HOLLO S CORRESPONDENCE. THE ROLLO SERIES 18 COMPOSED OF FOURTEEN VOLUMES, VIZ Rollo Learning: to Talk. Rollo Learning to Read. Rollo at Work. Rollo at Play. Rollo ul School. Hollo s Vacation. Rollo s Experiments. 5 Rollo s Museum Rollo s Travels. i Rollo s Correspondence. -; Hollo s Philosophy Water. \ Roilo s Philosophy Air. < Rollo s Philosophy Fire. I Roilo s Philosophy Sky. A NEW EDITION, REVISED BY THE AUTHOR BOSTON: PHILLIPS, SAMPSON, AND COMPANY. Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the Year 1855, by PHILLIPS, SAMPSON, & CO., In Bit Clerk s Office of the District Court of the District of Massachus iooo NOTICE. THIS volume constitutes the tenth in the history of Rollo, and completes the series, so far as at present contemplated. The writer may, perhaps, carry forward, from time to time, the history of Jonas, and there Hollo may himself occasionally appear. One volume, entitled JONAS S STORIES, has already been issued ; an other, JONAS S LAW, intended to exhibit the nature of rights and obligations among boys, and the principles on which their disputes are to be settled, may fol low soon. Except so far as Rollo may appear, as a secondary personage in these sketches of Jonas s history, our readers will now take leave of him, at least for a long time to come. 941 CONTENTS. Page HOLLO S COBRESPONDENCE 7 CRITICISM 18 A CHAPTER OF LETTERS 4] THE SUSPENSION 60 SCHOOL AT HOME 68 STUDY HOURS AND PLAY HOURS fe3 MORE LETTERS 92 AN EXPEDITION 106 THE TRAVELLERS 117 THE TURCO STORY 130 HYDRAULICS 139 THE RETURN 157 CHARLES 169 ADVICE... ,. 183 ROLLO S CORRESPONDENCE. ONE day, when Rollo was about seven or eight years old, he was sick. He was not very sick ; but he was so sick that he had to keep in his bed almost all the day. It was winter, and his mother had moved his little trundle-bed out before the fire, so that he might be comfortable. Rollo got better in the course of the day ; his father gave him some medicine in the morning, and in the afternoon he was much better. So his little brother Nathan came in to play with him. He brought his blocks, and spread them all out upon Rollo s bed. Rollo sat up in his bed, and played with them. But he could not b Jld very well : the bed was so soft and uneven. " Mother," said Rollo, " may I get up ? " " I am afraid you are not quite well enough," said his mother. S HOLLO S CORRESPONDENCE. "Yes, mother," said Hollo, "1 feel a great deal better ; and we can t build upon the bed, for we have not got a good founda tion. Nobody can build without a good foundation." " O, I can get you a foundation," said his mother. She had been sitting all this time at her work-table, by the side of the fire, sewing. She was very busy. She, how ever, put down her work, and went down stairs to get Rollo and Nathan a foundation. Presently she came back with a square board in her hand. " There," she said, as she brought the board to Rollo, and placed it down before him, evenly, upon the bed. " There, now you can build." She left Rollo and Nathan then, and went back to her work. They began to build a powder-house. Rollo said that they would play that it was a powder-house, full of pow der, and that fire caught to the powder, and so the powder-house b 1 . w up. When he was ready for the explcK.un, he and Nathan were to knock down the powder-house and scatter the blocks about, and say, Bang. They played this for a. little while, but ROLLO S CORRESPONDENCE. 9 "Rollo was too feeble to enjoy such a play long. The board troubled him, for it would riot lie steadily upon the bed. Nathan was rather restless, and sometimes, just as they had got a building half done, he would sud denly move his position, and tumble it all down. This worried Rollo ; his head felt weak and giddy, and at length he laid it down upon his pillow, and shut up his eyes. Nathan placed the board again in an even position, and began to build by himself. As he kept talking all the time, he dis turbed Rollo, and Rollo said, " Nathan, I wish you would move your blocks off my bed." " No," said Nathan, "for then my house will tumble down." So Nathan went on building his powder- house, talking to himself all the time. "O dear me," said Rollo, "I wish he would go aw^y." But Nathan, intent on building his pow der-house, did not think of the inconvenience he was occasioning to his sick brother. And Rollo s mother, being busy with her sewing, did not notice what the children said. " Now my powder-house is going to bo 10 ROI.LO S CORRESPONDENCE. struck with lightning," said Nathan. " Look, Hollo, look ; if you want to see the lightning blow up." " No," said Rollo, moving his head a little farther off, upon his pillow, " no, I am tired ; I don t want to see." " Look, Rollo, look quick," said Nathan. " O dear me," said Rollo, " what a noise ! " Just then the instant arrived for Nathan s explosion. With a sudden dash of his hand he knocked down his powder-house ; the bricks flew around the bed, and one of them fell upon Rollo, and struck him upon the cheek. It hit him just upon the hard, bony place, a little below the eye. "O Rollo!" said Nathan, ( I did not mean to hurt you." Rollo did not answer, but his face assumed an expression of pain, and the tears began to come into his eyes. Nathan put his little, soft hand over the place, and begged Rollo not to cry. Rollo, however, turned his face over, and moved away, and his cheek was hid under the bed-clothes. He did not cry aloud, but he sobbed a little, so that his mother heard him. 11 He was not hurt much, after all. If he had been well, he would not have regarded it a moment. But he was feeble and ten der, arid a very little suffering, under such circumstances, was more than he could bear. His mother came and wiped away his tears ; and she told Nathan that he had better put his blocks away. Nathan was unwill ing. He said that he would not build any more powder-houses ; he was only going to build a steamboat. " But the steamboat may blow up too," said his mother. Nathan assured her positively that his steamboat should not blow up ; he would take special care of it " No, I had rather you would not build any more, now," said his mother. " Be sides, Dorothy is going to bake some rolls for supper, and if you would like it, you may go down and ask her to give you a small piece of dough, and let you make a little cake." Nathan liked this plan very much. So he put his blocks in their place, and away he went to make his cake with Dorothy. Rollo s mother then placed her little 12 HOLLO S CORRESPONDENCE. patient comfortably in bed, and smoothed the bed-clothes around him. She spoke soothingly to him, and recommended to him to go to sleep ; and then she returned to her work. After a short time, Rollo asked again to get up. He was tired, he said, of lying in his trundle-bed. His mother was somewhat in doubt about it, but on the whole con cluded, that perhaps he would sleep better during the night if he should get up and have his bed made. She accordingly con sented. She took him up gently, bathed his face and hands, combed his hair, dressed him, and put him in his little rocking-chaii before the fire. Then she brought a little table, which Rollo had to play with, before him. It was just high enough for him to sit to it, in his little chair. Then she made up his bed, arid trundled it away, under the great bed, out of sight. " Now, Rollo," said she, " I am going to get you some supper." So his mother went down stairs, and in about a quarter of an hour she returned with some toast, and a cup of " milk tea," as she called it. It was made with milk and hot ROLLCTS CORRESPONDENCE. 13 water, and well sweetened with loaf sugar, Hollo liked milk tea very much. After Rollo had eaten his toast and drank his tea, he wanted a pencil and paper to draw. His mother got them for him, and then she returned to her work. Rollo did not like drawing, very long. He tried a little while, bat he did not seem to succeed very well ; and at last he put his pencil down, and laid his head back against his chair, and sighed. " What is the matter, Rollo ? " asked his mother. " I can t draw very well," said Rollo. " Why not ? " inquired his mother. " I don t know," said Rollo ; " I am too tired." His mother looked at him, and saw that his cheek was flushed, and he looked rest less and uncomfortable. She was afraid that he had been exerting himself too much. So she told him she thought he was not we.", enough to draw, and that he had better put his drawings away, and go to bed again. Rollo did not answer, but immediately began to put up his paper and pencils. His mother was very glad to see him complying 2 14 HOLLO S CORRESPONDENCE. so readily with her suggestions, but on look ing at him again, she saw the tears flowing fast from his eyes. They were, however, tears of disappointment and sorrow, not of vexation. She pitied him, and laying down her work, she determined to do something to soothe and comfort him. She went and helped him put his drawing implements away, and then she took him up in her lap p.nd began to rock him. " Now, Rollo, what can I do for yo i . ; " said she. " I don t know, mother," s^.id Rollo ; ;c only I wish you would draw me some pictures ; or else tell me a story." " Well, I will tell you a story. I will put you back again comfortably in bed, and Shen I will tell yo i a story." Rollo assented to this ; his trundle-bed was drawn out, and he was put into it. It was soft and smooth, and he was glad, on the whole, to get his cheek upon the pillow again. His mother lighted a lamp, for it was beginning to be dark, and then returned to her work, by the side of the fire, and began to tell Rollo a story about a boy who was ROLLO S CORRESPONDENCE. 15 learning to ride on horseback, and whose horse ran away with him into a river to drink. Rollo listened with great interest for a time, and then gradually fell asleep. The next thing that he knew was, that he was waking up. The air felt cool upon his cheek. He raised his head and looked around. It was bright daylight. There was no fire in the fireplace, and his mother was no where to be seen. He knew it was morning, and supposed that his father and mother had gone down stairs. His eye soon fell upon his little chair, which was placed close to his trundle-bed ; and in it was a pile of books, with a letter upon the top of them, so placed as to pre sent the back of the letter, which contained the address, distinctly to his view. He saw the word ROLLO written very legibly upon it. He knew that, it must be a letter to him. He thought his mother wrote it. He took it, and opened it, and read as follows : " At my Work-Table, Wednesday Evening. " Dear Rollo, " You have gone to sleep, and can no more hear my stories ; so I have concluded to write you a little letter. 16 ROLLO S CORRESPONDENCE. " Your father came home a few minutes ago. He came to your trundle-bed, and said he was glad to find that you were asleep. He felt of your pulse, and of your cheek, and said he thought you were a great deal better. He hoped you would have a good night, and be well in the morning. " Nathan has just come in with his cake. He baked it on the kitchen hearth, covering it over with ashes. Dorothy told him to do it so. He thought the ashes would stick to it, but it did not much, and she brushed it clean for him, by shaking it in a cloth, when it was done. He is keeping a piece of it for you. " There is one advantage in being sick, as you have been. We learn by experience how people feel when they are sick, and how they like very quiet and gentle treatment, and kind, soothing words. Thanny does not know, but I do, for I have been sick a great many times. I suppose that if your father, or myself, or Thanny should be sick now, you would know a great deal better how to take care of us, than you would have known if you had not been sick yourself. 17 " I cannot write any more now. I should .ike to have you answer my letter to-morrow, if you please. " t am your affectionate mother, "L. H." Hollo was very much pleased with his let ter. He read it again and again, and he thought it was very kind indeed in his mother to write it for him. He determined that when he got up he would write an an swer to it. He wanted to get up immediately, but as he had been sick the day before, he did not know whether his mother would be willing. He waited, accordingly, a few minutes, and presently his mother came in to ask him how he did. She found him so much better, that she let him get up and dress himself, and she said she thought that perhaps after breakfast he might go out a little while to play. a* 2* 18 CRITICISM AFTER breakfast, however, his mother, on going to the door, found that a bleak wind was blowing, and she thought that it would be better for Rollo to remain in the house. She moved his little desk into the parlor, and put it by the side of the fire ; and she told him that he might sit at it and arnuse himself in any way he pleased. " You may read," she said, " in some story-book, or you may write or draw, or paste pictures into your scrap-book." " I ll tell you what I will do, mother," said Roilo. " I will write an answer to your letter." "Very well," replied his mother; "I should like to have you do that very much." So Rollo began to get out his writing materials to write his letter. His mother went away, and presently came back into the room with two or three large, rosy ap ples, in a small plate. CRITICISM. 19 11 Are those apples for me ? " said Rollo. " One of them is ; I am going to let you roast it," replied his mother. " I am very glad of that," said Rollo, jumping up from his seat, and going to take one of the apples. " You ll take a good deal of pleasure," said his mother, " I have no doubt, in watch ing it while it is roasting, and then in eating it when it is roasted and cool." " Yes, mother," said Rollo. " And you must remember, when other children that have been sick are getting bet ter; and you have the care of them, that it is an excellent thing to put them down an apple to roast. It amuses a convalescent very much, and then it tastes very pleasantly when they come to eat it, especially if you put a little sugar on it." " Are you going to put any sugar on mine ? " asked Rollo. " Yes, perhaps I shall, if you are a good boy." " Well, mother," said Rollo, after a mo ment s pause, " and when Thanny is sick, T \vill get him an apple." 20 CRITICISM. So Hollo put the apples down to the fire to roast, and then sat down to write his letter.* Li about ten minutes his mother came back into the room, intending to sit down to her work, and keep Hollo company. She found him just folding up the piece of paper which he had been writing his letter upon. " Have you finished your letter already ? " she said. " Yes," he replied ; " haven t I been quick ? " " Pretty quick," rejoined his mother, " though that is not always the highest praise a letter can receive." " What is not ? " asked Rollo. " Its having been written quick," she replied. At the same time she took Hollo s letter, sat down by the side of her work-table, laid her work down, and prepared to read the letter. Rollo stood by her side to look over. The paper was a small, square piece. It was folded over and over once or twice ; on the back side was written, " FOR MY MOTHER," in pretty large letters. They opened it, and Rol o s mother read as follows. It was writ ten very near the upper edge of the paper, KOLLO STOOD BY HER bIDE AND LOOKED OVER Page 20. CRITICISM. 21 and there were some mistakes ; but she took no notice of them in reading it. She read it correctly, as Rollo intended it to have been written. l( Dear Mother, " I am very much obliged to you for sending me a letter. I am going to write you an answer now. 1 believe I cannot write any more now. " Your affectionate son, " ROLLO." " O dear me ! " said Rollo, " how the Rollo is blotted!" " Yes," said his mother, " you folded it up before the ink was dry." " That is because I was in a hurry to get it done," replied Rollo. " Yes," said his mother ; and she began then to resume her work. " Well, mother," said Rollo, after a few minutes pause, " and what do you think of my letter?" " I know what I think" said she, " but I don t know exactly what I had better say." "Why not? said Rollo. 22 CRITICISM. " Because I don t know which you most desire, praise or improvement." " I don t understand exactly what you mean/ said Rollo. " Why, if you have written this letter only to be praised for it, and are in such a state of mind as to be satisfied, yourself, with this first attempt, and wish to find me satisfied with it, then I must praise it ; and I can praise it very easily and honestly, for, considering that it is the first attempt, it is really very well. But, on the other hand, if your mind is more intent on future improvement than on present praise, then I must look over the letter and find out all the faults, and tell you of them, so that you may improve, and become a good letter-writer. But then, if I do that, it will disturb the satisfaction which you now feel with your letter, for I should find a good many faults." Rollo hesitated. He hardly knew which view he should prefer to have his mother taJ^e of the case. He had written the letter to please his mother, and he wanted very much to have her express herself pleased and satisfied with it ; but then, on the other hand, he wanted to make improvement, and CRITICISM. 