall be done. 
Lee. I thank you.  It will do much towards conciliating our people.  I accept your terms. 
(Lee offers his sword to Grant.) 
Grant. No, no.  I should have included that.  It has but one rightful place.  I beg you. 
(Lee replaces his sword.  Grant offers his hand and Lee takes it.  They salute, and Lee turns to go.)
CURTAIN
The author of this work, Mr. Drinkwater, explains that the play does not claim to be more than a dramatic representation of some of the most important events in the life of Lincoln.  It is indeed a very free representation, as is necessarily the case with an historical play.  For instance, the speech made by Lincoln in the scene that follows was not actually made by him on that occasion.  Parts of it, however, are to be found in speeches delivered by Lincoln on other occasions. 
The last scene shown is that where the President attended the theatre a few days after the events described above.  It was then (as we have read elsewhere) that he was assassinated by a man who had a grievance against him.  Lincoln, with his wife, and a minister of state named Stanton, are seen sitting in a box.  During an interval in the performance, the President is called upon to make a speech.  He rises and says: 
"My friends, I am touched, deeply touched, by this mark of your good-will.  After four dark and difficult years, we have achieved the great purpose for which we set out.  General Lee's surrender to General Grant leaves but one confederate force in the field, and the end is immediate and certain.  I have but little to say at this moment.  I claim not to have controlled events, but confess plainly that events controlled me.  But as events have come before me, I have seen them always with one faith.  We have preserved the American Union, and we have abolished a great wrong.  The task of reconciliation, of setting order where there is now confusion, of bringing about a settlement at once just and merciful, and of directing the life of a reunited country into prosperous channels of good-will and generosity, will demand all our wisdom, all our loyalty.  It is the proudest hope of my life that I may be of some service in this work.  Whatever it may be, it can be but little in return for all the kindness that I have received.  With malice towards none, with charity for all, it is for us to resolve that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom; and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth." 
The President sits down, and everybody is cheering and applauding enthusiastically.
At this moment, we see the door of the box opened suddenly.  A man comes in, he raises a revolver, shoots at the President, and then rushes away.  A doctor runs into the box, examines Lincoln, who has fallen to the ground; and then, to the horror of all present, announces that Lincoln is dead. 
With this the play comes to an end. 

LESSON 37.
WHERE DOES ALL THE MUD GO TO?
PART I.
You remember that we once read about where mud comes from.  We read that it comes from the hills and mountains, and that even hard rock can be so crumbled and rotted that at last it turns into the mud that we see on streets and roads.  We now ask the question "Where does all this mud go to? " 
Let us first consider what the difference is between a river and a canal.  There are several important differences, of course, but perhaps the most important of all is that in a river the water is always running, and that in a canal the water is still or nearly so.  Have you ever seen men on barges scooping up the mud from the bottom of a dirty canal and pouring it on to the banks?  Or have you ever seen big machines called dredgers, or dredging machines, doing the same thing?  We may see the chain of buckets each in its turn plunging into the water, scraping the bed of the canal, and coming up full of liquid mud which is poured off into large tanks. 
If the bottom of a canal were not cleared or dredged in this way every few years, the canal would get filled up with mud, and it would not be a canal any more.  Now a river is different; the running water carries away the mud all the time, and rarely allows it to settle down.  Perhaps after a long period of dry weather, the water in the river is very low and moves along very slowly.  At such times the force of the water is not great enough to carry all the mud away, and much of it settles on the bottom.  But after a heavy shower, or after a few days of steady rain, the water rises and rushes along between its banks.  It clears away and carries with it not only the mud, but also coarse sand, gravel and stones. 
Where does all this mud and stony stuff go to?  If we consider for a moment, we must conclude that it goes where the water goes; water and mud travel together, and where the water of the river ends its journey, the mud and stones end their journey too.  As everybody knows, it all goes down into the sea.  However far we may be from the sea, whenever we see a brook or a river, we know that the water in it will in the end find its way down into the ocean.  The stream or brook may run into a larger stream, the larger stream may flow into a river, the river may join a larger river, but the journey never stops until the fresh water joins the salt water of the ocean, and becomes part of it. 
And even then, if the river is a large one, and if the current is strong, it will continue flowing onwards and outwards.  If you have ever been to Shanghai, you will have passed in a boat through the Yellow Sea.  Looking at the water of this sea, you will have realized why it is so named, for its color is a yellowish brown.  Looking at this water more closely, you will see that this is muddy water.  It is the mud brought down by the great river, the Yang-tse-kiang.  Even hundreds of miles away from the mouth of this river, its water is still moving out into the sea, and where the water goes, there goes the mud as well.  We find the same thing wherever a large river empties itself into the sea. 
Have you ever walked along the shore of Tokyo Bay not far from where the water of the Sumida-gawa flows into it?  Have you noticed, at low tide, the mud lying in stretches and islands?  Have you noticed the millions of black and brown particles being washed to and fro, backwards and forwards, where the current of the river meets with the waves of the sea?  
And so in the end our mud goes out to sea, and finishes by becoming deposited on the floor of the ocean.  For, although the surface of the sea is more or less in movement, at a certain depth the water is still or nearly so, and in still water, the grains of mud, naturally enough, sink gradually to the bottom.  The coarse grains, on account of their greater weight, will be the first to settle down, the finer and lighter particles being carried still further out. 

LESSON 38.
WHERE DOES ALL THE MUD GO TO ?
(Conclusion.)
Imagine yourself in a diver's dress at the bottom of the sea not very far from a river mouth.  As you walk, your heavy boots sink in the muddy deposit which covers the whole of the sea-floor.  The further you walk away from the shore, the less thick the deposit will be, but all the same, even hundreds of miles from the shore, you will find the ocean bottom covered with muds of different sorts. 
All mud eventually goes into the sea, and in the sea there is plenty of room for it.  The floor of the ocean is a very large place; it has length, breadth and depth.  There is enough room in the North Atlantic Ocean alone to hold all Europe with its mountains, and much more besides.  As the mountains wear away, the depths of the ocean fill up; what is lost by the land is gained by the sea; as the land surfaces get lower, the seas get shallower.  Indeed, if this process were to go on long enough, and if nothing else happened to prevent it, all the land and everything on it would finish by being swept into the sea.  The map of the world would show nothing but one vast ocean.  But as we shall see later, other strange things are happening which prevent such a state of affairs from coming about. 
The mud and sediment that we find on the floor of the sea does not all come from the rivers.  Just as the rivers receive their mud from their own banks, the sea receives much material from its own coasts.  Have you ever seen the sea at high tides during stormy weather, dashing against the cliffs, tearing the rocks away and wearing them down?  All this dirt and stony stuff is washed out and away to sea, and is deposited there with the river sediments. 
We know very well the sort of stuff that is lying at the bottom of the sea in various places.  Sailors and fishermen often find it necessary to make "soundings."  In order to do this, they throw overboard a lump of lead attached to a long cord; when the weight reaches the bottom of the sea, they pull it up again and measure the length of the wet cord.  In this way, they know exactly how deep the water is at that particular point.  They compare the depth with the depths marked on their charts (or maps of the sea), and so are able to find out exactly where they are. 
Sometimes it is an additional help to them if they know exactly what sort of sediment is on the sea bottom immediately beneath them, so they give the lead a thick coating of grease.  When the lead is pulled up, some of the sediment is found sticking to the grease.  By long experience, the fishermen have come to know what sort of stuff is to be found in different places, and so they can judge at once in what part of the channel they are rowing or sailing. 
Often, too, shells and other animal remains are found sticking to the grease.  This reminds us that the whole of the ocean floor must be one huge cemetery!  On land, when an animal dies, its body rots away, and nothing is left except its teeth and bones.  But at the bottom of the sea, every dead creature is soon covered over by the new sediments, and so is preserved.  Shells, bones of fishes, teeth, the remains of crabs and lobsters; all these things and many more, instead of rotting, are laid out and gently buried. 
The mud and stuff that we see on land, on river banks, or at the mouths of rivers does not look particularly beautiful.  It looks a dirty and unwholesome mess.  But at the bottom of the sea, it does not have this appearance.  When, after you have been working in the garden, your hands are covered with clay and earth, you say that your hands are dirty, that they are covered with dirt.  Well then, wash your hands in a basin of water without soap; give this earthy stuff time to settle, and you will see it arranged in a neat layer at the bottom of the basin.  It will look quite clean. 
Perhaps you have noticed on certain parts of the sea-shore how neatly the sea arranges and sets out the different kinds of dirt; coarse stones in one layer, finer beach in another, gravel in another, sand in another.  So it is at the bottom of the sea; everything is so nicely sorted that it is no longer dirt at all.  You may have heard the expression "Dirt is only matter in the wrong place," and this saying is perfectly true. 
We have seen where the mud comes from; we have seen where it goes to.  Later, we shall see what may happen to it afterwards.

