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"I am going to make you a beetle and wedge for your own, Nathan, and then you and I can split together: only, it is not a reward, you must understand. It was wrong for you to keep my beetle, and run away with my knife, and you are sorry you did so, an't you, Nathan?"
"Yes," said Nathan.
"And you won't do so any more, will you, Nathan?"
"No," said Nathan, "I won't do so any more."
Whether Nathan was really sorry for what he had done, or whether he only said so because Rollo was going to make him a beetle, is very doubtful; though it is not impossible that he was a little sorry.
Rollo went down into the shed again with Nathan; and while he was at work making the new beetle and wedge, he let Nathan use his. The first piece of board had been split up; so he laid another one before Nathan, and gave him his beetle and wedges and knife, and then went away out to the barn to get some more wood for w...
When he came back, he found Nathan standing at the shed door, with the little beetle in his hand, waiting for him. As Nathan saw Rollo coming, he called to him, saying,
"Come, Rollo, come and help me; the board won't split."
"What is the matter with it?" said Rollo.
"I don't know," said Nathan, "only it won't split."
So Rollo went in to see. He found that Nathan had gone to work wrong. Instead of trying to drive the wedge into the end of the board, so as to split it along the grain, he had made the cleft with the knife in the side of the board, and was attempting to drive it in there, as if he supposed he could split the board acro...
"Why, Nathan," said Rollo, "that isn't right. You can't split it across."
Then he put the wedge into the end, where it ought to be put, and set Nathan to driving it. Now it began to split at once; though Nathan could not see why the board should not split one way as well as the other.
Rollo himself did not understand it very well. Nathan asked him why it would not split the other way, and he said that that was across the grain. But when Nathan asked him what he meant by grain, he could not tell.
He took up the wood and examined it, and observed little lines and ridges, running along in the direction in which it would split; but at the ends of the board, where it had been sawed across the grain, it was rough. He determined to ask Jonas about it, or his father.
He then went to work, and made the wedges and a little beetle for Nathan. He made Nathan's beetle smaller than his own, because Nathan was not strong enough to strike hard with such a heavy beetle. He did not get it done in season to use that day; but, the next day, he and Nathan sat down upon the shed floor, and spent...
Dorothy seemed very much pleased, and promised the boys that, the next time she baked pies, she would kindle the fire in the oven with their kindling wood, and then she would bake them each a little apple turnover.
* * * * *
That evening, just before Rollo went to bed, he asked Jonas if he could tell him why boards would only split along the grain.
"Yes," said Jonas, "I think I can tell you. But do you know what the grain is?"
"No," said Rollo, "I don't know any thing about it."
"You know that boards are made from the stems of tall trees."
"Yes," said Rollo.
"Well, now when trees are growing, there are little channels running up and down from the roots to the branches."
"What are they for?" said Rollo.
"They are for the sap. The sap flows up and down in them. But then there are no channels across from one side of the tree to the other, because there is no sap to go across. The sap all has to go up from the roots to the branches; and so the channels must all be up and down the tree.
"Now," continued Jonas, "when they cut down the tree, the trunk will split easily, up and down, the way the channels and fibres all go; but it won't split easily across. And just so, when they saw it up into boards, the boards will all split lengthwise, from end to end, for this is the way the channels and fibres all l...
"Why?" said Rollo.
"Because, if trees would split across, as easily as they do up and down, the first good wind would blow down all the forests in the world."
"O, Jonas!" exclaimed Rollo, "all the forests in the world?"
"Yes," replied Jonas, "if the wind blew all over the world."
Horology.
One day, at eleven o'clock, Rollo, after having put away his books carefully into his desk, went out to play. It was a calm and pleasant autumnal day. Brown and yellow leaves were falling from the trees, and lying about the yard. Rollo found Nathan sitting upon the steps of the door which looked toward the garden yard....
"Now, Nathan," said Rollo, "I will lie down upon the steps, and make believe I am a bear gone to sleep, and you come and poke me with your stick, and then I will growl at you."
"Well," said Nathan, "I will."
So Rollo laid down upon the steps, putting his arms upon the threshold of the door for a pillow, and his head upon his arms, and pretended to be asleep; but he did not look much as if he was asleep, after all, for he could not look quite sober. He tried to look sober; but there was a lurking smile upon his face, which ...
This play lasted several minutes, until at length Nathan spoiled it by punching Rollo too hard with his whip-handle. A great many plays are spoiled by roughness on the part of some who are engaged. Rollo, being hurt a little, got out of patience. He ought to have asked Nathan, pleasantly, not to punch him so hard. Inst...
They both went into a corner of the yard, where Rollo used to have his sand-garden. This sand-garden was made of clean sand, which Rollo and his cousin James once wheeled up from the brook; and then, after they had smoothed it out, and raked it over, they used to get plants and flowers, without any roots, and stick dow...
Rollo began to rake off the leaves with his fingers, and then sat down, and went to digging a hole in the sand. It was very dry upon the top, but on digging down a little way, he found it damp, and so it would hold together pretty well, and he could pat it into any shape. A load of clean sand makes a very good place fo...
Rollo sat down on one side of the sand-garden, and Nathan on the other, and both busied themselves in digging and building little houses. They both became very much interested, and sat some time very still, until, at length, Rollo looked around to see what Nathan might be doing.
"What are you doing, Thanny?" said he.
"O, I'm making the sand run down through."
Rollo observed that Nathan had an old tin dipper, which he was holding up in one hand, and putting some dry sand into it with the other. There was a very small hole in the bottom of the dipper, for it was an old one which had been worn out and thrown away; and the sand ran out of this little hole in a fine stream, and ...
"O, Nathan," said Rollo, "let me have the dipper."
"No," said Nathan, "I want it myself."
Rollo would not take it away from Nathan, though he wanted it very much indeed.
"Yes, Nathan," said he, "let me have the dipper, and I will make you an hour-glass out of it."
But Nathan said, "No, no," and moved away a little farther.
Rollo then remembered that such a little boy was generally not interested in any one thing very long, and that, if he should let Nathan alone, he would soon put the dipper down, and then he could have it without any difficulty. So he went on making houses in the sand, and in a few minutes Nathan put the dipper down. Th...