23 BO he wished to have the faults pointed out. " Mother," he said at length, after think ing of the subject a few minutes, " I wish you would do both. First tell me about the letter, as if you thought I wanted praise, and then, afterwards, tell me the faults." " Very well," said his mother, " I will. In the first place, then, I think you were a good boy to think of writing me an answer, of your own accord. It showed that you felt some gratitude to me for writing the let ter. Then it is written neatly. Tis true you blotted the Rollo a little in folding it up ; but then you seem to have taken pains and care to write it well, and to. keep it clean. Then you finished it all, complete, folding and addressing it ; and you made no fretful complaints about your pen and ink, or your writing, while you were at work." While his mother was saying this, Rollo leaned upon the arm of her chair, looking down upon her work, but with an evident expression of pleasure upon his countenance. When his mother had finished, he paused a moment, and then, looking up, he said, CRITICISM. " And now, mother, tell me what you would say if I wanted improvement." " Very well, I will," she said. " In the first place, the form of the paper would have been better if you had folded it once, before you began to write, like a sheet of paper, so as to make four pages. It would then have looked more like a real letter." " I thought this would do just as well," said Hollo. " It is a little better, perhaps," said his mother, " to have your letters correspond in form with those you will hereafter have to write ; then you will become familiar with the form, and with all the details." " Well, moUier," said Hollo, " I will fold over the next one." " Then you have not written any date. The date, you know, is a memorandum of the place and time where the letter was written, and is placed upon the upper corner, towards the right hand." " But, mother, you knew where the letter was written, and when:" " Yes, but your object is improvement, and so it is best to write the lettei according CRITICISM. 25 to aJ the usual forms. Besides, it is specially important to be in the habit of always put ting in the date to a letter. Some persons very frequently forget it." Here Rollo went to his desk, and looked at his mother s letter, which was lying open there, and said, "Yours is dated, At my Work-Table. I thought we ought to put in the name of the town." " We must put in such a designation of the place as will be sufficient* for the infor mation of the person whom we are writing to. As you knew perfectly well what town I was writing in, I thought it would be more interesting to you to know that I was writing at my work-table." " Yes, mother, it was," said Rollo. " So, sometimes, people date a letter At Sea, or l Newgate Prison, or On board ship Bellerophon, or put any other designa tion of the place which they think will be most interesting to their correspondent." "Newgate Prison?" repeated Rollo. " Yes," replied his mother ; " if a person vas in Newgate Prison, which is in London, he would be likely to date his letter in those b 3 26 CRITICISM. words, rather than by the word London. So you might date a letter to Jonas, if you should write one to him, In the Parlor, or wherever you might write it." " I will," said Hollo, his eye brightening up at the idea. " I will write Jonas a letter. Perhaps he will answer it." " Perhaps he will ; but now I am going on to tell you of the points in which you can iiMorove, in writing your letters." " Well, mother," said Hollo, " what is the next?" " The next point is, that I would advise you, after you have written a letter, always to look it over very carefully yourself, before you send it, and correct all the mistakes you can find in it." " Are there any mistakes in my letter to you, mother ? " said Rollo. " Yes," replied his mother, " there are several." " I wrote it as well as I could," said Rollo. " I know you did ; but perhaps you did not .ook over it carefully, after you had finished it." " No, mother, I did not," said Rollo. CRITICISM. 27 " It often happens that a person sees many mistakes, in carefully revising his work, which he did not notice, in first writing it. You can try it, with this letter of yours. If you look it over carefully now, perhaps you will find some mistakes." Hollo looked over his letter carefully, as his mother had suggested, and he found quite a number of mistakes. Some words were misspelt ; commas and periods were omitted, and in one case a whole word was left. out. Rollo corrected these errors, and he deter mined that when he had finished his letter to Jonas, he would revise it very carefully, before it was sent. " I have one more thing to tell you," re sumed his mother, " and that relates to the subject matter of your letter. It contains three sentences. The first tells me that you were very glad to receive a letter from me. That is very well, for I should naturally be glad to have evidence that the letter pleased you. The second sentence tells me you were going to write me an answer. Now, it was of no consequence to say that, for of course, on receiving your answer, I should know that you concluded to write me one. 28 CRITICISM. And the last sentence tells me that you can not write any more now. This I should know too, of course, by finding that the let- tor was ended. So that two sentences out of three were of no use." Hollo smiled at the emptiness of his epis tle. After a minute or two, however, he attempted to excuse it, by remarking that he did not know what else to say. c: O, yes," replied his mother ; " you might have told me how you felt this morning, or what you were intending to do to-day ; or have given me an account of something you had seen or done before you were sick ; or asked me some questions. There are a thousand things you might have written about. You never have any trouble in find ing something to talk about. What should you think, if you should come down some morning, and find Nathan in the parlor, and should say something to him, and then if he should answer, Hollo, I am glad you spoke to me, and I am going to say something to you in answer. That is all I am going to say now. Rollo laughed outright at the idea of such a speech from Thanny ; but his mother told CRITICISM. him it would be almost exactly like his letter. 11 A great many people," said she, " fill up their letters with utterly useless matter, which gives their correspondents no informa tion, and affords them no pleasure ; such as apologies for not having written before ; or telling them that they have concluded to write now ; or that they mean to write more fre quently hereafter ; or that they have a bad pen, or are in a hurry ; or that their hand trembles ; or other similar things. I advise you to fill up your letters with something more interesting than such things." " And then," continued his mother, " I would write longer and fuller letters." " But, mother," said Rollo, " it will take me a great while to write a long letter." " Very well," said his mother, " be a great while. For instance, if you are going to write to Jonas, it would be better to put a great deal of value into a few letters, than divide and scatter it over a great many." " I do not understand exactly what you mean," said Rollo. " Why, you will be occasionally writing ette.rs to Jonas, I will suppose Now, if you 3* 30 CRITICISM. write only a short letter to-day, of a few lines, to-morrow you may write another, and the next day another ; and then, in a week or two, yon will have written a number of little letters, none of which will be worth much. But if you devote the time you spend in writing letters for several days to one letter, you will probably produce one of some value ; and Jonas will prize it much more than he would the little ones." Hollo was not so much pleased with his mother s opinion on this last point, as he had been upon the others. He did not quite like the idea of waiting so long before sending Jonas his first letter. However, he deter mined to write Jonas a great deal longer and better letter than he had written his mother ; and he went to his desk, prepared his paper, and began. He worked upon his letter industriously for an hour, and was so still that his mother almost forgot what he was doing. At length, however, he got up out of his chair, and said, " There, now it is done ; only I have got to look it over." He then soemed busy for a few mirutes, CRITICISM. 31 looking it over, and soon after brought it to his mother, for her to read. She read it aloud, as follows : " At my Desk in the Parlor, Thursday Morning " Dear Jonas, " 1 am learning to write letters, and am going to write one to you. I have been sick, but now I feel a great deal better. I am almost well enough to go out and work with you to-day in the woods, only it is beginning to snow ; and besides, my hatchet makes my arm ache, so that I cannot work but a little while. " Do you tfrink we are going to have much of a storm ? " Yours, truly, " HOLLO. " P. S. I wish you would write me an answer." Hollo s mother liked the letter very much, and while Hollo was folding and directing it, she went to the fire to take up his apple. " There," said Hollo, " I forgot my apple. " Never mind," said his mother, " I have been watching it for you." CRITICISM. Roho observed that there were three apples at the fire, although lie had put down only one. He asked his mother who they were all for. " One is for you/ she replied, " and one is for Nathan." " And the third ? " said Rollo, inquir ingly. " O, that is a secret." " / know," said Rollo. " Who do you think ? " " For you ? " "No." " For father ? " " No." " For Jonas? "No, not for Jonas." " Is it for me, then ? " said Rollo. " No, not exactly." " Then for Nathan ; are you going to let him have two ? " " No, you have not guessed exactly." Rollo was so perplexed with this riddle, that he stopped folding his letter, looked at the apples, and tried to think who the third one could possibly be for. But his mother told him to go on with his work, and she CRITICISM. 33 said that after he and Nathan had eaten their apples, she would tell him who the third apple was for. Hollo folded and addressed his letter, and then began to seal it with a wafer, which his mother let him have, while she went out with the apples, to put a little sugar upon them. In a few minutes she returned, Na than following her. He had seen the apples, and was highly delighted to think that he was going to have one of them. " Now, mother," said Rollo, " how shall I send rny letter ? " " I don t know," said she ; " perhaps Na than will carry it." As she said this, she put the little plate, with the three roasted apples upon it, down upon a chair, where both Rollo and Nathan could reach it. Nathan crowded up closely to see, but he did not touch them. There were two spoons in the plate, one for Rollo, and one for Nathan. " What ? " said Nathan ; " carry what ? " " Carry my letter out to Jonas." " Well," said Nathan, " I will carry it, as soon as I have eaten my apple." " But I want it carried now." said Rollo. 34 CRITICISM. " I want Jonas to have it as soon as pos sible." "No," said Nathan, " not till after I have eaten my apple." Rollo wanted Nathan to go then very much, but Nathan could not consent to post pone the eating of his apple. Rollo began to complain of him in an impatient tone, as if he had a right to require him to go and deliver the letter. His mother reproved him. She said that Nathan must do just as he pleased about going, as he was under no obligation to go at all. " Well," said Rollo, I wish he would go. Come, Thanny, that s a good boy ; do, and then I will give you one spoonful of my apple." Nathan hesitated. He looked at the ap ples, but seemed undecided. " Pay him in advance," said Rollo s mother, " and perhaps he will go." " Well, J said Rollo ; and he cut out a mouthful of his apple with his spoon, and held it out towards Nathan, saying, 11 The.-e, Nathan," if you will carry the let ter now, [ will give you this out of my apple, CRITICISM. 35 and you will have all your own besides. Come, open your mouth." So Nathan opened his mouth, and Rollo put the spoonful of apple in. Nathan then took the letter, and went out to find Jonas. He passed through the kitchen with his letter in his hand, and thence went out to the shed. The shed door was open, and, on looking out, Nathan exclaimed, " O dear me ! it snows." The ground was white, and the snow was falling, though not very fast. Nathan did not like to go out. He heard Jonas at work in the barn, and he called out to him, but he could not make him hear. Then he de termined to go and get the bell, and ring him in. He accordingly went back through the kitchen to another entry, where the bell was hanging, and he brought it to the shed door, and began to ring. Jonas heard it, and came to the barn door. When he saw Nathan ringing the bell, he called out to know what he wanted. " Here is a letter for you," said Nathan, holding out the letter. New, Nathan used often to amuse himself 30 CRITICISM. by folding up little pieces of paper, which ne picked up about the house, and carrying them to Jonas or Dorothy, saying, " Here is a letter for you." And Jonas supposed that this was only some of Nathan s play. So he answered, " I can t come to get it now, Thanny ; I am busy. And, besides, you must go back, for it snows." The wind blew, and the snow, which was flying through the air, came a little into Nathan s face, and confused him, so that he did not hear very well what Jonas said. It happened that there was a bench just outside of the shed door, and Nathan concluded that he would put the letter upon the bench, and let Jonas come and get it when* he was ready. So he laid it down, calling out, at the same time, " I will put it on this bench." " Very well," said Jonas, "and now run in." So Nathan ran back in search of Rolio and his apple, in the parlor. " What did he say ? " asked Hollo, when Nathan came in. CRITICISM. 37 * He said he was busy," said Nathan. " Busy ! " said Rollo. " Yes," replied Nathan. Rollo said he did not understand what he meant by that. . " Perhaps," said his mother, " he meant that he could not answer it then, because he was busy. I rather think you will get an answer by and by." So Rollo and Nathan took their spoons, and began to eat their apples ; Rollo won dering all the time who the third apple could be for. When they had done eating the two, however, they went to their mother to know who was to have the other, and she said that she got the three apples, one for Rollo, one for Nathan, and the third for Rollo and Nathan together. " Why, mother," said Rollo, " you said it was not for us. I guessed MS." " No, you guessed yourself, and also Na than, separately ; and I told you that was not right, exactly." Rollo recollected that it was so ; and then he and Nathan went back, and ate the third apple. They afterwards amused themselves 4 38 CRITICISM. in various ways all day ; but Rollo heard nothing from Jonas, ahout his letter. After tea, however, he concluded to go and see Jonas. He accordingly went out- and found him getting ready to sit down by the fire to read. " Jonas," said he, " a n t you going to answer my letter ? " " What letter ? " said Jonas. " Why, the letter which I wrote you this morning." " I did not know you wrote me one," replied Jonas ; " I have not received it." Rollo was astonished. He could not im agine what had become of his letter. " I wrote you a noble long letter, and sent Nathan with it. I ll go and ask him what he did with it." So off he went in search of Nathan. He found him in the parlor, playing horses. " Nathan," said Rollo, " I gave you my letter to carry to Jonas ; what did you do with it?" Nathan felt a little afraid ; he had had some misgivings about leaving the letter on the bench. He began to walk back and CRITICISM. 39 forth, with his hands behind him, and his head down. " Yes," said he, " 1 carried it." " And what did you do with it ? " said Hollo, following him closely. " I put it on the bench," said Nathan, timidly. " What bench ? " said Hollo. " I put it on the bench, by the shed ; and Jonas saw it." Hollo went back to Jonas, and told him that Nathan said he put the letter upon a bench, and that Jonas saw it. Then Jonas recollected that Nathan had brought him a letter, and put it upon the bench ; and lie arose, and went to look for it. It was pretty dark, and so he took a lantern. The bench was covered with snow, and more was fall ing. Jonas brushed the snow away care fully, but no letter was to be found. Jonas then thought that perhaps the wind might have blown off the letter, before it got cov ered up with snow, and he began to poke around with a stick, among the little drifts, in the direction towards which the wind would have blown it. Out it came at length, 10 CRITICISM. from under a little rose-bush. Jonas care fully brushed off the dry snow, and brought it into the house. He sat down by the chimney corner and opened it, and read it, Hollo standing by his side. He answered it that evening ; and the answer, together with some other letters, which Rollo wrote and received, will be given in the next chapter. 