LESSON 39.
NAPOLEON BONAPARTE.
A little over 130 years ago, just when the most terrible period of the great French revolution had passed, those who were governing France were looking for someone who could direct their army against the enemies of the Republic.  The year before, a young officer of artillery had done well in defending Toulon, a naval town near Marseilles.  He was a man without fortune, a native of the island of Corsica, speaking his native language, Italian, better than French, and he was the man they chose to be chief of the Republican army.  At college he had been looked down upon by his fellow students; he was a short man, and could not afford to dress well; his appearance was far from dignified, and beyond a very practical knowledge of military matters, he did not seem to have the qualities of a hero or of a leader of men.  He was a man of comparatively little understanding or of imagination, but one of great directness and of immense energy. 
His name was Napoleon Bonaparte, and for the next twenty years, he was the most living power, not only in France, but in all Europe.  This penniless Italian-speaking officer was to be the future Emperor of France, and the dictator of the greater part of Europe, worshipped by his soldiers, looked upon as a god by the French and as the devil by the enemies of France. 
He was first called to Paris, where, with his artillery, he defeated in one day those who wished to restore the French kings.  The next year he commanded the army which was sent to Italy to drive out the Austrians.  His soldiers had little to eat, little to wear; being without tents, they slept in the open air.  They marched long distances; they climbed through the ice and snow of the Alps, dragging the heavy cannons through the passes.  They came down into Italy, and within one year drove out the Austrians. 
The French being at war with England, Napoleon went on to Egypt in order to fight the English there and, as he hoped, in India.  He landed in Egypt in 1798, but unfortunately for him, his fleet was destroyed there by the British admiral Nelson, and his army had to remain there. 
Napoleon returned to France and, like Cesar, became the First Consul.  By this time, the fortunes of France were declining; the Austrians had come back to Italy.  Napoleon led an army there for the second time, and for a second time drove the Austrians away.  There was much fighting on land and' on sea during which time Napoleon increased his power.  Two years later, in 1802, peace was declared. 
Then Napoleon turned his attention to France.  He governed it well, building roads and bridges, encouraging education and trade.  He made France once again a united country, and everybody thought that the bad times of revolution and war were at an end.  He succeeded, too, in changing the form of government and, like Octavius, the son of Cesar, he made himself Emperor. 
But he was not satisfied; he went once again to Italy, where he was made King of that country.  His next plan was to conquer England, but he was prevented from doing so by the English navy, which destroyed his ships at the Battle of Trafalgar.  He next had to fight Austria and Russia, and was victorious at Austerlitz.  The next year, 1806, he defeated the Prussians at Jena. 
Portugal and Spain refused to submit to the requirements of Napoleon and, with the help of the English during a war which lasted seven years, the Spaniards and the Portuguese drove the French armies from their countries. 
In the meantime, Napoleon had to fight Austria again, winning the battle of Wagram, and in 1812 invaded Russia.  He captured Moscow, but as the Russians succeeded in burning down this city, leaving Napoleon's army without food or shelter, he was forced to retire.  In this terrible retreat through the snow and ice, the greater part of his army perished. 
He raised a new army, but was defeated at Leipzig in Germany by the allied Russian, Austrian, Prussian and Swedish armies.  In the meantime, the English, with the Portuguese and Spanish armies, had driven the French soldiers into France. 
Napoleon was forced to abdicate, and was banished to the island of Elba in the Mediterranean. 
But this was not the end.  Within the year, he escaped from Elba and, raising an army as he went, he marched back to Paris and reigned again for a short period of a hundred days.  He invaded Belgium in order to defeat the allied British, Prussian and Belgian troops, but near Brussels, at a place called Waterloo, his best soldiers were beaten back by the British, and the Prussian army completed his defeat. 
Napoleon again abdicated, and was sent as a prisoner to an island in the Atlantic, where, six years later, he died. 
Like all other great conquerors, he failed in his purpose.  He was the cause of great suffering and of an enormous loss of life.  If he had not been ambitious, if he had been satisfied with making his country secure and happy, he would be considered to-day as one who had done much for civilization.  We can admire him only as a man of action and energy. 

LESSON 40.
A CONVERSATION CONCERNING MEALS.
PART ‡T.
  A. Hallo, here you are.  I didn't see you this morning at breakfast, and so I thought perhaps that you'd left. 
  B. Oh, no.  I'm still here.  I expect I shall be staying at least ten days longer.  I shouldn't have gone away without telling you, and saying goodbye.  What about you? 
  A. My movements for the next week or two are not very certain.  How long I stay depends on circumstances.  In any case, I fancy I shall stay on for another week. 
  B. Are you doing anything particular to-day? 
  A. No, nothing special.  There's one thing I want to do though, and that is: to try to find another hotel.  I don't know what you think about it, but for my part, I don't like this one.  The cooking isn't very good, and in the dining-room there's always a smell from the kitchen. 
  B. I don't fancy the place, either.  This morning at breakfast, they brought me some bacon and eggs.  The bacon was nearly all fat, and the eggs were nearly raw.  And the tablecloth wasn't clean either, and if there's one thing more than another that I dislike, it's dirty table linen. 
  A. My breakfast was just about as bad, if not worse. Th e ham was too salt, the tea was much too weak, and I believe that more of the milk came from the tap than from the cow.  And last night at dinner, the steak was so tough that I couldn't eat it. 
  B. Well, there's scarcely time to look out for a new hotel this morning.  It's nearly twelve o'clock.  Are you going to lunch here again? 
  A. No. I don't think so. 
  B. I'll tell you what.  Let's go and have lunch at that restaurant where we had our supper last night.  It seemed a very nice place. 
  A. Yes, that'll suit me very nicely.  I don't feel like having another meal here. 

  B. Here's the place.  I hope there are not too many people or else we shan't find any seats. 
A. Oh, it's all right.  There's plenty of room.  Let's sit down here, shall we? 

