Rollo's Museum. Abbott Jacob
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which he had been intending to burn. It had been lying all summer, and had got very dry. In the mean time, Jonas continued digging his canal, and was gradually approaching the pool of water. When he had got pretty near the pool, he stopped digging the canal, and went to the pool itself. He rolled a pretty large log into the edge of it, for him to stand upon; and with his hoe he dug a trench, beginning as far in the pool as he could reach with his hoe, while standing upon his log, and working gradually out towards where he had left digging the canal. The bottom of the pool was very soft and slimy; but he contrived to get a pretty deep and wide trench out quite to the margin, and a little beyond.
“Now,” said he to Rollo, “I am going to dig the canal up to the end of this trench, and then the water will all run very freely.”
There was now a narrow neck of land between the end of the canal and the beginning of the trench; and as Jonas went on digging the canal along, this neck grew narrower and narrower. Rollo began to be impatient to see the water run. He wanted Jonas to let him hoe a little passage, so as to let it begin to run a little.
“No,” said Jonas.
“Why not?” said Rollo.
“There are two good reasons,” he replied. “The first is, it will spoil my work, and the second is, it will spoil your play.”
“What do you mean by that?” said Rollo.
“Why, if I let the water run a little now, it will flood me here, where I am digging, and make all muddy; and I cannot finish my canal so easily; so it will spoil my work. Then, besides, we want to see the water run in a torrent; but if I let you dig a little trench along across the neck, so as to let it off by degrees, you will not take half as much pleasure in seeing it run, as you will to wait until it is all ready. So it will spoil your play.”
Rollo did not reply to this, and Jonas went on digging.
“Well,” said Rollo, after a short pause, “I wish, Jonas, you would tell me how the bubbles of air get down into the mud, at the bottom of the brook.”
“I don’t know,” said Jonas.
“It seems to me it is very extraordinary,” said Rollo.
“It is somewhat extraordinary. I have thought of another extraordinary phenomenon somewhat like it.”
“What is that?” said Rollo.
“The rain,” replied Jonas.
“The rain?” said Rollo; “how?”
“Why, the rain,” replied Jonas, “is water coming down out of the air; and the bubbles are air coming up out of the water.”
“Then it is exactly the opposite of it,” said Rollo.
“Yes,” said Jonas.
“But you said it was like it.”
“Well, and so it is,” Jonas replied.
“Like it, and yet exactly opposite to it! Jonas, that is impossible.”
“Why, yes,” said Jonas, “the air gets down into the water, and you wonder how it can, when it is so much lighter than water. So water gets up into the air, and I wonder how it can, when it is so much heavier. So that the difficulty is just about the same.”
“No,” said Rollo, “it is just about opposite.”
“Very well,” said Jonas. Jonas never would dispute. Whenever any body said any thing that he did not think was correct, he would sometimes try to explain it; but then, if they persisted, he would generally say “Very well,” and that would prevent all dispute. This is an excellent way to prevent disputes, or to end them when they are begun.
While Jonas was digging slowly along through the neck of land, Rollo was rambling about among the bushes, and at length Jonas heard a sudden scream from him. Jonas looked up, and saw Rollo scrambling away from a little thicket, and then presently stopping to look back, apparently frightened.
“What now, Rollo?” said Jonas.
“Here is a great hornets’ nest,” said Rollo.
Jonas laid down his spade, and went to where Rollo was. Rollo pointed to a little bush, where Jonas saw, hanging to a bough, not far from the ground, a small hornets’ nest, about as big as a common snow-ball, and as round. Jonas walked slowly up towards it, watching it very attentively, as he advanced.
“O Jonas! Jonas!” exclaimed Rollo, “you’d better be careful. Jonas! Jonas! you’ll get stung.”
Jonas paid no attention to what Rollo was saying, but still kept moving slowly on towards the bush. When he got pretty near, he took his knife out of his pocket, and advancing one step more, he took hold of the end of the branch with one hand, and cut it off close to the tree, with the other. Rollo, in the mean time, had run backwards several steps to avoid the danger; still, however, keeping his eyes fixed upon Jonas.
Jonas brought the nest out of the thicket.
“Jonas!” said Rollo, in a tone of strong remonstrance, “you are crazy.”
“There are no hornets in it,” said Jonas, quietly.
He brought out the nest, and held it so that he and Rollo could see it.
“The hornets have made it of brown paper,” said he.
“Brown paper,” said Rollo. “Where do they get the brown paper?”
“O, they make the brown paper too.”
“Ho!” said Rollo; “hornets can’t make paper.”
“Think not?” said Jonas. Jonas was always careful not to contradict, even when he supposed that Rollo was mistaken.
Rollo said he was sure that hornets could not make paper. Then Jonas took off a little shred from the hornets’ nest, and compared it with some brown paper which he had in his pocket; and he explained to Rollo that the hornets’ nest was made of little fibres adhering to each other, just as the fibres of the paper did.
“It is the same article,” he said, “and made of the same materials; only they manufacture it in a different way. So I don’t see why it is not proper to call it paper.”
“I don’t think it is paper,” said Rollo; “nothing is paper but what men make.”
“Very well,” said Jonas, “we won’t dispute about the name.”
So Jonas returned to his work, and Rollo said that he meant to carry the hornets’ nest home, and show it to Nathan. He accordingly laid it down by the side of his fire, near the dipper and the raspberry seeds.
In a short time, Jonas reduced the neck of ground, where he was digging, to a very narrow wall, and he called Rollo to come and see him let out the water. He took the shovel, and he told Rollo to take the hoe, so that, as soon as he should break down this wall, they could both be at work, digging out the passage way, so as to get it cleared as soon as possible.
He accordingly began, and soon made a breach, through which the water rushed with considerable force into the canal, and then wandered along rapidly towards the outlet into the brook. Rollo pulled away with his hoe, hauling out mud, moss, grass, and water, up upon the bank where he stood; and Jonas also kept at work clearing the passage with the spade. In a short time they had got a fine, free course for the water, and then they stood still, one on each side of the bank, watching the torrent as it poured through.
At length, the water in the pool began to subside gradually, and then it did not run so fast through the canal; and pretty soon after this, Jonas said he thought it was time for them to go home to dinner. So Rollo put up his raspberry seeds in a paper, and put them into his pocket, and carried his hornets’ nest in his hand. Jonas took the dipper and the lantern, and thus the boys walked along together.
A FALSE ALARM
As Rollo and Jonas walked along towards home, Rollo told Jonas that he thought he had been very successful in collecting curiosities that day.
“Why, what curiosities have you got besides your hornets’