41 A CHAPTER OF LETTERS. LETTER I. Jonas to Rollo. " Thursday Evening. " Dear Rollo, " I received your letter, though not till very late. The mail did not get in in good season. It was owing to the great snow storm. The mail-carrier could not get along, and he abandoned the mail, and it got all buried up in the snow. But they recov ered it again, and so the letter arrived at last. " I am sorry you have been sick. Once I. was sick. It was when I was a little boy. I don t remember much about it. Only I was on board a vessel. The sailors made a terrible noise, and disturbed me. I was lying upon a chest. It was very hard. One of the sailors frightened me very much. He looked very cross, and said he was going to bring down a whole bucket of salt water, and make me drink it for medicine ; for he said 1 was b* 4* 42 shammii -g sick. But I wasn t shamming sick ; I was really sick. I had a dreadful pain in my side, and could hardly breathe. I have forgotten how I got well. " I think I can fix a long handle into your hatchet, so that you can use it like an axe, with both hands, and then it will not make your wrist ache. I will do it early to morrow morning, and then we can go out together, if it does not snow. " Good night. " JONAS." LETTER II. Rollo to his Father. " Friday Evening. 11 My dear Father, " Jonas and I have been down into the woods to-day, hauling up wood on the new sled. I helped Jonas load. We brought up eight or ten loads. There is a good deal more to come, and Jonas is going to work there to-morrow, and I want to go with him. But there is one difficulty. My feet get very cold while I stay down there, unless there is a fire. We could build a fire pretty well, but it melts the snow, and makes a wet. place A CHAPTER OF LETTERS. 43 upon the ground. Jonas says, that if I had a certain large, flat stone, which is lying in the pasture up the brook, for a hearth, and two other stones on each side for andirons, 1 should get along much better ; for I could have a log for a seat, and then put my feet upon the warm and dry hearth, to warm them. I asked him to go and get it for me, and haul it down upon the sled, with old Trumpeter. But he says he cannot, without your leave ; and that is what I have written you this letter for to ask if you are willing that we should take the horse and the sled, and go up to-morrow arid haul it down. " I am your affectionate son, " ROLLO. " P. S. Jonas thinks it will not take more than half an hour." LETTER III. Rollo s Father to Rollo. Saturday Mornirg. (t My dear Boy, " Yours, of last evening, was duly received. Jonas may get the stone for you. I think it is a very good plan to make a fire- 44 place of it. It will be a good place to roast apples, as well as to warm feet. " Affectionately, your " FATHER." LETTER IV. Rollo to his Cousin Lucy. " Monday. 11 My dear Cousin, " I have lately begun to write letters, and as it snows to-day, so that I can t go out, I have concluded to write a letter to you. I am now sitting at my little desk by the parlor fire. Mother has just been telling Nathan a story. It was this, as nearly as I can recollect it : " Once there was a little boy, about as big as Nathan. He was playing around upon the floor. He found a little black thing, and he asked his mother what it was, and she said it was an apple-seed. And the boy asked his mother what it was good for ; and she said, it would grow and be a little apple- tree. <; So the boy went and put the apple-seed out of doors upon a bench, and a few days afterwards he went to T ook at it, and he A CHAPTER OF LETTERS. 45 found it would not grow. * What did you do with it ? said his mother. I put it on the bench, said the boy. O, said his mother, that won t do. Seeds won t grow if you put them on a bench. No, indeed. You must plant it in the ground. How must I plant it ? said the boy. l You must dig a little hole in the ground, and plant it in the hole, said his mother. " So the boy went out and got his seed, and he carried it out into the yard, and dug a little hole, and dropped his seed in ; but he did not cover it up ; and presently a little bird came along, hopping, and she picked up the seed, and ate it up. And the boy came in and told his mother a bird had got his seed And she said, { Did not you cover it up? : No, mother, said the boy. O/ said his mother, that won t do. Seeds won t grow unless you cover them up. No, indeed. " And now I am tired of writing, and can not tell you about his other feed till the next time. " Good by u HOLLO." 46 LETTER V. Rollo s Father to Rollo. " Monday, just before Tea. "My dear Son, " As I have a few minutes to spare before tea, I write you this line, to request that you will give me a full account of your success in moving the flat stone, and making a fireplace of it, on Saturday. I should like to have Jonas write me an account, too. " FATHER." LETTER VI. Lucy to Rollo. " Tuesday Morning. " My dear Cousin Rollo, " Last evening, when I got home, I found your letter waiting for me, and I had a fine time reading it, while I was warming myself. I was pretty cold, for I had been riding into the city with my father. I have not any story to tell you, and so I will give you an account of my ride. It was a ride in a snow-storm. " When it began to snow in the morning, my father asked me if my courage did not fail me ; but I told him no. He had promised me before that I might go with him, and 1 A CHAPTER OF LETTERb. 47 told him I believed I must hold him to his promise. So we got into the sleigh just as the snow began to fall. I had good warm mittens, and a hot plank to put my feet upon. "The snow looked beautifully, falling through the air and lodging upon the trees. The roofs of the houses soon grew white, and the men and the horses that we met with on the way, were all frosted over. At one place we saw some boys out at play around a school-house. Some were holding out their hands to let the snow-flakes fall upon them, and some were making snow-balls ; and then there were four or five trying to make a sliding place, by brushing off the snow from a long piece of ice. But the snow kept falling upon it, all the time, so that they could not get it very bright and clean. Still they could slide upon it pretty well. I wish you and I had a good sliding place. " When we got into the city, father said he had some business to do, and I should have to wait some time. So he took me to a bookstore where he was acquainted, and left me there. He gave me some money to 48 HOLLO S CORRESPONDENCE, buy me a book ; and he said that after that I might sit down and read my book, till he came back. I could not find any book that 1 liked very well, and so I bought a little inkstand and some steel pens. I am writing this letter with one of my pens, and* I like very much. I cannot tell you abou* our ride home, for I have got to the c^^. of my paper. "Your aflcctiona f " jiisin, " LUCY. * P. S. I hope you \vili write to me again soon, and tell me fl 3 rest of the story." LETTER VII. Rollo to his Father. "Tuesday Evening. O .ar Father, " According to your request, I am oing now to give you an account of our getting the flat stone. It was larger and heavier than I had expected; but we got it. We took the sled there to haul it upon. Jonas let me drive, and we both rode on the sled. In one place we had to go through the brook. A CHAPTER OF LETTERS. 49 " When we got to the stone, Jonas and I pried it up, and put it on the sled ; and then we hauled it along to the place. This is all. I am going out to show Jonas my letter, to ask him if it is right, and also to see his account. " Your affectionate son, " ROLLO. " P. S. Jonas says my letter is too short, and that he is going to give a longer account, and that his will not be done for several days. " I am much obliged to you for the wafers you gave me. They are just right. Jonas is going to make me a seal." LETTER VIII. Rollo to Lucy. " Tuesday Evening. 11 My dear Cousin Lucy, " I liked your account of your ride very much. I wish we had a sliding place. I mean to get Jonas to pour some water down some evening, when the night is going to be cold, and then it will freeze, and we can slide upon it in the morning. c 5 50 " My father has given me some wafers, and I send you some with this letter. My mother gave me the box. T have got another just like it for myself. They were made to put hooks and eyes in, but they make beau tiful little wafer boxes. I have written one letter to father this evening, and so I cannot write any more now. " Your affectionate cousin, " ROLLO." LETTER IX. Rollo s Mother to Rollo. " Thursday, Dec. 20. " Dear Rollo, " As I was looking out the window this morning, I saw your sled left in the yard in the walk. Thinks I to myself, Rollo ought to take care of his sled ; I must speak to him about it. I, however, forgot it until you began to ask me to write you a letter, and then I concluded to write on this sub ject. I accordingly notify you hereby that your sled is left out, exposed to injury itself, and in other people s way. Therefore please be so kind as to take care of it, and greatly oblige yours, &c. " LAURA H." A CHAPTER OF LETTERS. 51 LETTER X. Rollo to his Mother. " Thursday, Dec. 20. u Dear Mother, " When I received your letter, I went out to get my sled, but I could not find it where you said it was ; and after I had looked all about, I went arid asked Jonas if he knew where it was, and he said, Yes. I asked him where ; and he said he had im pounded it. I asked him what he meant by that ; and he said, that, when cattle, or horses, or sheep got astray, people had a right to shut them up in the pound. The pound is a little yard with a high fence, very strong, all around it, and when any body s cattle get shut up in the pound, they have to pay some money before they can get them out ; this is to teach them to take better care of them next time, and not let them get astray to trouble their neighbors. " But I don t think that Jonas has any business to impound my sled, and I wish you would tell him to give it back to me. " Affectionately yours, " ROLLO." LETTER XL Rollo s Mother to Rollo. "Dear Rollo, "It seems to me that the plan of im- pounding horses and cattle is a very good one , and I don t see why the principle is not likely to be successful when applied to boys sleds. Please let me know why you object to it. You can answer on this same piece of paper, as there is plenty of room. "MOTHER." Hollo to his Mother, (on the same sheet.) " Because, mother, my sled does not run about, and get into people s gardens, like cattle and horses. " ROLLO." " Bat it gets in people s way ; and then it looks careless, and so is a source of trouble to all who like order. What did Jonas say you must pay for poundage ? " MOTHER." " I did not stop to hear ; 1 came right away as soon as he told me that it was in the A CHAPTER OF LETTERS 53 pouul, and that I must pay something for poundage. I did not think he had a right to make me pay any thing for poundage. He called out to me, and told me I had better come back and hear what the poundage was; but I didn t go. " ROLLQ." " t am sorry you did not go and hear what he had to say. It is always best to take such things good-naturedly. I advise you to go and ask Jonas what the poundage is, and if it is any thing unreasonable, then you can come and tell me. " This paper is now nearly full. We have been having a written conversation upon it, rather than a correspondence. If you have any thing more to say to me upon this subject, yo i had better take a new piece of paper. " MOTHER." LETTER XII. Jonas to Hollo s Father. "Friday, Dec. 21. "Respected Sir, " Rollo showed me a note from you, requesting me to give you an account of our 5* 54 manner of moving the flat stone. I will do it, very gladly, as well as I can. " I brought the sled up as near to the stone as I could, and then tried to pry the stone over on to the sled. But I found that it was too heavy to be managed in this way. I could pry it up a little, but could not turn it over. I was encouraged when I found that Rollo and I could move it with the iron bar ; for a man once told me that if two persons could move a stone at all, they could get it up a mountain, by taking time enough. " I accordingly concluded to pry up one side, and put skids under, with the ends resting on the sled ; and then I got a roller, and meant to put the roller under the stone, and so roll it up the skids. I got some stones out of the brook, and Rollo put them under as fast as I pried the stone up. I had to be very careful not to let him get his fingers under. At last we got the stone up so high that we could put under the skids and the roller; but we could not roll the stone up. I could move it a little way, but it would come back again before I could get another hold. " I then concluded that we must pry up the stone until we should get it as high as A CHAPTER OF LETTERS. 55 the sled, by first prying up one side, and blocking it up, and then the other. I thought we could then put the skids under, level, a] id then, by means of the roller, we could roll it along. This plan succeeded very well. I pried up first one side, and then the other, and Hollo blocked up all I gained. In a short time we got it a little higher than the sled, and then I could put the skids under, level, only I had to block up the ends of the skids, which were under the stone. After we got the skids fixed, we had to pry up the stone a little higher, so as to get the roller under, and then we found that we could work it along with our bars very easily. I had the iron bar, and Rollo had a wooden one, which I made for him. " After we got it loaded, the horse drew it eisily, and Rollo and myself, besides, on the top of it ; and when we got it to the n ghc place, we worked it oif of the sled withov t much difficulty. " I am, very respectfully, " Your friend, " JONAS. 56 HOLLO S CORRESPONDENCE. LETTER XIII. Hollo to Lucy. " Friday. u Dear Cousin Lucy, " The rest of the story is this. The little boy got another apple-seed, and his mother told him she would show him how to plant it. So she took a little flower-pot, and put some earth in it, and then she made a little hole, and put the seed in, and covered it up. There, said she, now I will put the flower pot in the sun, by the window, and by and by it will grow. " So in about a fortnight the seed came up, and it grew into a little apple-tree. When it got too large for the flower-pot, the boy s father took it up and set it out in the garden ; and after some years it began to bear apples. They were largo, red, rosy apples, and very sweet and good. " Very affectionately yours, ROLLO." A CHAPTER OF LETTERS. 57 LETTER XIV. Rollo to his Mother. "Saturday. " Dear Mother, < I went yesterday to ask Jonas what the poundage was, upon my sled, and he said it was only to give him a slide upon it, some day. So I took the sled, and promised to give him the slide any day. But I don t think I shall slide down hill any more, myself, this winter, for I had rather stay in at my desk, and write letters. " But there is one thing I like to do out of doors, and that is, to go and build a fire at my hearth, down by the brook. It is a beau tiful fireplace, and some day I want you to come down and see the fire. I do not build the fire on the great stone, for fear that it should crack it. Jonas says that fire will crack some kinds of stone. I therefore make the fire on the ground, so as to have the stone before it for a hearth. Don t you think you could come down some day, and see me roast apples upon it ? " ROLLO." 58 HOLLO S CORRESPONDENCE. LETTER XV. Hollo s Mother to RoUo. "Saturday Morning. " My dear Boy, " I am glad that you are interested in writing letters ; but you must not expect that the interest will continue very long. Children take up one thing after another, for amuse ment, and enter into each with their whole souls ; and each scheme, after having had its day, is abandoned and forgotten. There is no harm in this, for if children go on steadily in their studies and duties, they may vary their amusements as much as they please. Still it is best that they should understand it fully, and not expect, when they are all ab sorbed in some new pleasure, that it will last forever. Just now, you are tired of sliding down hill, and are interested in writing let ters, but you should not, on that account, be careless of your sled ; for the interest in coasting will undoubtedly return again. " From your affectionate " MOTHER." A CHAPTER OF LETTERS. 59 LETTER XVI. Rollo to his Mother. (( Dear Mother, " I mean to take care of my sled now ; but I really don t think that I shall want tc slide down hill any more this winter, my feet get so cold. And then I don t think I shall get tired of writing letters ; I like it very much, and I haven t got tired of it yet. " Your affectionate son, " ROLLO " THE SUSPENSION WHEN Rollo brought his last letter to his mother, he told her that he meant to get a book, and keep a copy of all his letters in it. " And then you see, mother," said Roilo, " I can have my letters and the answers too ; and you see it is necessary for me to know what I wrote, in order to understand the answers." " Yes," replied his mother ; " but it will be a good deal of trouble to make a careful copy of every letter, before you send it." " O, I shall not mind that," said Rollo. "But I don t see, mother," he continued, leaning over his mother s table, with his pen in his hand, " what makes you think I shall get tired of writing letters." " Because that is the nature of boys." " Is it the nature of all boys ? " said Rollo " Of all that I have ever known ; and at any rate it is your nature." Is it ? " said Rollo. THE SUSPENSION. 