  B. I don't like this table; there's a slight draught from that door.  I don't like draughts; I catch cold so easily.  Let's go over to the other side. You take that seat facing the window. 
  A. I wonder what they've got.  Let's have a look at the bill of fare.  Is there anything here you particularly like?  There's soup, of course, several kinds of fish, roast beef, steak, boiled mutton, veal and roast chicken. 
  B. Why not try the table d'hote?  Where's the menu? By the way, why do they always write the menus in French? 
  A. Oh, I don't know.  I suppose it's because it's the usual thing.  It's astonishing how many things we do without having any particular reason for doing them except that it's the usual thing to do.  Why do people shake hands, raise their hats to ladies, say "How do you do? " or "Good morning" to each other?  People always say "Good morning" or "Good evening" even when the weather's perfectly horrible. 
  B. Well, I suppose we do and say these things because we're civilized human beings.
  A. I don't know so much about that.  Civilization ought to be more than just doing and saying things that have no meaning.  In the meantime, what about our lunch?  The waiter's just coming to see to us. 
  B. I don't want a heavy lunch.  If I have too much to eat at this time of day, it always 
makes me feel sleepy in the afternoon.
  A. Very well.  Let's choose something light.  Soup, I suppose, and a steak (I hope it'll tender this time).  That'll be quite enough for me.  I don't care for sweet things like pudding and cake and ice-cream. 
  B. Yes, that'll suit me too.  What shall we have to drink?  Wine or something? 
  A. Thank you, I prefer water. 
  B. What?  Just plain water? 
  A. Yes.  Pure water's the most healthy drink there is. 
  B. Well, it may be healthy, but for my own part, I prefer beer. 
  A. Beer?  Nasty stuff.  I've only tasted it once in my life, and that was enough for me 
  B. Well, everyone according to his taste.  Tastes are curious things.  Some people like all sorts of extraordinary things.  A man l knew once was awfully fond of snakes. 
  A. Snakes?  To eat? 
  B. No, not to eat.  He used to keep snakes just as people keep cats and dogs.  Now there are some people who hate cats and dogs, 
  A. I don't much like cats myself.  It's so difficult to make friends with cats; they're not sociable animals, except when they want you to give them something to eat.  But dogs are different.  I can't imagine anyone not liking dogs.  I've got two at home. 
  B. Have you?  I haven't any dogs.  I don't say I dislike them, but they're too much trouble.  Besides, as I travel about a good deal, I shouldn't have enough time to see to them properly. 

LESSON 40.
A CONVERSATION CONCERNING MEALS.
PART ‡T.
  A. Hallo, here you are.  I didn't see you this morning at breakfast, and so I thought perhaps that you'd left. 
  B. Oh, no.  I'm still here.  I expect I shall be staying at least ten days longer.  I shouldn't have gone away without telling you, and saying goodbye.  What about you? 
  A. My movements for the next week or two are not very certain.  How long I stay depends on circumstances.  In any case, I fancy I shall stay on for another week. 
  B. Are you doing anything particular to-day? 
  A. No, nothing special.  There's one thing I want to do though, and that is: to try to find another hotel.  I don't know what you think about it, but for my part, I don't like this one.  The cooking isn't very good, and in the dining-room there's always a smell from the kitchen. 
  B. I don't fancy the place, either.  This morning at breakfast, they brought me some bacon and eggs.  The bacon was nearly all fat, and the eggs were nearly raw.  And the tablecloth wasn't clean either, and if there's one thing more than another that I dislike, it's dirty table linen. 
  A. My breakfast was just about as bad, if not worse. Th e ham was too salt, the tea was much too weak, and I believe that more of the milk came from the tap than from the cow.  And last night at dinner, the steak was so tough that I couldn't eat it. 
  B. Well, there's scarcely time to look out for a new hotel this morning.  It's nearly twelve o'clock.  Are you going to lunch here again? 
  A. No. I don't think so. 
  B. I'll tell you what.  Let's go and have lunch at that restaurant where we had our supper last night.  It seemed a very nice place. 
  A. Yes, that'll suit me very nicely.  I don't feel like having another meal here. 

  B. Here's the place.  I hope there are not too many people or else we shan't find any seats. 
B. Oh, it's all right.  There's plenty of room.  Let's sit down here, shall we? 

  B. I don't like this table; there's a slight draught from that door.  I don't like draughts; I catch cold so easily.  Let's go over to the other side. You take that seat facing the window. 
  A. I wonder what they've got.  Let's have a look at the bill of fare.  Is there anything here you particularly like?  There's soup, of course, several kinds of fish, roast beef, steak, boiled mutton, veal and roast chicken. 
  B. Why not try the table d'hote?  Where's the menu? By the way, why do they always write the menus in French? 
  A. Oh, I don't know.  I suppose it's because it's the usual thing.  It's astonishing how many things we do without having any particular reason for doing them except that it's the usual thing to do.  Why do people shake hands, raise their hats to ladies, say "How do you do? " or "Good morning" to each other?  People always say "Good morning" or "Good evening" even when the weather's perfectly horrible. 
  B. Well, I suppose we do and say these things because we're civilized human beings.
  A. I don't know so much about that.  Civilization ought to be more than just doing and saying things that have no meaning.  In the meantime, what about our lunch?  The waiter's just coming to see to us. 
  B. I don't want a heavy lunch.  If I have too much to eat at this time of day, it always 
makes me feel sleepy in the afternoon.
  A. Very well.  Let's choose something light.  Soup, I suppose, and a steak (I hope it'll tender this time).  That'll be quite enough for me.  I don't care for sweet things like pudding and cake and ice-cream. 
  B. Yes, that'll suit me too.  What shall we have to drink?  Wine or something? 
  A. Thank you, I prefer water. 
  B. What?  Just plain water? 
  A. Yes.  Pure water's the most healthy drink there is. 
  B. Well, it may be healthy, but for my own part, I prefer beer. 
  A. Beer?  Nasty stuff.  I've only tasted it once in my life, and that was enough for me 
  B. Well, everyone according to his taste.  Tastes are curious things.  Some people like all sorts of extraordinary things.  A man l knew once was awfully fond of snakes. 
  A. Snakes?  To eat? 
  B. No, not to eat.  He used to keep snakes just as people keep cats and dogs.  Now there are some people who hate cats and dogs, 
  A. I don't much like cats myself.  It's so difficult to make friends with cats; they're not sociable animals, except when they want you to give them something to eat.  But dogs are different.  I can't imagine anyone not liking dogs.  I've got two at home. 
  B. Have you?  I haven't any dogs.  I don't say I dislike them, but they're too much trouble.  Besides, as I travel about a good deal, I shouldn't have enough time to see to them properly. 

LESSON 41.
A CONVERSATION CONCERNING MEALS.
(Conclusion.)
  B. Just look at that awful person over there, with the black and white trousers that are too short for him!  He has just cut his bread into little pieces with his knife, and keeps wiping his mouth with his handkerchief instead of with his napkin, which he has tucked in so as to cover his fancy waistcoat.  And l do believe that he's eating potatoes from the dish with his fork!  The next thing he'll do will be to eat his peas with his spoon! 
  A. Well, why shouldn't he do things in his own way?  If he likes eating peas with his spoon or using his napkin to protect his waistcoat, is there any reason why he shouldn't? 
  B. Oh, come now!  Is there any reason why he shouldn't behave himself like a civilized human being? 
  A. I thought you were going to say that.  "Civilized human being" is one of your favorite expressions.  If anybody doesn't do things exactly like everybody else, you call him uncivilized. 
  B. Well, after all, one ought to have decent table manners. 
  A. Aren't table manners merely local customs?  In America, I believe, most people cut up their meat first, and then eat it with the fork in their right hand.  And in the East, they use chopsticks instead of knives and forks.  Now if you went to Japan and had a Japanese meal, I expect your table manners would be so bad that you would be called an "uncivilized human being!" 
  B. Well, this is England, and not America or Japan.  When in Rome, do as the Romans do, as the saying is; and when in England, do as the English do. 
  A. I've noticed that most English people, when in Rome or in any other foreign country, generally do as the English do. 
  B. And a good thing too. 

  B. Let's have our coffee in the other room.  There are some nice comfortable armchairs in there. 

(Waiter.) Sugar and milk, sir? 
  B. Yes, both. 
  A. None for me. 
  B. What are you going to smoke?  Here, have one of my cigars; I can really recommend them. 
  A. Thanks!  I very rarely smoke; and when I do, I prefer a cigarette.  I haven't got the tobacco habit. 
  B. Well, on the whole, I suppose it's better to be without habits of that sort.  I smoke too much, and that's a fact.  But I never smoke cigarettes. I like either a good cigar or else a pipe. 

  B. And now, what about looking out for another hotel ?  If we are going to move, the sooner the better. 
  A. Yes, I suppose so.  There are one or two hotels close to the station that might suit. Shall we walk in that direction? 
  B. Do you know, I'm feeling rather too lazy for walking, and the station's rather a long way from here.  I propose we call a taxi. 
  A. All right.  Let's ask for the bill. 
  B. Oh, I say! 
  A. What's the matter? 
  B. You'll have to pay.  I must have lost my purse.  What a nuisance! 
  A. Lost your purse?  When did you have it last?
  B. I don't quite know.  I think I had it this morning. 
  A. You didn't leave it in your overcoat pocket, did you? 
  B. Perhaps I did. I'll go and look. 

  B  It's all right.  I'd left it in my overcoat pocket. 
  A. That isn't a very safe way of carrying money, is it?  You'll have your purse stolen one of these days if you don't take care. 
  B. I don't usually carry my purse in my overcoat pocket, you may be sure.  I must have put it there without noticing.  If anybody had wanted to steal it, it would have been quite easy. 
  A. I never use a purse myself.  I've never liked purses.  It's such a nuisance opening them and shutting them again.  As a matter of fact, I think that very few people carry purses -- men, I mean, I know women do.  In the old days before the war, when we had gold instead of banknotes, I can understand people carrying their money in purses.  I carry notes in my pocket-book and keep silver and copper coins loose in my pocket. 
  B. Yes, you're one of those careless people.  I prefer having a proper place for everything.
  A. Well, you can't call your overcoat pocket a proper place for a purse.  If somebody had stolen it, you'd have lost all your money.  There's no fear of losing all your money when you carry it loose. 
  B. In the meantime we haven't ordered the taxi. 
  A. Let's get the restaurant people to order one. 
  B. I've often noticed that when restaurant or hotel people order taxis for you, they are always more expensive than when you order them yourself in the street.  I remember I was staying at a hotel once, and they charged five shillings for the taxi to take me to the station.  And I happened to know the regular fare was four shillings.  Those hotel people make a profit on everything. 
  A. Well, that's how they earn their living.  You don't expect them to provide you with everything at cost price, do you? 
  B. No.  I expect them to make a reasonable profit, like everybody else, that's only fair But they generally want to make too big a profit.  They made 25% (per cent) profit on that taxi, and I object to fancy profits 
  A. I don't suppose it was a taxi at all.  And I don't think your figures are right.  A taxi has a fixed price.  I expect it was the hotel car.  Anyhow I'm not going to take the trouble to search all over the town for a car now, just to save sixpence.  I'd rather walk to the station.  Waiter!  Just order a taxi, will you? 
  Waiter. Very well sir.

  A. Here's the taxi.  Let's go.  Have you got everything?  Overcoat, stick, gloves? That's all right then.
  B. Now for a decent hotel. 

LESSON 42.
THE LAND TIIAT COMES OUT OF THE SEA.
  According to an old Japanese story, the hero, Hachiman Taro Yoshiie once sailed from the West to the place where Tokyo now stands.  He landed at the foot of a cliff and, climbing to the top, rested there for the night.  A temple now stands at the place where he rested, and a large stone shaped rather like a bull marks the spot where he slept and had a wonderful dream.  But we will not talk about this dream now.  Let us rather examine this cliff and landing-place.  It is situated in Koishikawa, close to the Koraku-en.  We should expect to find the sea at the foot of the cliff, but, strange to say, the sea is nearly three miles away!  Therefore all the land in the lower part of Tokyo must once have been under the sea, and has since come out of the sea! 
  Now this is not by any means the only instance of finding the sea a long way from where it used to be.  In various parts of the world, we may find great tracts of dry land which we know, from historical records, to have been the floor of the sea. 
  In other places, we find the contrary, for we have many examples of dry land having become submerged, that is, covered by the sea.  Off the East coast of England, for instance, there used to be large tracts of country, with towns and villages.  The land is no longer to be seen, for it now forms the floor of the sea. 
  So it looks as if the level of the sea sometimes falls and rises.  But we know that this cannot be the case, for (except for slight differences caused by the tides) the level of the sea all over the world must be the same and must remain the same.  If anything has changed its level, it must be the land and not the sea.  It appears that in many or in most parts of the world, the land is slowly rising or sinking, so slowly that it is not noticed for hundreds of years.  In some cases, however, this change of level may take place suddenly.  At the time of the great earthquake in 1923, the Boshu peninsula is said to have been raised considerably, and still remains at a higher level than before the earthquake.
  We do not know how it is or why it is that land should rise or sink in this manner, but we suppose that this rising or sinking is due to the same cause as that of earthquakes.  Sometimes the land will rise and continue to rise for centuries or for thousands of years or more.  It may rise very slowly and very gradually, but if the rising continues long enough, a low-lying country may be raised as high as a mountain.  The land under the sea may rise too, and when it has risen sufficiently, it emerges from the sea and becomes dry land.  Now it is a strange thing, and an almost incredible thing, but most of the dry land all over the earth was once the floor of the sea.  Even the tops of the highest mountains were most probably once far below the level of the oceans. 
  How do we know this?  How can we prove this? 
  It is very easy to prove it.  If we examine the rocks that hills and mountains are made of, we see that they are of two sorts: "igneous" and "sedimentary."  The igneous rocks, like granite, or lava, are formed of hard crystals; where they came from and what they are made of does not interest us at present.  But the sedimentary rocks are all old sediments, and if we look at them on them face of a cliff, or in a quarry, or on the mountain side, we see at once that they must have been formed under the water.  They are all arranged neatly in layers and bands; they are neatly of the same materials as those which form the floor of the sea: sand, gravel, clay, mud and lime.  They are hard, it is true, but this is because they have been squeezed and compressed for so many thousands or millions of years.  But sandstone is simply hardened sand, and shale is simply hardened clay, and so on. 
  If we go to certain parts of the country, even high up in the mountains, and look carefully at the rocks, we may find the most certain proof that these rocks were once sediments on the floor of the ocean.  For in these hard rocks, we find sea-shells, and the teeth and bones of fishes!  These are the things we call "fossils."  We knock the stones with a hammer or split them with a chisel and there in our hand we may hold a beautiful fossil shell, a piece of seaweed, the tooth of a shark, or the traces of some prehistoric reptile.  In museums you may see collections of fossils in their thousands of varieties.  Some of the shells look as fresh and as bright and as richly colored as if they had been picked up on the sea-shore, and yet they have been hammered out of the rock high up in the mountains hundreds of miles from the sea-coast. 
  If you want know more about the way that sea-bottoms rise above the water and become dry land and mountains, about the way that rocks crumble into the sea again, you must read a book about geology.  Geology is the science of the rocks of which the earth is made; it is one of the most instructive and attractive of sciences.  One of the branches of geology is called mineralogy, and is concerned with minerals and the igneous rocks. 