61 " Certainly," replied his mother. " Don t you remember that once you undertook to learn to knit ? and morning, noon, and night there was nothing like knitting. You were as pleased with your needles, as you now are with your desk, and you had a little basket to keep your ball in. But in a week the in terest was all over ; and now I doubt whether you could find either your needles or your basket." " Well, mother, I got tired of knitting." " Yes, that is exactly what I say. It was so with coasting. When you first had your sled, you could scarcely think of any thing else, day or night. Now, you care very little about sliding." " Well, mother, that is because it is so cold." " It is not any colder," replied his mother, " than it was when you first had your sled." Rollo knew that this was true, and had not any thing to say in reply; so he was silent. " I want you to understand the truth of the case, Rollo," continued his mother ; " which is, that children like novelty, and are con 6 6x HOLLO S CORRESPONDENCE. slant] y shifting and changing their pleasures. I don t censure you for this at all ; I only want you to understand it. I do not want you to suppose that this love of letter-writing of yours is the development of a new and permanent literary taste, which is going to take the place of all your other amusements ; for this would be a delusion. After it has had its day, it will disappear like its prede cessors, and something else will take its place." Rollo could hardly believe that his mother s views of the philosophy of the subject were correct. At any rate he was perfectly sure that he should not very soon lose his in terest in writing letters. " Letter-writing," he said, " was a different thing from common plays." His mother admitted that it was a different thing, in many respects ; and there the conversation ended. Rollo went back to his desk, and began a letter to Lucy. After he had written a few lines, he seemed to pause. He leaned his elbow upon the desk, and resting his cheek upon his hand, he appeared, for a time, to be in deep thought either considering what hn should say next, THE SUSPENSION. t>3 or else lost in a reverie upon some other sub ject. At length he suddenly looked up to his mother, and said, " Mother ? " 4 What, my son," she replied. " I might warm my feet at my fireplace." " So you might," said his mother, without, however, paying much attention to what he was saying. "If there was only a sliding place near there," added Rollo, speaking partly to him self and partly to his mother. " A sliding place where ? " asked his mother. " Why, near my fireplace. You see, moth er, if there was only a hill, near my fire place, I might slide down hill while Jonas is there at work ; and so, when my feet were cold, T could go and warm them by my fire. I believe I ll go and see." " It is almost dinner time," said his mother ; "wouldn t it be better to wait until after dinner, and go then." "O, I am not going to slide now," said Rollo ; "only to see if there is a place where I can make a coast there. I can run down to my fireplace in a very few Diinut.cs." Gl Rollo \vcnt accordingly ; and he found that there was i piece of descending ground, very near, which Jonas thought would make a fine coast, as soon as it should be well worn. He determined, therefore, to come down imme diately after dinner, and wear it. When he got back to the house, he wrote a line or two more upon his letter ; but his heart was upon his new coast. He was very glad when the dinner bell rang. After dinner he concluded to put away his letter, and finish it at some other time. He placed it carefully in his desk, for he always kept his desk in good order, and then trundled his desk back into its place. It was upon castors, so that he could move it about easily ; and there was a particular part of the room where he was ac customed to keep it, when he had it in the parlor. Rollo got very much interested in his new coasting place, and he spent all his play hours, for a good many days, in sliding upon it : sometimes alone, and sometimes with other boys whom he invited to come and slide with him. One day his mother let him lead Na than down ; and he took him upon his slea before him, and gave him several good slides. THE SUSPENSION. 67 He thought about his unfinished letter, two or three times, but he did not feel exactly like working upon it, and at length it passed en tirely away from his thoughts ; and for sev eral months after this, Rolio neither wiote nor received any letters. 68 SCHOOL AT HOME. THE winter passed away, and the summer came. Hollo did not go to school. There was no good school near. So his mother asked him how he should like a school at home. Rollo said that he should like it very much indeed. His mother told him that the difficulty would be to arrange his work, so that it should not be a constant source of interruption to her, or to his father. " However," said she, " we will try the experiment." So his mother formed a plan, and it was as follows : She placed his little desk in her own room, by the window, in one corner. By the side of his desk was a little table, with an hour glass upon it. The hour-glass was made with two hollow places, above and below, and a narrow opening in the middle, leading from SCHOOL AT HOME. 69 DUO to the other. There was some fine red sand in the hour-glass, which would all run through into the lower part; and then when the glass was turned bottom upwards, the part containing the sand was up, and the empty part down. Then the sand would run down again, through the opening, into the empty part below, and keep running slowly until it had all run through. It took the sand just an hour to run through the opening. They made it so on purpose. For, after they had made the glass, and bored the hole, they were then careful to put in just sand enough to be an hour running through. That is the reason why it was called an hour glass. In some glasses they put in only enough sand to be half an hour running through. Then it is called a half-hour-glass And sometimes they put in so little, that it will run through in a minute ; and in this case they make the glass very small too ; and they call it a minttfc-glats. Hollo s mother put the hour-glass on the little table, by the side of Rollo s desk, in order that he might know how long to study. When the desk, and the hour-glass, and all 70 ROLLO S CORRESPONDENCE. his books Avere ready, his mother led him in there, and then said, " Now, Rollo, here is your study." " Yes," said Rollo, " I like it very much." It looks pleasant to you now, but you will be tired enough of it, I expect, a great many times." Rollo did not make any reply. " Every morning, after breakfast, now, you must come immediately here, and commence your studies." " And shall you be my teacher ? " " Why, yes, I shall tell you generally what you are to do, but then, after that, you must go on alone." " Only, if I have any questions, I can ask you." " No," said his mother, " I shall be away, perhaps, or I shall be busy, and, at any rate, I shall not want to be interrupted. I can de vote ten or fifteen minutes, every morning, to looking over the work you did the day be fore, and telling you what more to do ; but I cannot have rny whole morning broken in upon." "Then I can ask father," said Roilo. SCHOOL AT HOME. 71 "No," said his mother, "father will be en gaged too." " Not so but that he can answer my ques tions," said Hollo. "He cannot always answer them conve niently," said his mother. " If a boy has liberty to go and ask his parents questions about his studies any time, he will be inter rupting them continually. Their time would be entirely at his mercy ; and no parents could instruct their children at home in that way. " Besides," continued his mother, " I want yon to learn co study in solitude, and to rely upon your own resources. You will be obliged to do it in college, and when you are a man ; and you musf learn now." " But, mother," said Rollo, " I must ask questions sometimes, or else I shall not know what to do." "Yes, I -will tell you beforehand," said she, " what to do in every possible contin gency." " Contingency ? " said Rollo, what is con tingcnry 1 " Why, every possible case that may chance to happen." 72 HOLLO S CORRESPONDENCE. " O, mother ! " said Rollo, you cannot tell me, beforehand, what to do in every possible case/ " I will try, at any rate," said she. " In the first place, you are to study arithmetic two hours every morning, the first thing. Now; what difficulties are there that you may get into in that study, which I must provide against ? " " Why, I might riot know how to do the sums," replied Rollo. 11 True ; to guard against that, I will ex plain to you generally, every morning, the nature of the sums that come in that day s lesson ; so that you will know how to pro ceed in doing them. .If any should come wrong, you must look over them, and see if you can find the error ; if you cannot, you must leave them upon the slate, for me to see the next morning, and then pass on to the next sum ; and so keep trying the sums in succession, until the two hours have ex pired. If you get so completely into diffi culty that you do not know at all what to do, then you may shut up your Arithmetic, and set yourself sums in addition, or in any of the rules that you have gore over, and do SCHOOL AT HOME. 73 them. Now, are not all contingencies in respect to doing sums provided for ? " " Why, yes," said Rollo ; " but but, perhaps I shall not have any slate-pencil. His mother did not answer this suggestion in words, but she lifted up the lid of Rollo s desk, and pointed to a little box there, con taining a considerable number of slate-pen cils, all ready for use. They were all rather short, but they were .ground smooth and handsome, and with long, slender points. Jonas had prepared them by grinding them upon the grindstone, at the barn. " You see," said she, pointing to the pen cils, " that that case is provided for." " Yes, mother," said Rollo ; " what beau tiful pencils ! " " But, perhaps, I shall lose my slate," continued Rollo. " How can you lose your slate ? " " Why, I may possibly take it away some time, and then forget to bring it back." " True, you may. In that case you must not trouble any body about it, by asking them if they have seen it ; but simply gq and find it yourself." d 7 74 " But suppose I cannot find it," said Rollo. " You must go on looking for it fahhfuliy and carefully, until the two hours are gone." " What, two whole hours * " 11 Yes, if you do not find it before. And you must consider the tediousness of such a long search as your proper punishment for not having taken care of it." Rollo smiled, but did not make any objec tion. " Now, are not all contingencies in respect to the two hours for arithmetic provided for ? " said his mother. " Why, yes ; though there may be some thing which we have not thought of. There may be some difficulty, different from any of these." " If there should be," continued his moth er, " any thing which, after all I have said, absolutely prevents your studying arithmetic in any way, then I would rather not have you come and ask me any questions, but employ yourself in any useful way you think best, until the next morning, when the reg- alar time will come for me to attend to you." SCHOOL AT HOME. 75 " Well, mother, I will," said Rollo. " So now two hours for arithmetic are provided for. Then you may have a few minutes recess." " How shall I know when ? " said Rollo. 11 Why, when the hour-glass has run out the second time." " O, yes," said Rollo. " You may have a few mii.utes recess, just to take a little run, to see what Jonas is doing, or to have a little play with Nathan. Then, when you come in, you must turn the hour-glass again, and begin another hour. This last hour you must spend in writing." " What shall I write ? " " Any thing you please, only you must write it carefully and well." " Who ll set me a copy? " "It is not necessary for you to have a copy. I don t care at all about your writing like any body else. I only want you to write well. Now, if you write an hour every day, and take pains to form your letters uniformly, regularly, and with care, you will very soon learn to write well ; though your hand will not be modelled after any 76 HOLLO S CORRESPONDENCE. particular master s, and I shall like it all the better for that." " The better ? " asked Rollo. " Yes," said his mother. " It is better that every gentleman should have his own individual hand, different from those of other people, rather than similar to them. I shall look at your writing every morning, and if I see any letters which you form badly, in any way, I will show you how to form them better, and so far as that is concerned, I will set you copies ; but it is not at all necessary that you should have a full copy set for you every day." " I have not got any writing-book," said Rollo. " I know it ; but here is plenty of paper." So Rollo s mother opened his desk, and showed him a quantity of paper in one cor ner, in half sheets. " There," said she, " every day take out one of those half sheets, and write upon it. There is a ruler and two pencils for you to rule the lines." " What are there two for?" asked Rolio. " Why, you may perhaps lose one." " But I can t rule straight," said Rollo. " No matter," said his mother ; " you cac SCHOOL AT HOME. 77 rule straight enough to write for the purpose of learning ; for you see you can take pains, and form your letters smoothly, and uni* formly, and regularly, whether your lines are exactly parallel or not. Besides, you must learn to rule straight. That is important, as well as learning w write." " Well, mother," said Rollo, " I will try ; but you have not told me what to write." " You may write any thing. You may write an account of what you did the day before, or what you are going to do. Or you may write a story to read to Nathan ; or, if you choose, you may fold over a half sheet of paper into the form of a note, and write a note to me, or to father. Or you may write a letter to Jonas, or to any body. You have not written any letters for a long time. But whatever you write, it must be written slowly, carefully, and well, and shown to me the next morning after you have written it." " Suppose my pen gets bad," said Rollo. " I have mended you a dozen pens," sail his mother, in reply ; and so saying, she went to her own table, in another part of the room, and opened a drawer. She found in the drawer a large number of pens, which 7* 78 ROLLO r S CORRESPONDENCE. she brought to Rollo, and gave him. Hollo put them into his desk. " Now you must be economical and careful in using the pens," said his mother, " and not change them too often. There are enough to last you a week or fortnight. Whenever one becomes decidedly bad, you may wipe it clean with your little pen-wiper, and put it away, and take another. Then to-morrow morning I will mend those that. have been spoiled ; but I expect it will not be more than one or two in a morn ing. " Still," continued she, " it is possible, after all, that something may occur which will prevent your writing." "What?" said Rollo. 11 O, I don t know," said she. " By and by, after several days, or weeks, you may get out of ink ; or somebody may possibly have taken your ink-stand away, or your paper may get exhausted, and you may for get to ask me for any more at the right time." Well, and what shall I do then?" said j come and ask you for some ? " " No, by no means," said his mother. SCHOOL AT HOME. 79 " this whole experiment is a plan to guard against my being interrupted at irregular hours, to give you instruction. So you must not, on any account, come to me." " What shall I do, then ? I can read," said Rollo, looking up quickly, as the idea struck him. " I can have some of my books here, and read." " No," replied she ; " that will not do, fox reading is easier and pleasanter than writing, and so you will not care much if you should get into some difficulty, and be obliged to put away your writing. We must have some plan which will substitute something less agreeable than the writing, and that will operate as an inducement for you to keep your things in order, and so go on reg ularly." " Well, mother, what shall it be ? " asked Rollo. " You may write on your slate, instead of writing upon paper. And if there should be any difficulty in your writing upon your slate, so that you cannot possibly do that either, then I would rather not have you come to me, but sit still till the hour is out." 80 ROLLO S CORRESPONDENCE. "Well," said Hollo, drawing a long breath, "I believe I understand." " There is one thing more," said his mo ther, " and then I believe that every con tingency will be provided for. Something very extraordinary indeed may happen, which we have not thought of at all, and prevent your studying altogether." u O, mother," said R,ollo, " how can it 1" " Why, suppose I should lock my room, and go away somewhere, carrying the key with me, inadvertently." " Why, then, I could not study, I know," said liollo. " Now, if any thing very extraordinary, like that, should occur, even then I should rather not have you ask any body what to do. I should prefer to have you exercise your own discretion, and do what you sup pose I should prefer." " Why, mother, it would not take but a minute to ask father, if he was at home." " I know it would not ; but my object is not merely to save us trouble, by this ar- rar.goment, I want to get you into habits of self-government and control. When you SCHOOL AT HOME. 81 grow up and become a man, there will not be, as there s now, somebody for you to run to, at every little difficulty ; but you will be compelled to judge for yourself; and rely on your own resources ; and I want to have you learn the art while you are a boy. Though it is, still, a great part of my object to save myself trouble. If I can get things in such a train, that you can go on and study three hours regularly and successfully every day, without my having any more trouble than to spend a few minutes at the beginning of the time, *hen I can take charge of your education, a good deal, at home, instead of sending you to school all the time. But if parents are obliged to sit by their children while they are studying, to answer questions, or even to be always exposed to interruption from them, you see it would take up so much of our time, and interfere so much with our other occupations, that we could not attend to it. So I want to arrange the business in such a way, as that I shall give you all the instruc tions necessary, at one time, in the morning ; and then be effectually protected from all interruption for the rest of the day. T 82 Roilo was, on the whole, well pleased with the plan of trying the experiment ; and so his mother, recommending to him to be faithful and patient in case any difficulties should occur, left him to himself, at his little desk in the corner. 83 STUDY HOURS AND PLAY HOURS. HOLLO went on very pleasantly for two 01 three days in studying 50/0 ; though he made some mistakes. For instance, on the first day, just after his mother had left him, on looking into his arithmetic, there was one "sum" which he did not know certainly whether he was to do, or not ; and so he jumped up, and ran out to ask his mother. I can t tell you any thing about it/ said his mother. " Why, mother, just tell me whether it is to be done or not. I don t want you to show me how to do it." His mother made no reply, but simply put her finger to her lips, in token of her having not a word to say. She smiled, however, at the same time, which indicated that she was not particularly displeased with Rollo for com ing to ask ; but she shook her head, and kept her finger upon her lips, as if to say that she 84 HOLLO S COHRESPCNDENCE. could not, on any account, say a word tc him about it. In fact, Rollo ought not to have gone to ask her. It would have been better to have performed the doubtful problem at once, for that could have done no harm, certainly. He went back, somewhat out of humor with his mother for not being willing to answer him. The ill humor soon wore off, however, and then, for several days, he went along very smoothly. His mother generally spent ten minutes with him in the morning, before he commenced his studies, explaining to him the difficulties which he had encountered the day before, and giving him general directions. One morning, however, after a few days, Rollo got weary uf studying. It was a warm and pleasant morning, and he wanted to be out to play. His sums did not come right ; though this was because he was not so care ful and attentive as usual. Rollo was not to blame for being weary of studying ; all stu dents are so sometimes. But he ought not to have given way to this feeling of weariness. There is no particular merit in studying dili gently, while the freshness p.rid interest of the HE TOOK UP HIS HOUR GLASS. Page 87, STtJDY HOURS AND PLAY HOURS. 87 study continues. It requires no effort to do that. The praise of diligence and persever ance is not deserved, until the novelty and pleasure of the employment is worn off, and the student is urged on by a sense of duty. But Rollo, as soon as he began to feel a little tired of studying, began to be idle. First he amused himself for several minutes, by an old contrivance of idle boys in school, namely, rolling his pencil down his slate, as it lay inclined upon the desk. The pencil being polygonal in form, that is, having a good many sides, instead of being perfectly round, it made a sharp, rattling sound in roll ing down. This would not seem to be a very elevated species of enjoyment, but it is generally found sufficient to amuse idle boys. After a time, however, Rollo got tired of hearing his pencil rattle down the slate, and then he began to look out the window, and wish that his hour was out. He took up his hour-glass, and began to shake it, to make the sand run faster ; but it seemed to run slower instead of faster, for the shaking. At length he opened his desk, and began looking over the books and papers ; and, pres ently, he came upon the old letter to Lucy, which he had begun months before, and left unfinished until now. He took it out of his desk, and read what he had written. He re membered the pleasure and satisfaction which he had enjoyed in writing and receiving let ters, and he accordingly concluded to finish this letter and send it, and then to write some others. His mother had given him leave to write letters, or any thing else, during one of the hours that he had to spend at his desk ; and so he concluded that he had a very fine opportunity to renew his correspondence. He finished his letter to Lucy, and then folded and sealed it ; and happening accident ally to observe the hour-glass at the moment when he was putting in the wafer, he saw that the sand was out, and of course his hour was expired, and he was at liberty to go and play. He, however, carefully finished his let ter ; and then he had a great mind to write another to Jonas, instead of going out. " And then, perhaps," said he to himself " I shall have an answer from him by to morrow, when I am ready to write again." So he took another piece of paper, and be gan to write. He had advanced about half way down th STUDY HOURS AND PLAY HOURS. 89 first page, when his mother came into the room with a work-basket in her hands. " O, Hollo," said she, " are you here ? " " Yes, mother," said Hollo : still, however, going on with his writing. " As busy as a bee. But isn t your time out ? Yes," said she, as she came up and looked at his hour-glass. " Yes, the sand is all gone. Why ain t you out to play ? " " See, mother," said Hollo, holding up the letter which he had finished. " All done up and sealed. Though I wish, now, I had kept it open, so as to show it to you." " And what are you writing, now ? " asked his mother, as she went and put her work- basket down upon her table. " I am beginning a letter to Jonas. Don t you think it is a good plan ? " " I am not certain that it is a good plan to do it now ? " " Why not, mother? r said Hollo, with sur prise. " Because it is play hours." Hollo was much surprised to hear his moth er speak as if she had any objection to his studying or writing in play hours. He paused d* 8* 90 HOLLO S CORRESPONDENCE. from his work, and sat in silence, wondering what shu could mean. " Well, mother," said Rollo, at length, " and what harm can there be in writing let ters in play hours? " " I am not certain that there is any harm. I did not say that I knew it was a bad plan, but only that I was not certain that it was a good plan." " And why not, mother? " said Rollo. By this time, however, Rollo s mother had spread out some calico upon her table, and was carefully adjusting a paper pattern upon it, in order to cut out a garment for Nathan. Her attention seemed to be absorbed in her work, and she did not answer Rollo. " Mother," repeated Rollo, " what harm is there in it ? " " Let me see," said his mother, looking still intently upon her work, and shifting the pattern to another corner of the calico, to see if it would come out any better there. " O dear me ! " said Rollo. "What s the matter, Rollo?" said his mother; still, however, keeping her eyes upon her work STUDY HOURri AND PLAY HOURS. 91 " I wish you would just tell me what harm there is in writing letters in play hours." " Well, Rollo, I am very busy planning, just now ; but if you will send me youc ques tion in writing, to-morrow, I will reply in the same way." " In writing ? " said Rollo. not exactly un derstanding what his mother meant. "Yes," she replied ; "that is, write me a little note, and put the question in the note." " Well, mother," said Rollo, " I will. I will write the note now." " No, not now," said she ; " not until the regular hour for writing comes, to-morrow." Rollo wondered why his mother was not willing that he should write the letter then ; but, as he perceived that she was very much engaged, he did not trouble her by asking any more questions. And as she had expressed some doubt about his writing even to Jonas, at that time, he concluded to put his writing in his desk, and go out to play. The letters, which he wrote and received for several suc cessive days after this, are given in the next chaptei . 92 MORE LETTERS. LETTER I. Rollo to his Mother. " Study Hours. Dear Mother, "I have put off writing to you until now, according to your request. What I wanted to know, is, why you thought it could possibly be a bad plan for me to write my letters in play hours. I thought, myself, that it would be an excellent plan, and that you would like it ; for writing letters is something like studying, and I thought you liked to have me study as much as possible. Please answer this as soon as you conveniently can, and believe me " Your affectionate and dutiful son, ROLLO." LETTER II. Rollo to Jonas. "Wednesday Morning. " Dear Jonas, " It is a long time since I wrote to you ; and now I am going to begin writing letters MORE LETTERS 93 again. What I want to say new is this A great while ago you promised me that you would " Thursday, 10 o clock. " I wrote so much yesterday, after study hours, and mother came just as I had finished writing the would, and she advised me not to write any letters in play hours. So I put it away until to-day; and now, as the time for writing letters in my study hours has come, 1 am going to finish it. I have written a letter to my mother to know why she is not willing to have me write letters any time of the day. What do you think the reason can be ? " But I was begi lining to say that you promised me, a great while ago, that you would show me how to draw; and now. when will you do it? I wish you would write me a letter about drawing ; and then, you know, I could read it, and follow your directions. That would be better than to have you tell me ; for if you were to tell me, I might forget, but if you write it, I can look at the letter at any time, and so always remember. "I am, very sincerely, your friend, " ROI.LO." 94 HOLLO S CORRESPONDENCE. LETTER III. Rollo s Mother to Rollo. " Thursday Evening, 10 o clock. " My dear Hollo, " You are now sound asleep, as 1 sup pose ; the house is still, and my day s work is done. Before I follow your example, I am going to answer your note. " The reason why I doubted whether it was wise for you to write letters in play hours, is this : It is difficult for children to find sources of interest and pleasure in con nection with their studies ; but it is easy enough to find them for plays. When, there fore, you find any thing in your studies which pleases you, it is best to preserve the enjoy ment for the hours of study, which would otherwise be tiresome ; and not exhaust it in play hours, when you have plenty of other means of enjoyment. This pleasure of wri ting letters, for example, will riot last very long, and it would be especially evanescent if you were to give yourself up to it ac aii hours, as long as it should last. But if you economize the pleasure, and preserve it ioi the hour when you will especially need it, it will last much longer, and sweeten a good many hours of toil. By taking an y one of the MORE LETTERS. 95 enjoyments of study, and making a mere means of amusement of it, you rob the study hours of what they can ill spare, for the sake of giving to play hours that of which they already have enough. That is the philosophy of it, I believe. " Now, I think it very probable that, as you postponed your letter to Jonas, and the one you were intending to write to me, until the regular hour for writing, you looked forward to that hour with much greater interest and pleasure than you commonly do. Whereas, if you had written the letters for mere amuse ment, in your play hours, the interest and pleasure would have been soon exhausted, and then, when your hour for writing had come, you would have had nothing to write which would have interested you, and the occupation would be only a dull and tiresome duty. " But good night ; it is time for me to go lo bed. From "MOTHER." 96 HOLLO S CORRESPONDENCE. LETTER IV. Hollo to his Mother. " Friday " Dear Mother, "I have read the letter which you wrote me yesterday, and I am much obliged to you for it. I could not imagine what rea son you could have for thinking I had better not write letters for play ; but now I under stand, and I think it is a very good reason too. I had a great deal better time at my studies yesterday, because I had some letters to write ; and in the morning I was glad, and not sorry, when the study hours came. I have been thinking that I had better not read my tetters, any more than write the answers, except in study hours ; and I should like to have you, when you write to me again, leave the letter in my desk, or upon it, and then, when I come there to study, I shall find it: only I will not open it until my arithmetic sand has all run out. " Do you think, mother, it would do for me to write a letter, sometime, to Miss Mary, now she has got home? " Affectionately, your son, " HOLLO." MORE LETTERS. 9V LETTER V. Rollo 9 s Mother to Rollo " Friday Evening. " Dear Rollo, " I think there is no objection to your writing to Miss Mary. I have not time to say any more this evening. MOTHER." LETTER VI. Jonas to Rollo. " Tuesday Evening. " Dear Rollo, "You forget that there are no even ings now, and so I cannot write any letters ; at least, I cannot write any long ones. I have been waiting all this time for an opportunity to answer your letter. And now I don t see how I can find time this summer to write you any thing about drawing. But this I will do; if you will draw something, and send it to me in a letter, I will mark it where it is wrong, and perhaps draw another of the same kind, myself, for you to look at, and compare with yours. This, I think, will be as improving to you as for me to write you some directions, though it will be a new way of e 9 98 HOLLO S CORRESPONDENCE. teaching for you will in fact be setting me a cop/. " Good night. " JONAS." LETTER VII. Rollo to Miss Mary. " My dear Teacher, " I heard, a few days since, that you had come home, and I mean to come over and see you ; but first, mother has told me I might write you a letter. I have learned to write a great deal since I went to your school. " I wish you would keep a school again, and that I might go to it. This is all I have to say now ; but I wish you would write me a good long letter. " I am, very affectionately, yours, ROLLO." LETTER VIII. Lucy to Hollo. " Dear Rollo, " I am very glad you finished that old letter, and sent it to me. I have been busy all this afternoon at work in my little garden ; MOUE LETTERS. 99 the flowers grow finely. Do you remember the convolvulus seeds which you gave me. I planted them in a row, all along by the fence, and they came up finely. A little while ago, I got father to drive me a row of nails along on the top of the fence, and I was going to tie some strings to them, for the convolvulus stems to climb up upon. But now I can t reach the nails very well, and I don t dare to climb up upon the fence. I wish you would come over some afternoon, and climb along, and tie the strings for me. Then I think they can. get up very easily, for we can drive some lit tie stakes into the ground at the bottom, tu tie the other ends of the strings to. If we can only do this, I think the fence will be all covered with the flowers by and by. " From Cousin LUCY." LETTER IX. Miss Mary to Rollo. " Monday Evening. " My dear Pupil, " I received your little note, and it gave me a great deal of pleasure. I was very ^lad to find that you had not forgotten me. 100 HOLLO S CORRESPONDENCE. I was also much pleased to find that you had made so much improvement in your writing. c: I have been absent a long time, and I feel somewhat fatigued from my many duties in the school where I have been, and I am be sides pretty busy now, at home. So I have not time to write you a longer letter now ; but, instead of it, I enclose for you in this a story, which I wrote a little while ago, and read to some children. " Very affectionately, your old teacher, " Miss MARY." The following is the story which was en closed in Miss Mary s letter. CYMON. Cymon was one day tired of play. He did not know what to do with himself. He had been making a boat, and had cut two of his fingers, and made them all tender, with his work ; and so he felt uncomfortable in body, as well as in mind. Cymon s mother put some cerate upon his hands, and bound up the fingers which were cut. This relieved the outward suffering ; but that which was within was not so easily MORE LETTERS. 