LESSON 43.
KING LEAR.
(PART ‡T)
  "King Lear" is the title of one of the saddest stories told by Shakespeare.  It is a story of foolishness and ingratitude, of pride and humility, of faithfulness and tender unselfish love.  It must be remembered that the story is not true, and that such event as these never took place, except in the imagination of Shakespeare. 
  Long ago there was a King of Britain whose name was Lear.  He was over eighty years of age at the time of this story, and so he decided that the time had come to give up his crown and his possessions, and spend his few remaining years in peace. 
  But he had no son to come after him as King; he had only three daughters.  The eldest was Goneril, wife of the Duke of Albany; the second was named Regan, who was married to the Duke of Cornwall ; and the youngest and most beautiful, Cordelia, was not yet married. 
  The King made up his mind to divide his kingdom between his daughters, and told them that he would give the largest share to the one who loved him most. 
  His eldest daughter, Goneril, a selfish, cold-hearted woman, pretended that she loved him more than her health, beauty, honor -- more than life itself.  The foolish King listened to this flattering and exaggerated talk, and, actually believed what he heard.  He was so delighted that he gave her and her husband a third of his kingdom. 
  His second daughter, Regan, whose character was just as selfish and wicked as that of her elder sister, said that her sister's words were not strong enough to express how great her own love was.  The King thought he was most fortunate in having such loving daughters, and gave to Regan and her husband another third of his kingdom. 
  Now, his third daughter, Cordelia, really did love her father, but she was so disgusted with the flattery of her sisters, whose fine speeches were only intended to make their father give them his kingdom, that she could not bring herself to tell him how much she really loved him.  She could only say that she loved her father according to her duty, neither more nor less.  Lear was shocked at what he thought was ingratitude in his favorite child, and threatened that if she did not express herself more warmly, her fortune would suffer. 
  But Cordelia could only answer that she loved, obeyed and honored him.  She could not promise to love him more than anything else in the world.  If she ever had a husband, it would be her duty to give him half of her love, care and duty.  But this plain speaking made her father still angrier.  He gave her nothing, and divided her share between her two sisters. 
  A faithful friend of the King's, the Earl of Kent, protested against this severity, and blamed the King for his foolish and unjust decision.  This made the passionate King so angry that he immediately told the Earl that if he did not leave Britain within six days, he would put him to death. 
  The King of France, who for a long time past had wished to marry Cordelia, heard the cruel decision of Lear, and without any hesitation he took the poor girl as his wife, for, he said, her virtues were more precious than a kingdom.  And so Cordelia said good-bye to her sisters, and begged them to take care of her father, and by so doing to show that they had spoken the truth. 
  It had been arranged that Lear should spend his days between the homes of his daughters, and that he should be attended by a hundred of his followers.  But no sooner had Cordelia gone than the sisters began to show their selfishness and cruelty.  Goneril, with whom he was staying, treated her father with indifference.  She would avoid him, and showed by her behavior that she considered the old man as a useless burden, and his attendants an unnecessary expense.  Her servants refused to pay any respect to Lear, and would either refuse to carry out his orders or, which was more insulting still, would pretend not to hear them.  His daughter, to whom he had always been so kind and generous, was repaying him with the deepest ingratitude. 
  On the other hand, the good Earl of Kent, whom Lear had treated so badly, repaid this bad treatment with almost incredible kindness.  Although he was to lose his life if found in Britain, he chose to remain disguised as a serving-man in order to give his services to the old King who, not recognizing him, accepted them.  He gave himself the name of Caius, and on many occasions was able to help his master and avenge some of the insults which Lear had received.  Another friend of the old King was his poor jester, who, by his funny sayings and jokes, would amuse him in his dull hours. 
  Goneril told her father at last that his staying in her palace was inconvenient so long as he insisted on keeping his hundred knights.  She begged him to reduce their number to fifty, and mockingly added that he should keep none but old men about him as being more suitable to his age.  At this, Lear fell into a great rage, and declared that he would go to his other daughter.  He cursed Goneril loudly, and prayed that she might never have a child, or, if she had, that it might live to treat her as badly as she was treating her father.  And he thought to himself how small was the fault of Cordelia (if it was a fault) as compared with her sister's.  The Duke of Albany, however, was very sorry to see the old King so badly treated, but he was too weak in character to oppose his wife's will.

LESSON 44.
KING LEAR.
(Conclusion.)
  When Lear arrived at the castle where Regan lived with her husband, he found that Goneril had got there first, having come to set her sister against the King, her father.  Regan advised him to dismiss half of his attendants and to beg Goneril's pardon.  Lear refused to do so, and declared that he and his hundred knights would stay with Regan.
  But Regan said that if he stayed with her, he would have to content himself with twenty-five knights.  In the end, the sisters said that he had no need of any attendants at all when he might be waited on by their own servants.  This cruel ingratitude so affected the King that he began to lose his mind.  He blamed himself for his foolishness, and threatened revenge against his unnatural and arrogant daughters. 
  He refused to stay under the same roof with them, and with no other companion than the poor jester, went out into the storm, and wandered in the darkness, rain, and furious wind.  The good Earl of Kent, known to the King as Caius, followed him and persuaded him to take shelter from the violence of the storm in a wretched hut.  The jester went in first and then ran back terrified, saying that he had seen a spirit.  But this spirit turned out to be nothing more than a poor ragged beggar, who talked like a madman.  Lear, who was now mad himself, maintained that this fellow was some father who had given all away to his daughters; for nothing, he said, could make a man so wretched but having unkind daughters. 
  With the help of some of the King's loyal attendants, the Earl of Kent had Lear removed to the castle of Dover, and went to the court of the King of France.  He related to Cordelia the miserable condition of her father, and Cordelia begged her husband to allow her to go to Britain with an army, so that she could restore her father to his throne.  The King of France consented, and she landed at Dover with a royal army. 
  Now, one of the old friends of King Lear was the Earl of Gloucester, who had acted in regard to his two sons almost as foolishly as Lear had done to his own daughters.  His two sons were named Edmund and Edgar.  Edmund was a selfish and wicked man, but he was his father's favorite.  He had told his father lies about his brother Edgar, a brave and honest man, so that the father forced Edgar to leave his home.  And this Edgar was the very man that Lear had met in the hut on the night of the storm. 
  The wicked son, Edmund, discovered that his father, the Earl of Gloucester, meant to help Lear secretly and that he knew of the coming of the French army.  And so he went to Regan's husband, the Duke of Cornwall, and told him all he knew.  The Duke immediately had the Earl of Gloucester arrested for treason.  He had him blinded, and he made Edmund Earl in his place.  So great was the indignation against such cowardly brutality that the Duke was killed by one of his own attendants. 
  The blind father was now taken to Dover by his faithful son, Edgar, and the good Earl of Kent.  When they were approaching the town, they found King Lear wandering as a madman.  One of Goneril's followers met them and tried to kill the blind Earl, but Edgar was able to save the Earl and kill the man.  Edgar discovered at the same time that this man was carrying a love-letter from Goneril to his own brother Edmund.  Lear was now brought to the French camp at Dover, where his daughter Cordelia, who had never ceased to love her father, received him tenderly and tried to comfort him and to cure him. 
  In the meantime, the two bad daughters had been punished for their wicked deeds.  They were both in love with Edmund, and were jealous of each other.  Goneril poisoned her sister, and when she was imprisoned for her crime, put an end to her own life.  All those who knew the story of their bad acts, declared that they had deserved their punishment. 
  We should now hope that the troubles of Lear and Cordelia were at an end, but sad to say, their unhappiness was not yet complete.  The British forces, which Goneril and Regan had sent under the command of Edmund to fight the French, were victorious, and King Lear and Cordelia were made prisoners. 
Edmund, now dying of a wound he had received, was sorry for his wicked behaviour, and gave orders for the life of Cordelia to be spared, but at that very moment old King Lear was seen carrying the dead body of the daughter to whom he had been so unkind.
The Duke of Albany, the husband of Goneril had always been friendly towards Lear, and now wished to restore the throne to him again, but it was too late; his heart was broken and he was on the point of death.  The Duke, however, rewarded both Edgar and the Earl of Kent for their services to the poor old King. 