101 cured. He walked about the house, not knowing what to do. He felt miserable. He wished that it was tea-time, bed-time, any time, rather than the beginning of a long af ternoon. At last Cymon said to himself, " I am re solved what to do. As I cannot think of any thing which will give me any pleasure, I may as well go about, and see if I cannot do some good. If I can do a little, it will be better than none." So Cymon walked along, to see what good he could do. He went into the shed. The axe was lying down by the wood, and he took it up and put it into its place. He put the wood, too, in order a little, so as to make the shed look neat ; and then he went into the kitchen. His mother was at work there, and several of the doors were open. 11 Ah," said Cymon, I ll shut all the doors. ; So he went about, and shut the doors care fully. His mother looked up, and said, " Thank you, Cymon." Cymon did not answer, but he began tc feel better, already. 9* 102 ROLLO s CORRESPONDENCE. Cymon found his ball lying in the entry. "Ah," said ho, " I ll take care of my ball. " And of my books too," he continued ; for (ho moment that he took up his ball, his eye fell upon two picture-books, which were lying upon a chair. He took up the picture-books, and carried them away towards the shelves in the back chamber, where they belonged. As he was carrying them along, he saw his little brother sitting down upon the floor, and trying to mend his whip. The lash had come off, and he was trying to tie it on. " Ah," said he, "here is another chance to do some good. I will help my little brother mend his whip." So he sat down by the side of him, and be gan to bind on the whip-lash with a small cord which he drew from his pocket. Little Alfred for that was his brother s name looked on, with an expression of great interest and pleasure in his countenance. When it was done. Alfred did not thank him for it ; but he looked so delighted, when he found that it was fastened very securely, and would snap, that Cymon was more than paid for his labor. Cymon then carried his ball and booKs up to the shelves. Just before he got there, ha MCRE LETTERS. 103 thought that Alfred had no particular means of amusement, and that he would be aiding his mother, if he were to take care of him. " Yes," said he to himself, " that will be a way to do good." So lie went, and asked Alfred if he should like to help him put the playthings in order. Alfred said, yes ; and then they both went ail about the house, and gathered together all the picture-books and playthings they could find, and carried them up to the shelves where they belonged. They were careful to go and come very still, and to shut all the doors af ter them, so as not to disturb any body. Then Cymon went to work, to put them in order upon the shelves. He wanted Al fred to help him ; but Alfred preferred to sit upon the floor, and look at the playthings, which were collected there, before they were put up. Cymon let him do as he pleased. He knew that the little fellow was not old enough, yet, to understand the beauty of system and order, and so he did the work himself. Just as he got them all neatly arranged, his father came up into the chamber to see what he was doing. Cymon took a great deal of 104 ROLLO S CORRESPONDENCE. pleasuie in showing his father how neatly he had arranged every thing the books all on a shelf, the various sizes separated the carts, and tops, anl balls, and blocks, and farm-houses, on other shelves, neatly ar ranged ; and all those which were broken were put by themselves on the lowest shelf, the parts carefully brought together, so that they conld easily be mended. " Very well," said his father, "I am glad to see that. And now, this evening, we will carry the broken playthings down stairs, and I will get out the glue-pot, and some little nails, and we will mend them all up nicely." " Yes, sir," said Cymon, " I should like that very much." " You see," said his father, "if you are going to keep your playthings in such good order as this, I must certainly mend up the broken ones for you. And now come down to supper." " To supper ! " said Cymon. " It cannot be supper-time." " Yes," said his father, " the tea and the hot cakes are all ready." " Why, father ! " said Cymon, " I thought it was only tin; middle of the afternoon." MORE LETTERS. 105 It was supper-time, however, truly. The ong, dull, stupid afternoon, which Cymon had looked forward to with such dismal feelings, O 7 had glided insensibly and rapidly away, arid supper was ready. Cymon went down stairs, saying to himself, "I have made a discovery. Doing good is a grand way to dispel melan choly, and make the time pass swiftly and pleasantly along." 106 AN EXPEDITION. ONE afternoon, in the month of August, Rollo was in the garden, getting an ear of corn to roast ; and Jonas, who was passing along that way, came up to see what he was doing. " I am getting me an ear of corn," said Rollo. 11 These are fine corn-stalks," said Jonas, looking at the tall canes, and the long, green leaves hanging from them on every side. " By the way, that makes me think of our new cow ; we are going to have a new cow. " Are we ? said Rollo. " Yes," replied Jonas, " a cow and a calf/ " Where are we going to get her ? " said Rollo. " At your grandfather s. Your father told me, yesterday, that your grandfather had bought him a cow and calf, and that he was going to send for them." " Who is he going to send ? " said Rollo. AN EXPEDITION. 107 " He said that perhaps he should send me." " You ! " said Rollo, with surprise. " O, Jonas ! You could not go. It is thirty miles to my grandfather s. You could not go thir ty miles." " Why not ? " said Jonas. - Why, you could not walk so far," re plied Rollo. " Don t you think I could walk as far as a calf?" " How big is the calf? " said Rollo. " I don t know," replied Jonas. " I only know there is a cow and a calf." "O, I am very glad," said Rollo, holding his ear of corn carelessly in his hand, and looking very eagerly at Jonas. " When do you think they will come ? " 11 1 don t know," replied Jonas. " I don t know whether your father will send me or not ; and if he does, I don t know how soon I shall go. I suppose it would take about four days ; two to go, and two to come." " Could a calf walk fifteen miles in a day ? " said Rollo. " I don t know," said Jonas ; " arid I cannot stop any. longer, now." Rollo thought a good deal about the cow 108 HOLLO S CORRESPONDENCE. and calf. He wished that his father would let Jonas go in the wagon, and carry him with him. He resolved to ask his father ; and he did, accordingly, propose the plan to him that evening, just after supper. His father entertained the project much more favorably than Hollo had expected he would. He said he did not know but that it would be a very good plan. Nathan, who was playing horses with a chair, dropped the reins, and came and asked if he might not go too. " O, no, Nathan," said Rollo, " you caivt go." - Why can t I go ? " said Nathan ; " and where is it ? " Here Rollo laughed aloud, and said Nathan wanted to go, without knowing where it was that he was going. Nathan looked a little disconcerted, and went away again to his play. " 1 think, Rollo, that you had better, on the whole, take the chaise instead of the wagon." " What, grandfather s chaise ? " said Rollo. Rollo knew that his father had been buy ing a chaise for his grandfather, and that he was trying to get an opportunity to send it to AN EXPEDITION. i(j9 liim. So when Mr. Holiday mentioned the chaise, he supposed that it was his grandfa ther s chaise that he meant. "But then, father." said Hollo, "how shall we get back ? " " You must ride and tie" said his father. "How is that ? " said Rollo. " Why, when two people ride and tie," re plied his father, " one rides a mile or two, and then ties his horse by the road-side, and walks on. Then the other, who is walking along behind, comes up and unfastens the horse, and gets on, and takes his turn in riding. Presently he overtakes the other ; and, after talking a minute or two together, he passes on, until he is a mile or two in advance ; and then he ties the horse again by the road side, and walks on himself, leaving the horse for the one who is behind. Thus they ride and walk by turns, each one tying the horse by the road-side until the other comes up." " That is an excellent way," said Rollo. " I think, myself, it is a pretty good way," replied his father, " when there are two riders, and only one horse." " We could not get along very fast" said Rollo. 10 110 HOLLO S CORRESPONDENCE. " No, not very fast," replied his fathei , " though two men can get along faster in that way, than either of them could walk ; hut not so fast as they would go, if they were to ride all the time. The speed of travelling in that way is intermediate between that of a man and that of a horse." Rollo thought of it a few minutes in si lence ; but he could not get a very clear idea of the reason, why the speed would be inter mediate between that of a man and a horse. While he was considering the subject, his father said, a In your case, however, you could not go any faster than a man would walk, for the calf could not go any faster. You would have to regulate your speed by his. So, strictly speaking, you would not ride and tie ; for, as you would have to go very slow ly, one of you would ride, and the other would walk along by his side, so as to keep together." " Yes," said Rollo, " I could walk until I got tired, and then Jonas could let me get on and ride ; and when he was tired, I would let him ride again. I wish you would let me go, father," said Rollo. AN EXPEDITION. Ill u Perhaps I shall," replied his father. Hollo s mother, who had been listening to Ihe conversation thus far without saying any thing, now said that she should be afraid to have him go so far. " Only think," said she ; " he would have to walk fifteen miles." " Yes," replied his father, "if he walked half of the way." " And he would walk half of the way, of course ; would not he, on this plan ? " " Why, I suppose Jonas would let him ride more than half. They could arrange that in any way ; and I don t think Jonas would let mm get tired." " How long would it take them? " said his mother. " They would go, in the chaise, in one day ; and then they would probably be two days in coming back. I am not certain but that it would be quite a useful expedition for Rollo." " It would, father, I know," said Rollo. "I should learn to ride, and to drive a cow You see, mother," he continued, turning tc his mother to explain it to her, " while he is riding, I should have to drive the cow. I ll 112 1 av3 a whip here, Nathan, let me have your whip, and I ll show you how I d crack it at her, if she offered to go out of the road." Hollo went to Nathan, and got his whip ; and in a minute or two he proposed that Na than should be the cow, and he would drive him. Finally, he became so much interest ed in playing drive cow, that he forgot all about the real expedition. He drove Nathan into the entry, and thence out into the yard ; and there they got to playing something else, until, after about half an hour, his mother came to tell them it was time to come in. A short time after this he went to bed ; and when his mother came to get the light, she told him that she believed his father had concluded to let him go. This was Saturday night. The next Monday morning, Rollo asked his father if he had really concluded to let him go with Jonas ; and his father said yes. " When are we going ? " said Rollo. " To-morrow morning," said his father. Well," said Rollo, in a tone of great sat isfaction ; " and 1 will go and pack my trunk." " Your trunk ? " said his mother. " You cannot carry any trunk." AN EXPEDITION. 1 13 "Won t there be room," said Rollo ; " in the chaise ? " " Yes," said she, u you might carry it, it is true ; but how could you get it back ? " " O, yes," said Rollo, " I forgot. We ciivt bring the trunk home on horseback. Now, how shall I carry my clothes ? " said Rollo, in a tone of great perplexity. " You will have to carry them on your back, for aught I see," said his mother. " That is the way horseback travellers have to do." " We will give thvm a little valise," said his father, " or else z- Dair of saddle-bags, which will hold a litt\*. You must be all ready to start early in th- morning ; and this evening, you and Jonas ma/ come in here to gether, and I will give you your instruc tions." " Well, sir," said R^llo, "we will." That evening Rollo and Jonas came in, according to Mr. Holiday s request, to re ceive his instructions. Rolla sat down upon the sofa. Jonas stood still near the door, with his cap in his hand, until Mr. Holliday asked him to sit down ; and then he sat down in a e* 10* 1 14 HOLLO S CORRESPONDENCE. chair standing near. Mr. Holiday then gave his instructions as follows : " I wart you, Jonas, to get the chaise all ready to-. light, and strap the saddle on be hind firm.y. The saddle-bags we will put in, in the morning. You will go in one day, of course ; and I want to have you stop to get dinner at the ferry tavern you know where that is." " Yes, sir," replied Jonas. " That is about half way j and it will be best for you to stop there at night, coming back. I presume you will be able to come home in two days ; but if you, or Hollo, or the calf, get tired, you can take three days for it ; and in that case, you must stop at such places as you judge best. " You will stay one day at grandfather s," continued Mr. Holiday, "and perhaps two. I shall leave you to judge about that, after you get there ; and I want you and Rollo, both, to write me letters while you are gone, if you have any leisure time, and give me an account of all your adventures. The more minutely and fully you write, the better." " How shall we get any paper ? " said Rollo. AN EXPEDITION. 115 " I must put you up some pens and paper," said his father, " and you can take them out when you stop. You will find it quite diffi cult to write on a journey. Very few persons have energy and efficiency enough for that." " Why, father ! " said Rollo. " We shall have a very good chance to write at night, when we stop at the tavern." 11 Very well," said his father, " we shall see. " And, Jonas," he continued, " I shall give you some money in the morning, more than you will probably want ; so that, in case any difficulty or delay should occur, you will be fully supplied." "Yes, sir," said Jonas. " I will take good care of it." " Very well. I believe that is all I have to say now. You must remember these in structions, for I shall not repeat them in the morning." So Jonas went away, and Rollo went to see his father put up a roll of paper, and some pens, and an inkstand. The next morning Jonas had the chaise at the door just before the breakfast-bell rang, 110 HOLLO S CORRESPONDENCE. so that immediately after breakfast they migh . be ready to set out. Rollo came in, very neatly but plainly dressed, and his father brought the saddle-bags, with every thing in them which they would need. After break fast, he gave Jonas a good supply of money, and then the two boys got into the chaise and rode away. Hollo s father and mother saw no more of him till the end of the week. What befell him and Jonas during that time, is described in the letters which the boys wrote and sent to Mr. Holiday. These letters are contained in the next chapter. 117 THE TRAVELLERS. LETTER I. Rollo to his Father. Ferry Tavern, Tuesday, 12 o clock. My dear Father, We have got so far, safely ; and we have had a very good time. I told Jonas that I wanted to begin my letter here ; but he says that he is not going to begin until wo get to grandfather s. He is out, taking care of the horse. We are going to stay here two hours ] and after Jonas has taken care of the horse, we are going to take a walk down by the river. I believe I will not write any more now, but will go out into the barn and see how Jonas gets along. At Grandfather s, Wednesday Morning. I wrote so much at the tavern, and then I went out into the barn to see what Jonas was doing. I found that he was helping a black man who was there. The black man was currying and feeding the stage-horses, and so Jonas thought he would help him. 118 HOLLO S CORRESPONDENCE. While lie was there, he told Jonas a story about his going across the ferry one night. It was before they had any ferry-boat, and so they had to wade the horses across. He was in the middle of the story when I went there, and I will write it down just as he told it, as near as I remember. " The squire came out to me, and says he, Sam, they call me Sam, generally, though my name is properly Solomon, but some how they always shorten it into Sam. l Sam, said the squire, do you think you can get acros^s the river to-riight ? " It is pretty dark, squire, said I. " i I know it is, says the squire. I never saw a darker night ; but the baby is very sick, and there is no doctor on this side with in fifteen miles. " If I should get across, said I, < I don t believe the doctor would come over. " No, says he, I don t think he would. [What follows was in Jonas s hand- writing.] But then you know you might tell him about it ; and get him to give you some medicine. " c Well, says I, squire, I ll try; and I ll do my best to get across, and that is all I can do. THE TRAVELLERS. 119 " * 1 know you will, Sam, says the squire, 1 and I d rather pay fifty dollars than to let you go ; but I am afraid the poor little thing will die before morning, if we don t somehow get word to the doctor. " So I went and took out Turco." And then Sam showed us Turco, which was a horse, standing in his stall. " There is Turco," he said, " and he is equal to a spaniel in the wa ter. Turco will carry me across, if its a possibility, said I. " So I bridled Turco, and led him out. The squire stood by, telling me how sorry he was to have me go. I said nothing, ex cepting now and then a good word to Turco. " The river, you know, is not very deep in the ford ing-place ; but it is deep enough above and below ; and the trouble I knew would be to keep the course. I led Turco down to the bank, the squire following me. " Squire, says I, there s a light. " So there is, says he. " I watched the light a minute, and then I told him it was a light in the old red house on t other side of the river. " That will guide you, says the squire. 120 HOLLO S CORRESPONDENCE. " Yes, says I, squire, that will guide me over, if I can keep sight of it j but what is going to guide me back ? " O, we ll have a light here, said he. We ll put all the lamps in the house on a table by the kitchen window. That looks right out upon the river. " Very well, squire, says I. Turco and I will do our best. " With that I sprang over upon Turco s back, and turned his head down towards the water. He did not like to go in. There was a little glimmer of light upon the water, from the squire s lantern ; but all beyond was as black as midnight. " l Come, Turco, says I, i we must go ; no flinching. " So Turco stepped forward, slowly, look ing down to the water at every step, while I watched the light." [What follows was in Hollo s hand-writing.] I believe I shall not write the rest of the story now, father ; I did not think it was so long. I began and wrote on a little way, and then I got Jonas to help me along with it, But he says, now, he cannot write any more, THE TRAVELLERS. 121 for it is time for him to begin his own letters ; and this is too long for a letter, now. I am, very affectionately, yours, ROLLO. P. S. I will tell you the rest of the story, when I come home. Turco got over, at last. LETTER II. Jonas to Rollo s Father. " Wednesday Evening, 9 o clock. Respected Sir, " After we left home, yesterday morn ing, we went along very well for about ten miles ; and then I thought I heard a rattling sound under the chaise. I looked under, and I found that the nut of one of the screws was working loose, which allowed the iron to play a little. I stopped at one or two farm houses, to see if I could borrow a nut-wrench, or a pair of pincers ; but I could not. One man had a pair of pincers, but they were too small. They would not open wide enough to take in the nut. I screwed it up as well as I could with my fingers, and went on. It worked loose, however, more and more : and, / 11 /22 HOLLO S CORRESPONDENCE. presently, I stopped again at a farm-house. Here I found a pair of pincers almost large enough, and so I took off the nut, and ground it a little on one edge upon a grindstone ; and then I could get hold of it with the pincers, and screw it up pretty firm. It kept on, then, till I got to the ferry tavern, where I got a wrench, and screwed it up hard. " This made us rather late in getting to the tavern, and we stopped two hours there. Hollo and I went to see a mill, pretty near there. They were making a new dam. The old one was carried away by the last freshet. They are putting the new dam a little higher up. They are making it of plank, which they pin down firmly to great beams of wood, which are fastened to the rocks by great bolts of iron. I don t see how this dam can pos sibly be carried away. " We got here safely, about five o clock. They were very glad to see us. The cow and calf are here, all ready to go, and we ex pect to set out day after to-morrow. I have been at work most of the day about the farm, and to-morrow we are going to lay down an aqueduct, to bring water into the barn-yard, THE TRAVELLERS. 123 The trench is all dug, and the logs are ready bored. They say that I can help them a great deal. " I am, with great respect, " Your obedient servant, " JONAS. " P. S. There is a man here going back the way we came, to-morrow morning, and he is going to carry our letters. " LETTER III. Jonas to Hollo s Father. " Ferry Tavern, Friday Afternoon. 4 Respected Sir, " We arrived here this afternoon, in pretty good season, and hoped to get along a little farther to-night ; but we are stopped by the rain. We remained two days at grandfather s, for they wanted my help about putting down the aqueduct ; and you direct ed me to act as might seem best when I got here, about staying two days. Hollo helped us a good deal about our work, by getting tools, going of errands, and bringing water for us to drink. " We got the aqueduct down before 124 ROLLO S CORRESPONDENCE. and then set the water to running. It came very fast, and it very soon filled up the trough which was made for it. I drove our cow and calf out to drink at it, as soon as it was ready ; and the cow liked the water very much. The calf would not drink. He is not old enough yet. This was yesterday. " This morning, we set out very early. The cow and calf would not go very well at first. They kept turning out one side and the other. Jeremiah came with us, a mile or two, to get us fairly started. Rollo rode, and I walked, at first. After a while, the cow began to travel more steadily ; and then Jere miah bade us good-by, and went back. Pres ently Rollo wanted to walk, and so I rode a little while ; but while I was on the horse, some children came running out of a school- house, by the side of the road, and frightened the calf. He jumped over a low place in the wall, and ran off into a field, towards the woods. The cow ran after him, and I was very much afraid that they would get into the woods, and be lost. " So I told the children to stay there, in the road, and keep the cow from running back the way we came, when I should drive THE TRAVELLERS. 125 her out of the field ; and then 1 got off the horse, and tied him to the fence, and Hollo and I went into the field after the cow. She had gone down a hill, and there she had stopped, and was browsing upon the bushes. Hollo and I went carefully round beyond, and drove her arid the calf back to the road again, without much difficulty. " I have reached the end of my paper now, but I shall begin another letter this evening." " Yours, very respectfully, " JONAS/ LETTER IV. Rollo to his Mother. " Ferry Tavern, Friday Evening. " My dear Mother, " Here we are, caught in the rain. It began to rain this afternoon about four o clock, just before we got here. We had a very pleasant time travelling, all day; only Jonas would not let me walk much. I think that he must be pretty tired, for he walked as much as two thirds of the way. " We had a beautiful luncheon-time this forenoon. You must know that grandmother 11* 126 put some cakes and some cheese into one side of our saddle-bags, and a little dipper for us to drink out of on the way. There was also a little glass bottle, very strong, full of mo lasses, for us to make some sweetened water with. " We came to a place where a stream of water passed across the road, and here the cow went down to drink. The calf was pretty tired, and so he lay down to rest a minute or two. " About an hour after this, we came to an other brook ; and Jonas said that we might as well stop and eat our luncheon then, as at any time. So he took out a rope from the saddle-bags, which he had all ready, to tie the cow up with, and put it around her neck, and tied her to a tree. The calf lay down and went to sleep. Jonas and I sat down upon a stone, by the side of the brook, and made our sweetened water, and ate our cakes and cheese. Then we came along very pleasant ly till dinner-time. We travelled after din ner about two hours, and then it began to ram ; we just succeeded in getting across the fen y to this tavern, and now we are here. WE CAME TO ANOTHER BROOK Page 126. THE TRAVELLERS. 129 Jonas says he thinks it will rain to-morrow ; and if it does, we cannot come home until Monday. " Jonas says that, if it should rain, so as to keep us here to-morrow, he shall watch at the window, to see if there is not any body going along who can take oui letters. " This one is from your butiful and afTec- ticnate son, "HOLUQ.* 9 130 THE TURCO STORY CONTRARY to Jonas s expectations, it cleared np in the night ; and when he awoke on Sat urday morning, the bright beams of the morning sun were just appearing among the trees in the eastern horizon. Jonas arose and dressed himself, and then went to the room where Hollo slept, and called him. They got up ; and as Jonas recommended that they should go a little way before break fast, Rollo dressed himself as soon as he could, and went out into the barn. He found Jonas taking care of the cow and calf; and, in about half an hour, they sat out again on their journey. They had no time to write any more letters, for they did not make very long stops any where during the day, but pressed iorward towards home. Thdy arrived about the middle of the after noon, with the two last letters they had writ ten safe in their pockets. THE TURCO STORY 131 Rollo s mother was very much interested lo hear the rest of the story about Turco, and she asked Rollo to tell it to her. But Rollo said that Jonas could tell it the best, and so she concluded to wait until after tea, and then go and find him. After tea, Rollo wanted her and Nathan to go out and see the calf. So his mother put on her bonnet, and went with him. The calf was lying down upon some straw, in a pen, in the barn. Nathan got a stick, and was going to punch it in through the cracks, and make the calf get up. But Rollo told him he had better not do so, for the calf was very tired. While they were looking at him, Jonas came along, and Rollo s mother asked him if he was tired, after his day s travelling. He said that he was not very tired, for he rode a good deal. " Well, Jonas," said Rollo s mother, " the story you began to tell us, about Sam and Turco, was very interesting. I am sorry you did not have time to finish it." " Why, that was Rollo s plan," said Jonas. "I only wrote in it a little, to help him." " Well, he did not finish it. Suppose you 132 HOLLO S CORRESPONDENCE. tell me the rest of it. I want to know how it turned out." " Why, Sam went on to say," replied Jo nas, " that he drove the horse on into the wa ter, while he himself kept his eye steadily fixed upon the light." " Was the water very deep ? " asked Mrs. Holiday. " Not very deep, at first," said Jonas j " only it grew deeper and deeper, as he went in farther and farther ; and then the light was not in the right direction, to lead him across in the shoalest place. It carried him too far down the stream a little; but then he thought it would be so excellent a guide, that it would be better to follow it." " And so he got safe across ? " said Hollo s mother. " O, no," said Hollo. "No," said Jonas ; "he went on for some time it was totally dark, excepting this single star of light right before him when, all at once, when he had got about into the middle of the river, the light went out in an instant, and then he found himself in total darkness. He said he looked all around, above, and below, and on every side, and he THE TURCO STORY. 133 could not see the least sign of any thing vis- ibit;. He could not see either shore, nor the sky, nor even the water under him ; and there he was, in the midst of a rapid and dangerous river, with only one narrow place which was shallow enough to ford ; and he was then almost off of that." " And what did he do ? " said Mrs. Holiday. 11 Why, he said he stopped a few minutes, and then went on as well as he could ; try ing to keep as near as possible in a straight line with his former course. But the water soon grew suddenly deeper. He turned the horse as quick as he possibly could : but, in stead of getting out, he only got deeper. The horse plunged in beyond his depth, and in an instant he was swimming, with Sam upon his back." " And what became of him, then ? " asked Mrs. Holiday. " Why, he said he had got then so com pletely turned round, and it was so totally dark, that there was nothing to be done, but to drift down the stream, and trust to chance. In a few minutes, however, he felt something heavy and hard strike upon his knee, in the water. He put out his hand to feel of it, 12 131 ROLLO S CORRESPONDENCE. and found that it was a large log, which was floating upon the water. He said he con trived to get his horse s nose over one end of it, and then he got upon the middle of it himself, astride ; and so he thought that he could keep both himself and his horse afloat the longer." : Why, this is a very extraordinary story," said Mrs. Holiday, in a tone of surprise, as if she hardly knew what to make of it. " Yes, ma am," said Jonas, " I thought it was, myself." " Well, go on, and tell us the rest of it. How did it end ? " " Why, he drifted about a short time, and at length, suddenly, the log pulled itself out from under the horse s nose ; and, at the same instant, he observed that his horse was strug gling. He knew at once that he had got bottom again, and was trying to keep his footing upon it, while the log was pulling down stream by the force of the current Sam said that he knew he mast immediately abandon the log ; and so he jumped off upon one side into the river, and found he had got bottom in about four feet of water. The current was not very swift, and so he and the THE TURCO STORY. 135 horse could just make out to sta-nd. And now he knew which way to go." " How did he know that ? " asked Mrs. Holiday. " Why, by the direction of the current ; for, as he wanted to go across the river to one bank or the other, he did not much ;-are which, he went neither against the current nor with it, but right across it ; and so he knew he must be going towards one shore or the other. He waded along in this way for some time. When he found the water growing deeper, he turned a little one way or the other ; and so, gradually, he got to where it was only two or three feet deep, and then he could get along very comfortably. "Very soon after this, he said that, sud denly, to his great joy, he caught a glimpse of the light again. He followed the direc tion of it closely, never allowing himself to lose sight of it, and keeping the horse mov ing steadily on. The light grew brighter and brighter, and, presently, another fainter one came into view. He wondered what this second light could be, for he did not know of but one house in view upon the other side of the river. However, the water HOLLOS CORRESPONDENCE. was now shoaling very rapidly, and so Sam said he knew that he was drawing pretty near to the shore ; and just then he heard a voice calling out to him, Sam, is that you ? Old Tiirco walked along out upon the shure, and there, to his astonishment, he found the squire with a lantern. He had got back to the same side of the river that he set out from." " Why ! " said Hollo s mother, with an expression of surprise, and with an incredu lous smile, " that is a very extraordinary story." Jonas made no reply. " It is a very extraordinary story indeed," she continued. " What did you think of it, Jonas ? " " I did not believe it, ma am," said Jonas, quietly. Why not ? " said she. " Why, there were several things that made me suspicious. First, he said that it was so dark that he could not see the sky j whereas, I believe that it is never so danc that we cannot see the sky." " True," said Hollo s mother ; " I did not think of that " THE TUKCO STORY. 137 * And then," continued Jonas, " as he> which way the river flowed, he must have known that lie was coming back again, when he saw the light the second time, by the direction of the current sweeping by him ; but he said he thought he was going on across, until he heard the squire s voice." " He might have got confused," said Hollo. " Yes," replied his mother, " he might have got turned about arid completely con fused." "Besides," continued Jonas, "I asked a man at the mill what sort of a fellow the black man was who lived at the tav ern ? " " And what did he say ? " said Hollo s mother. u He said," replied Jonas, " that he be- ieved he was a pretty clever sort of a fellow, only he was apt to tell rather large stories." Here Hollo s mother laughed heartily at the idea that the whole story was, after all, a fiction, and at Jonas s wariness in regard /* 12* 133 ROLLO S CORRESPONDENCE. to believing it ; and she walked along with Hollo and Nathan out of the barn, while Jonas went to work to tying up the new cow 139 HYDRAULICS. SOME mr*ths after this, Roilo went to spend several weeks at his grandfather s farm, on a visit. Before he went away, his father asked him to write home very often, and to give him, in his letters, very full accounts of whatever happened that was particularly interesting to him. " And especially," said his father, " if, in any case, you are placed in circumstances where you do not know what to do, I wish you would write to me and state the case, and I will give you my opinion." Rollo promised that he would ; arid the following are some of the letters which passed between him and his father : LETTER I. Rollo to his Father. " Grandfather s Farm, Nov. 20. " Dear Father, "I meant to have written to you long before this time, but I have been very 140 HOLLO S CORRESPONDENCE. busy with Charles. Charles is a boy that lives here, in the next house. There is an old mill down behind our houses, or rather a place where there was a mill once, but the mill is almost all torn down, and the gate is broken. Charles and the other boys wanted me to help them get in some gravel, and mend up the place, so as to make a pond. The reason why we want a pond is, to have it freeze over, so that we can skate upon it. Charles says, that if they can only stop up the old gateway and raise the water, it will flow over a large place, and make a pretty good skating ground. It is a beautiful place, for there are trees all around the stream where the pond will be, and some high rocks on one side, where there is a kind of a cave. " At first, I did not know whether grand father would be willing to have me play there, and I did not like to go very well , but p-ctty soon I asked him^ and he went down to see. He said he did not think that there was much danger of our raising the water high enough to drown ourselves, and so that I might go. I suppose he thinks we cannot make any dam at all ; but I think HYDRAULICS. 