LESSON 45.
THE BEGINNlNGS OF MAN.
  It took Columbus more than ten weeks to sail from Spain to the West Indian Islands.  We of to-day cross the Atlantic Ocean in an airship in sixteen hours. 
  Five hundred years ago, three or four years were necessary to copy a book by hand. We of to-day possess type-setting machines and automatic printing machines, and we can print a new book in a couple of days. 
  We understand a great deal about anatomy, and chemistry, and mineralogy, and we are familiar with a thousand different branches of science of which the very names were unknown to the people of the past. 
  In one respect, however, we are quite as ignorant as the most primitive of men: we do not know where we come from.  We do not know how or why or when the human race began its career upon this earth.  With a million facts at our disposal, we are still obliged to follow the example of the fairy-stories, and begin by saying: "Once upon a time, there was a man." 
  This man lived hundreds of thousands of years ago.  What did he look like? 
  We do not know.  We have never seen his picture.  Deep down in the clay, we have sometimes found a few pieces of his skeleton.  They were hidden among masses of bones of animals that have long disappeared from the face of the earth.  We have taken these bones, and by putting them together, we can see what sort of strange creature happened to be our ancestor. 
  This ancestor of the human race was a very ugly and unattractive sort of creature.  He was quite small.  The heat of the sun and the wind of the cold winter had coloured his skin a dark brown.  His head and most of his body were covered with long hair.  He had very thin but strong fingers, which made his hands look like those of a monkey or ape.  His forehead was low, and his jaw was like the jaw of a wild animal which uses its teeth both as fork and knife. 
  He wore no clothes.  He had seen no fire except the flames of the volcanoes which filled the sky with their smoke.  He lived in the damp blackness of vast forests.  When he was hungry, he ate raw leaves and the roots of plants, or he stole the eggs from the nest of an angry bird.  Once in a while, after a long and patient chase, he would manage to catch a sparrow or a small wild dog, or perhaps a rabbit.  These he would eat raw, for prehistoric man did not know that food could be cooked.  His teeth were large and looked like the teeth of animals. 
  During the day, this primitive human being went about in search of food for himself and his wife and his young.  At night, frightened by the noise of the beasts who were in search of food, he would creep into a hollow tree, or he would hide himself behind a few big rocks.  In summer, he was exposed to the hot rays of the sun.  During the winter, he froze with cold.  When he hurt himself (and people who hunt animals are forever breaking their bones or spraining their ankles), he had no one to take care of him.  He had learnt how to make certain sounds to warn his fellow-beings whenever danger threatened.  In this he resembled the dog, which barks when a stranger approaches.  In many other respects, he was far less attractive than a well-behaved domestic animal. 
  Altogether, early man was a miserable creature who lived in a world of fright and hunger, who was surrounded by a thousand enemies, and who was forever thinking of friends and relatives who had been eaten up by wolves or bears or tigers. 
  We know nothing of the earliest history of this man.  He had no tools, and built no houses.  He lived and died, and left no traces of his existence.  All that we know of him, we have learnt through examining his bones, and they tell us that he lived more than two thousand centuries ago. 
  Early man did not know what "time" meant.  He had no idea of days or weeks or years.  In a very general way, he had an idea of seasons.  Long experience had told him that the cold Winter was invariably followed by the mild Spring, and Spring grew into the hot Summer, when fruits ripened, and the wild ears of corn were ready to be picked and eaten.  The Summer ended when the wind swept the leaves from the trees. 
  It had always been that way.  Early man recognized these changes of cold and warm, but asked no questions.  He lived, and that was enough to satisfy him. 
  But man did not remain in that state of ignorance and animal-like existence.  Little by little, as time went on, men grew in intelligence.  They learnt to take care of themselves better.  They made tools and weapons out of stones; they learnt to make safe homes in caves. 
  But they were still far from the beginnings of civilization.  Forty thousand years ago, men had not yet learnt anything about cultivation.  They could not make baskets, nor pots, nor could they weave cloth.  They were still savages. 
  But by about ten or fifteen thousand years ago, they had made new progress.  Their tools were better. They had tamed animals and made servants of them. They could cook their food.  They could even draw.  Look at these pictures.  One shows a man gathering honey and driving off the bees, and the other shows a fight between archers.  These pictures are probably ten or twelve thousand years old. 
  The subsequent history of man is a long one.  Little by little progress has been made, and it is certain that as time goes on, we shall make more and more progress.

LESSON 46. 
A GREAT TEACHER. 
  The sixth century before Christ was one of the most remarkable in all history. Everywhere, in Egypt, in Babylon, in India, in China, men seemed to be taking an interest in endeavoring to discover the truth about things.  It was the age of great teachers. 
  At that time, there lived in the North of India on the slopes of the Himalaya Mountains, a great ruler, perhaps a king.  He longed to have a son, but had to wait for many years before his wish was realized.  When his son was born, he made up his mind that this boy should never see or hear anything of the suffering of the world. 
  This boy, whose name was Gautama, was to become one of the greatest of teachers.  At the age of eighteen, he was a strong, healthy young man, well-educated, and of a kind and gentle disposition.  The first time he went hunting, he was shocked at the killing of a deer, for this was the first time he had seen death. 
  His father wished him to marry a beautiful princess, the daughter of a neighboring king.  Before Gautama won her hand in marriage, he had to compete with others in athletic sports and games to prove his manliness.  He was successful in winning the prizes. 
  Gautama's father had a magnificent palace built for him on an island in the middle of a beautiful lake, and there for some time he lived a life of luxury with his young wife.  Orders had been given that Gautama should see nothing but beautiful things, and that beggars, sick, blind, or crippled people were to be kept away from him. 
  But this life of splendor and magnificence did not make Gautama really happy.  He got tired of the luxurious life in his island palace, and asked his father's permission to see the world.  His father was at first unwilling, but finally gave his consent. 
  He had not been away long before he saw poor and unhappy people.  Then he saw diseased man lying on the ground and moaning with pain.  The heart of Gautama was touched with sympathy, and he rushed to the man and held him in his arms.  Later he saw death, and knew that men must die, even as he had seen the deer die. 
  He went back to his palace a changed man.  Days and weeks passed.  He thought about what he had seen, and he suffered.  He wanted to know the truth about life and death, about happiness and unhappiness. 
  At last, he felt he could not stay any longer; he must go into the world as a poor man, for according to his idea (and this, too, was the idea of Christ, who lived five hundred years later), a life of poverty is the best and truest life.  He must break away from all the things which make people selfish or which tempt them to enjoy life. 
  And so one night he decided to leave everything.  He took a last look at his sleeping wife, with her newly-born son in her arms.  He did not wake her up, but crept softly away.  He mounted his horse and rode off.  The next morning he was far away.  He stopped beside a sandy river, cut off his hair with his sword, removed all his ornaments, and sent them with his horse and sword back to his house. 
  Going on, he presently met a ragged man, and exchanged clothes with him.  And so having given up everything that might remind him of his former life, he went and joined a number of wise men who lived in caves.  They taught him all they knew, but he was not satisfied with their teaching.  The Indians have always believed that power and know-ledge can be obtained only by going without food, sleeping little, and by physical suffering.  So Gautama went off with five companions to the jungle, or wild country, and tried to find wisdom in this way. 
One day, he was walking up and down trying to think in spite of his weak state.  Suddenly he fell unconscious.  When he recovered, he realized that whatever truth a man may reach is reached best by a nourished brain in a healthy body.  He offended and shocked his companions by demanding ordinary food and refusing to cause himself more physical suffering, and they went off in disgust, leaving Gautama to himself.
Probably for a long time, Gautama lived by himself, thinking and meditating on the right way of life, and on problems of happiness, suffering, and pain.  Little by little he saw things more clearly; step by step, he advanced until one day he came to a state of complete realization. 
  He had seated himself under a great tree by the side of a river when this realization came to him.  It seemed to him that he saw life clearly.  It is said that he sat all day and all night in deep meditation, and then he stood up and resolved to teach the world the truths that he had discovered. 
  He went and found his old companions, and they became his disciples.  In the city of Benares, they built themselves huts, and set up a sort of school to which came many who were trying to find wisdom. 
  Gautama's disciples declared that he was a Buddha, the latest of the Buddhas, but we do not know whether he ever used the title himself. 
  He taught that all suffering was due to the greedy and selfish desires of man, that until man has conquered these personal desires, his life is trouble and his end sorrow.  His teaching, which is called Buddhism, was put into writing afterwards.  Those who follow this teaching or believe in it are called Buddhists. 
  Buddhism spread in India, but subsequently declined in that country, and to-day it is found only in that part of India which is the island of Ceylon.  But this religion spread beyond India to Burma and Siam, to China, Korea, and finally to Japan.

LESSON 47.
THE KING WHO WAS HUMBLED.
PART ‡T
  One of the most beautiful of the poems of Longfellow relates the legend of a king who was so proud that an angel was sent to teach him humility. 
  According to this poem, Robert of Sicily was a powerful King.  One of his brothers was the Emperor of Germany and another was the Pope of Rome, the head of the Catholic Church.  He was a proud, arrogant and passionate man. 
  When he went to church, he did not go as a humble worshipper, nor as a true follower of Christ.  He went in magnificent clothes, attended by his nobles and knights; he went there to show himself off so that people might admire him for his wealth, and realize how great he was.  How different was his haughty behavior from that taught by Christ, who had said that those who wished to follow him must be humble, meek, and poor men. 
  One evening, the King sat proudly among his knights in church, thinking little of Christ, but much of himself, of how great a king he was, and of what he could do to make himself mightier still.  As he sat in his golden chair, he heard the priests singing in Latin one of the old hymns of the Christian Church. 
  He turned to one of the priests, and said, "What is the meaning of these words?" 
  The priest answered, "They mean that God throws down proud and mighty men from their seats, and puts in their place those who are humble and poor."
  The King sneered and laughed.  "It is just as well," he said, "that such words are sung only by priests and in Latin.  If I heard anybody else saying such treason and words so insulting to me, I should have him punished.  For I tell you this: there is no power that can push me from my throne!" 
  Then he leaned back in his luxurious cushions, shut his eyes and went off to sleep. 
  When he woke up again, to his surprise he found himself alone in the dark church.  He jumped up indignantly, and groped his way towards the door, but found it locked.  Then, in his bewilderment and fury, he cried out, and knocked.  But there was no answer.  Louder and louder he knocked, and louder he threatened and cursed.  At last the watchman hearing the noise, came to ask what the matter was.  King Robert, in a terrible rage, cried out, "Open the door, I am the King!" 
  The watchman thought it must be a robber, or perhaps a madman speaking.  He opened the door, and directly he did so.  King Robert rushed past him and out into the darkness of the night.  He ran through the streets and rushed through the courtyard of his palace, and, pushing aside the sentries and the attendants, made his way into the great hall.  In his rage and indignation, he did not notice that all his gorgeous clothing had been replaced by the poor and ragged clothes of a beggar. 
  In the great and magnificent hall, he saw a man seated on the throne, wearing his robes, his crown and his ring.  The man there looked like himself, he had the same features, the same hair, and was of the same height, but at the same time, there was something in his face that gave the impression of a holy angel from Heaven.  This angel looked calmly at the passionate man, and said, "Who are you, and what are you doing here?" 
  Robert answered, with a proud sneer, "Who am I?  I am the King!  I have come to claim my throne from you who have unjustly taken it!" 
  At these words, the guests sprang up angrily and, drawing their swords, advanced towards the beggared King.  The Angel, however, told them to refrain from violence and to put back their swords.  Then turning to the King, he said sweetly and gravely, "You are mistaken.  You are not the King, but the King's Jester.  From now onwards you will wear the cap with the bells, and the many-colored costume of the Jester.  For a companion, I will give you an ape.  You will serve and obey my servants." 
  The proud King was then led away by force, while everybody laughed, crying mockingly, "Long live the King." 
  The next morning, he woke up and found that he was indeed nothing other than a poor jester.  His clothes were jester's clothes, his lodging was a cold and damp cellar, a bundle of straw was his bed, and his companion was a wretched monkey. 
  Many days passed.  The proud King Robert was laughed at as a poor fool; his only friend was the ape; his only food was the food that others had left on their plates.  Sometimes he met the Angel, and when the Angel, half joking and half in earnest, would say to him sternly, but tenderly, "Are you the King?" he would throw back his head and answer haughtily, "I am the King!" 

LESSON 48.
THE KING WHO WAS HUMBLED
(Conclusion.)
  Three years passed in this manner, and then came ambassadors from the Emperor of Germany announcing that the King of Sicily with his Court had been invited to go to Rome and to spend the Easter season with His Holiness the Pope. 
  The Angel welcomed his guests with great joy, and gave them presents of rich clothing and jewels. 
  When the unhappy jester heard this news, he was filled with joy and hope.  "I shall surely be going to Rome with the Court, and when I get there I shall meet my brothers, the Emperor and the Pope," he thought.  "They will recognize me, they will kill the man who is disguised as myself, and they will restore me to my throne."  And then the Angel and all the nobles and knights and high officials set off on their journey to Rome.  This was a splendid procession, and in all the country to vns of Italy through which they passed, the people gazed with wonder upon the fine horses and the gorgeous clothing of those who rode on them.  But they laughed and shouted with merriment when they saw riding among the servants upon a poor black and white horse the funny-looking jester with his cap and bells, and with an ape seated behind him. 
  The procession reached Rome. 
  Try to imagine the gorgeous scene when Kings and Emperors met; imagine the rich decorations, the rejoicings, the greetings, imagine the flags flying and the bells ringing and everyone making merry. 
  On the great square before the cathedral of St. Peter's the Pope gave his solemn blessing to the kneeling people. 
  Then suddenly Robert the Jester pushed his way through the crowd and rushed furiously into the presence of the Pope.  "I am the King!  Look!  Look at me!  I am your brother!  I am the King of Sicily.  The man who wears my crown is an impostor.  He is not the King!  Do you not know me?  I am your brother!" 
  The Pope did not know what to think, but the Emperor of Germany suddenly burst out laughing, and said to the Angel, "This is a strange idea, brother, to keep a madman as your Court Jester."  And the attendants seized Robert and pushed him away.  It was evident that his brothers did not recognize him, and in despair he crept back to his poor lodging, his disappointment being almost too great for him to bear. 
  It was the great Christian festival of Easter, a time when Christians celebrate the coming back to life of Christ, who had been put to death by the Roman soldiers.  The presence of the Angel made people feel that Christ was indeed living and with them.  Kings and poor people alike felt comforted and happy and filled with the holy spirit of their faith. 
  Something of this feeling came even to the poor Jester lying on his straw.  He forgot his disappointment and no longer felt any resentment nor bore ill-will towards those who treated him with contempt; he felt himself to be a poor follower of Christ, and it seemed to him that God had come to earth and was there among them.  He knelt humbly on the stone floor and bowed his head to the ground. 
  The visit came to an end.  The Emperor returned to his country.  The Angel with his Court went back to Sicily.  When he was back in his palace and seated on his throne, he called Robert to him, telling the other people to leave the hall.  When they were alone, the Angel turned to Robert, and asked him again, "Are you the King?" 
  King Robert bowed, and said humbly, "You know best!  I have been a wicked man; let me go away and lead the life of a monk.  By prayer and repentance I hope that I may be forgiven for my pride and wickedness.  Let me go." 
  The Angel smiled, and through the open window they heard the monks singing in the chapel: "God has thrown down the proud and mighty men from their seats, and has put in their place those who are humble and poor." 
  While these words were being sung, Robert heard other words; he heard the Angel say," I am an Angel, and you are the King! " 
  King Robert was standing near the throne, and as he heard these words he looked up and found that he was alone, but dressed as in the old days with his rich robes and his crown. 
  When his courtiers came, they found him there kneeling, on the floor, praying silently in sincere repentance and humble gratitude. 

LESSON 49.
PHOTOGRAPHY
PART I.
  If you were asked, "What does the sun do to things?" you would probably answer, "It makes things light and it make things warm."  Your answer would be true, but not complete.  The sun does something else to things: it makes them alter their color. 
  We know, for instance, how some things fade when they are exposed to the sun.  Cloth which has been colored with dyes of inferior quality loses a part of its color when it has been for some time in the sun.  A piece of white paper, especially if it is of a poor, cheap quality, will turn yellow if exposed to the sunlight for a long while.  The sun, too, changes the color of leaves or the skins of fruit and vegetables.  The yellow leaves that we see in the early spring soon become dark green, and later in the year the green oranges turn yellow, and the green apples turn red on the side exposed to the sun, and the maple leaves turn yellow, brown, purple and red.
  Supposing you had a shelf made of fresh white wood, and you put several objects on it, such as a coin, a matchbox or a leaf.  Supposing the shelf were in a place where the sun could shine on it; after a few weeks you would find the wood of a yellowish colour.  On removing the objects, you would find a white circle where the coin had been, a white oblong where the box had been, and you would see a white leaf-shaped patch where the leaf had been.  This would be an example of what we might call natural photography. 
  This is one of the two principles of photography, namely, that in the case of certain substances, the parts that are exposed to the light change their color, in proportion to the amount of exposure they receive or to the intensity of the light to which they are exposed; and that the parts completely shaded from the light do not alter in color. 
  Now the plates, films and papers that are used by photographers are coated with substances that change their color very quickly.  A piece of what photographers call "printing-out paper " (or P. O. P.), if held in the sunlight will change in a few moments from white to purple brown. 
  You can watch it changing color; you will find that the little piece that your fingers covered remains white, because that part was protected from the rays of the sun.  But direct sunlight is not necessary.  You may put the paper on the table in your room where there is no sunlight, and the paper will gradually grow darker and darker, but not nearly so rapidly as when it is exposed to the direct rays of the sun. 
  If you cover this sensitized paper with a piece of thin paper with a pattern or drawing on it, the dark parts of the pattern or drawing will protect from the light those parts of the sensitized paper which are just under them, and these will be seen as white patches and lines; the sun will have copied the pattern for you. 
  But this copy will not keep, for if it is exposed to the light afterwards, the white pattern will become as dark as the rest of the paper.  If we want to keep the copy as it is, we must do something to prevent the white parts from growing dark.  We must "fix" it by putting the paper into a chemical solution which will dissolve the unaltered sensitive substance, and so prevent it from turning the rest of the paper dark. 
  Very pretty and instructive experiments can be made with that sort of sensitized paper which is used to make copies of drawings.  It is called "blue-print" paper, and is sold by any dealer in photographic goods.  When you open your packet of paper, you will find that it is white on one side and a greenish-blue color on the other.  The colored side is the surface which is covered with chemicals sensitive to light.  This paper acts in almost the same way as the "printing-out paper" that we spoke of just now, except that when it is exposed to the light, it turns dark-blue instead of brown.  Blue-print paper, however, is much easier to handle, because it can be "fixed" with ordinary water. 
  Many of you think that photographs cannot be made without a camera or a lens, but that idea is quite wrong, for it is possible to make many beautiful and instructive photographs in a very simple manner. 
  In this picture, you see photographs of leaves which were made without any camera at all.  If you want to make similar photographs, this is the way to do it.  Take a sheet of glass and a piece of heavy cardboard of the same size (as small or as large as you like).  Lay your leaf on the glass, put a piece of the blue-print paper against the leaf, with the blue side against the glass, then place the cardboard over this.  Two strong rubber bands slipped over the glass and cardboard at the end will hold them together tightly, and prevent the leaf and paper from moving. 
  Now take this printing frame out into the light, and leave it in the sun until the exposed portion of the paper seen through the glass has turned dark.  Then take it indoors slip off the rubber bands, take out the paper and wash it thoroughly. You will have a wonderful picture of the leaf with all its delicate veins showing quite clearly. 
  You will find it quite easy and interesting to make photographs of all sorts of leaves, seaweed, flowers, etc. in this manner, and even of drawings and pictures cut from magazines. 
  We shall next read how we take photographs with a camera. 

LESSON 50.
PHOTOGRAPHY.
(Conclusion.)
  The first of the two important principles that are concerned with photography is that certain substances alter in color when they are exposed to light.  We will now examine the second principle and try to understand it. 
  Imagine a room with a window or windows closed by shutters.  Imagine a small hole in one of the shutters through which the bright daylight comes pouring.  Let us imagine ourselves to be in a room like this.  We shall see on the wall opposite the window, and on the ceiling, a beautiful picture: the picture of the scene outside the house, perhaps with fields and trees and the sea beyond.  All these are reflected on the walls and ceiling of the room, with all their colors and movements.  Somebody walks past the house, and as he walks past, we see his reflection on the wall or ceiling. 
  But we notice that the picture is upside down; we see the sky on the lower part of the wall, and the ground on the ceiling.  The trees are pointing downwards, and the picture of the man passing by shows him moving in the direction opposite to the one in which he is really moving. 
  A long time ago, probably in the sixteenth century, somebody noticed this way in which an outside scene is reflected through a small hole, and invented a device by which the picture is projected on a table.  This arrangement is called a camera obscura, which means "dark room."  It will be interesting to see what this is like, for this idea was the beginning of photography and of the camera as we know it to-day. 
  It was found that the picture was much better and brighter if the hole were made larger and fitted with a piece of glass called a lens or magnifying glass.  In order to project the picture on a table instead of on the wall, a mirror was used in a manner shown in this picture. 
Now a photographic camera is simply a box with a lens fitted in the front in such a way that whatever scene the camera points to is projected on the inside back of the box.
That is the second chief principle of photography; a room (or a camera, which means the same thing) with a lens (or even a simple hole) in the front, and a back on which the picture is thrown.  If you want to see how a lens projects a picture, you can take an ordinary magnifying glass and a candle.  Hold them like this, and you will see the picture of the candle upside down on the wall. 
  You may even make this experiment without a magnifying glass, for if you take a piece of cardboard and make a hole in it, you can produce a similar effect, but the picture will not be so bright. 
  Now this is how photography came to be invented.  A piece of sensitized paper or a plate of glass coated with a sensitized film, as we have seen, will grow dark wherever the light strikes it, or in proportion as the light strikes it.  So one day, somebody had the idea of putting a piece of sensitized paper on the fiat surface on which the image is projected.  The very light parts of the scene made the paper very dark, the parts that were not so light did not make the paper so dark, and those parts of the scene which were quite dark had no effect on the paper at all.  So after a little while, the paper was seen to have a picture on it, and it was possible to "fix" the picture.  In this way, the first photograph was made. 
  But, unfortunately, the picture was a negative one.  The bright sky and all the light objects were shown as black, and all the dark objects and shadows were shown as white!  So it became necessary to try a different plan in order to make a positive picture, that is, a picture in which the light parts of the scene are light, and the dark parts dark. 
  This is the way it was eventually done.  A photograph was taken on a glass plate coated with a sensitized film.  On this plate was made the negative picture with all the shades reversed.  Then a piece of sensitized paper was put under this plate to make a second photograph, just as we can make photographs of leaves and drawings on a piece of blue-print paper.  The result was a positive image, a real photograph with the whites shown as white and the blacks shown as black. 
  There is however this difference between a plate or film and ordinary printing-out paper.  On the plate or film the image is not visible until it has been developed.  To develop a plate it is necessary to put it into a chemical solution called a developing solution, or developer. 
  Sixty or seventy years ago, photographs could be taken only by specialists or professional people who had to make their own plates and paper.  To-day good photographs can be taken by amateur photographers. 
  During the past half century many improvements and many new inventions have been made in connection with photography.  We now have plates so sensitive that we can take snapshots or instantaneous photographs.  We have cameras that fold up and can be carried in our pockets.  We can enlarge photographs by projecting the negative on sensitized paper by means of a magic-lantern, or by means of positive lantern slides we can throw the picture on a screen.  We have cinema-photography by which we use a magic-lantern to show moving pictures, and we can photograph objects in their natural colors.  We have photo-engraving by which a photograph can be engraved automatically on metal plates and printed in books or newspapers.  Cameras can now be attached to telescopes and to microscopes thus making possible telephotography and microphotography. 
  The camera is another example of something that began by being a toy and finished by becoming an instrument of the greatest utility.