141 we can, for Charles is a pretty large boy, and knows how to do things very well. "But I am rather sleepy now, and it is nearly time for me to go to bed. This is from your affectionate son, " ROLLO." LETTER II. Hollo s Father to Hollo. " Nov. 26. "Dear Rollo, " I was very much pleased with your letter, and I read it aloud to mother and Mary. Nathan listened to it too, with a good deal of interest, and wanted me to explain it to him. He wants me to let him go and slide upon your pond too. I am very glad you got grandfather s leave to play there. You worked there, I inferred from your account, some days before you obtained his permission. But you did not feel quite easy until you had asked him, and then you enjoyed your play there a great deal more than you had done before. " Boys are very often tempted to do things which they are doubtful about. They do HOLLO S CORRESPONDENCE. not know certainly whether they are right or not. They do not ask leave, because they are not sure that the thing is wrong. If they were sure that it was wrong, perhaps they would not do it. But it is not enough to justify any particular amusement or pleas ure, that the boy does not know that it is wrong ; he ought actually to know that it is right. " There was a case occurred here yester day, that illustrated this principle. You re member the little apple tree that you and I grafted in the garden a year or two ago : well, it bore last year one large apple. It was an early winter apple ; and so I have been keeping it down cellar, being very curious to taste of it, in order to know what sort of fruit my tree was going to bear. I observed a few days ago that it was begin ning to get mellow, and so I brought it up and laid it down upon the table in the parlor, intending, when mother came in, to rut and eat it. While I was gone out of the room a little while, however, Nathan came along to the table, and took the apple, and ate it; and when I came in he was just throwing the core into the fire. HYDRAULICS. Why, Nathan, said I, yon have eaten my apple. " Yes, father, said Nathan, I found an apple on the table, and I ate it. " But yon ought not to have eaten it, Nathan, said I. " Why, father, said he, c I did not know- that you wanted it. " * True, replied I, but you ought not to have eaten it unless you knew positively that I did not. " In this case there was very little harm done ; for, after all, there was only a little gratification to my curiosity lost by the acci dent ; but in many cases the evil might be very serious. So that it is the duty of children to avoid doing not only those things which are wrong, but also those things which are doubtful ; that is, those in respect to which they do not know whether they are wrong or not. You did very right, therefore, to ask your grandfather whether you might play with Charles and the other boys, down by the old mill-dam, though I agree with him that it is not very probable that you will raise the water mmh, unless 141 ROLLO S CORRESPONDENCE. your friend Charles is much more of an engineer than I suppose he is. " Very affectionately, yours, " FATHER " LETTER III. Rollo to his Father. 11 Grandfather s, Dec. 1. " Dear Father, " We have succeeded in raising the water, after all. Charles planned it, and it succeeds perfectly. You see the old gateway was broken and tumbled in, and the brook ran through the gap. It is not a very large brook. The way that Charles managed was this. He brought down a crowbar, and he and another big boy pried out the old pieces of the gateway, and then the water ran through better. Then he put a log across, and told us all to bring stones, great and small, and tumble them in above and below the log. He told us to work slow, so that we could hold out a long time. We did this two or three afternoons. Then Charles brought a wheelbarrow and some shovels, and HE BROUGHT DOWN A CROWBAR Page 144. HYDRAULICS. 145 wheeled on some gravel. Charles wheeled, and the other boys loaded. He pnt down a board upon the ground, so as to make it wheel easy. He tipped the wheelbarrow loads over upon the stones, on the upper side of the log, and all the gravel fell out and filled up the holes between the stones, and so began to stop. the water. The more we wheeled on the gravel, the more it kept rising ; and at last it began to run over the log; and now there is quite a big little pond. The reason why we put a log for the top is, that the water would wear away the gravel if it had run directly over it. At least so Charles says. " It is quite a large pond now, and as soon as we have some cold nights, it will freeze, so that we can skate on it. And there is another thing that we are going to do As soon as we have skated all over the ice, and cut it up so as to spoil the smoothness of it, Charles says we can put another log or timber on the top of the one we have now, and then put some more gravel before it, and that will make the water rise higher still, and overflow the ice; and then it will freeze again, and so make the ice all smooth, g 13 116 ROLLCTS CORRESPONDENCE. as it was at first. But I should not think it would do very well, for the water will rise under the ice, and not on the top of it ; and that would not do any good. 1 think we had better go and make a dam farther up the stream, just above the end of our pond ; and then, when the water rises in that upper dam, we can let it run over upon the top of the ice, and then it will do some good. " At least / think so, though Charles says it will not make any difference. But perhaps he did not understand me very well, for I told him one day, when he was at our house, on his father s gay horse, which kept pran cing and capering about all the time, and so he could not attend very well to what I was saying. "Good by. " ROLLO. LETTER IV. Hollo s Father to Rollo. " Dec. 5 u My dear Son, " I wos much pleased with your last letter. 1 am glad to have you give me such minute and particular accounts of what hap- HYDRAULICS. 147 pens to you, and interests you, when you are away from home. I did not notice any thing which I should wish to correct in it, unless it be the phrase, big little pond/ which, though it conveys your idea well enough, is a somewhat incongruous expression in form. As to your plans for getting the water upon the top of the ice, the philosophy of the thing is thus : " Water is heavier than ice, and, conse quently, if both can move freely, the water will take the lowest place, and buoy the ice up to the top. And, as Charles says, it will make no difference whether you pour the water upon the top of the ice or in under it If you had a piece of ice in a tumbler, for example, and were to pour the water in upon the top of it, it would run off down the sides, and keep buoying it up as fast as the tumbler got filled. And so, if the ice was perfectly flat, the water would still spread out all over it, and run down at the edges. It will make no difference, therefore, whether you dam up the water below your pond or above it. For if you dam it below, it will then, as you sup pose, introduce the water under the ice, and 148 raise it up. If, on the other hand, you dam it above, it will then, it is true, pour the water over upon the top of the ice ; but then the water would only run over it until it found fissures or holes, and then it would at once settle down into all these, and so buoy the ice up, and keep it always upon the surface. " There is only one mode that I know of, by which it is possible to make water remain upon the top of ice, and that is, by fastening the ice down. For as ice is lighter than water, it will certainly rise if it can, which ever way the water may come in. But there are two or three modes by which a sheet of ice may be fastened down in such a case. " 1. When the pond is pretty small, or the ice pretty thick in proportion to the size of the pond, the stiffness of the ice itself, and its adhesion to the shores, will keep it down. Bat if the pond is large, or the ice thin, then the rise of the water will force up the ice in the middle, and break it away at the edges. This is the case with ice in rivers, and in the sea, where the tide rises and falls. The ris ing of the water breaks the ice off from the shores and wharves, and raises it all up to HYDRAULICS. 149 gether. If you stand on the shores when the tide is rising, you can hear the ice breaking as the water forces it up. " 2. Another way by which ice may become fastened, so as to allow the water to overflow it, is this : When the pond is very shallow, so that the ice upon the top of it touches the grass and bushes and hummocks of ground in a good many places, this fastens it down ; and then, when the water rises, it will overflow the ice, as the ice cannot rise with it. I do not know how it is with your pond in this re spect. If the surface of the water does not lie near enough to the surface of the ground for this purpose, I don t know but that you might secure the result in the following mode, viz. : " 3. Make little holes in the ice, and drive stakes down here and there, into the ground below, and then let them freeze in. It is pos sible that in this way you might keep down a small sheet of ice, so that the water would flow over it. If Charles should conclude to try any such plan, I advise you to make holes first with the iron bar, through the ice, down oretty deep into the groi nd below, and then to drive the stakes down nearl level with the 150 fop of the ice ; and then, when you overflow the ice, the tops of the stakes will be covered, and so they will not be in your way in the skating. " But what long letters am writing about your ice and skating ! I only intended to have said a few words. It is rather Jonas s busi ness to correspond with you on this subject. I believe 1 must refer the subject to him, hereafter. " Mary wants to add a Postscript to this let ter, and accordingly I leave her a space. " Your affectionate father, T. H." "P. S. You would have laughed to see mother give Nathan some medicine this morn ing. It was just after breakfast, and Nathan fell down and gave his head a bump. Mother took him up, and amused him, and got him quiet, and then let him run about again. But in a few minutes he began to cry again, and came back, and said his head ached very bad. " O, then I must give you some medi cine, said mother. Poor little fellow, he has fallen down, and is sick, and I must give him some medicine. HYDRAULICS. 151 " So she poured out a little cream out of the cream-pitcher into a tea-spoon, and then said, " ( Now I must have some powder to mix with the medicine. " Then she took the sugar-bowl, and took up some sugar, and mixed it with the cream in the spoon. " At this Nathan began to look pleased, and to smile through his tears; partly, I suppose, because he was interested in the amusement of playing sick, and partly because he thought he should like the taste of the cream "and sugar. So mother took him up in her lap, and said, " I must take up this boy, and give him his medicine. Now you must be a very good boy, and take your medicine well. So she held his head with one hand, and brought up the spoon with the other, as if it was really something bitter and disagreeable, and said, * Now you must open your mouth and swal low it down like a good boy. " So Nathan opened his mouth wide, with a, curious-looking smile upon the rest of his face, and mother put in the spoon, pretend- ing to look very anxious, but I can t write any more, for I am at the end of the paper. "MARY." LETTER V. Rollo to Mary. " Grandfather s, Dec. 10 " Dear Mary, " I am much obliged to you for youi Postscript to father s letter. I should have liked to have known the rest of the story. But I suppose that Nathan took his medicine like a good boy, and then jumped down and ran away to play. I should think it was a very good medicine for a little bump. " Tell father I am very much obliged tc him for my skates. They came safe with the letter. I should have sent for them, but Charles said he had a small pair which he used to skate upon when he was a boy, and he would lend them to me. But my own are a groat deal better. " Our pond has frozen over beautifully, and it makes a very good beating-ground, only it isn t frozen very near the gate ; that is, the HYDRAULICS. 153 place where the old gate was, and where the water now runs over our piece of timber. Before we dammed it up, it did not freeze at all, and one of the boys told me that it did not freeze all last winter ; only here and there in little patches. I don t see why a dam should make it freeze. If you know, I wish you would tell me, or else ask father. After we have cut the ice all up with our skates, we are going to raise the water higher Charles says it won t be much work to do that, for now we have got a good foundation. The reason why it took us so long to make the dam was, because we could only work Wednesday and Saturday afternoons, because Charles goes to school the rest of the time. And now he does not skate any ; at least, he has not yet, for there is going to be an examination at his school, and he is busy all the time at home ciphering in frac tions. "Good by. " ROLLO." " Postscript. T am going to the examina tion, and 1 will write you about it. Charles nvited me to go with him, and grandfather says [ may. 1.54 HOLLO S COKRESPONDENCE. " Second Postscript. " Dec. 13 < Dear Father, " I meant to have sent this letter be fore, but I forgot it. We have raised our dam, and it succeeded completely. The wa ter covered the old ice all over, about two inches ; only in one place, where the water was deep, and there was no grass or bushes to hold it down, the ice bulged up. Charles says, next time he is going to anchor that piece with stakes, and then we can smooth over the whole with new ice whenever we want to. " HOLLO." LETTER VI. Jonas to Rollo. "Dec. 15. " My dear Friend, " Your father came out this evening, O7 while I was eating my supper, and read me your letter to your sister Mary. And he asked me if I would answer that part of it about the brook freezing after it was dammed up. when it would not before. He first asked me if I understood it ; and I told him I un- HYDRAULICS. derstood something about it, and that I would explain to you all I did understand. " Watei will not freeze when it is running at least if it is running fast. I do not know why. I only know the fact. It does not freeze out in the open sea, where the waves are running all the time ; nor in aqueduct spouts ; nor in falls and rapids, in brooks and rivers; but when water is still, or nearly still, then it can freeze. " Now, the reason why water freezes above a dam in a brook is, that it is made more still by the dam. Perhaps you will ask how it is that damming the water below, makes it any more still above, since the brook keeps run ning all the time, and just as much water must come in and pass through after the dam is built, as before. The reason is, that it has a. much wider and deeper space to run in, after the dam is built. The dam raises the water, and so makes it deeper ; and then it spreads out on each side, and that makes it wider ; and FO the water has a much more capacious channel, and can move much more slowly, and yet the same quantity passes along as there did before. But just over the dam itself, the passage for the water is very shallow and J56 HOLLO S CORRESPONDENCE. narrow ; and the water, having but little space there, has to move very swift, to get over as fast as it comes in above ; so that the reason why the dam helps cause the wa ter to freeze is, because it gives it more space, and so allows it to move very sloAvly. But what the reason is that water will freeze easier when it is still than when it is moving, I never knew. Melted lead will cool and harden, when you shake it about, as well as when it is standing still ; at least, I believe it does. " I like- your plan of raising the water to cover the old ice, so as to make good skating ; and I am very glad that you have found so intelligent, and faithful, and careful a play mate as Charles. " I am, very sincerely, your friend, " JONAS/ 157 THE RETURN. WHEN Jonas had finished his letter to Rol lo, he folded it carefully, superscribed it, and carried it in to Mr. Holiday. " Shall I read it, Jonas ? " said Mr. Holiday. " Certainly, sir," said Jonas; "I left it un sealed on purpose." 11 Take a seat, then, Jonas, a moment," said Mr. Holiday, " while I run it over." So Jonas took his seat, and Mr. Holiday read the letter, murmuring inarticulately to himself, as his eye passed along the lines. " Very well," said Mr. Holiday, at length, as he finished the letter and folded it up again. " Then you know this Charles, that Rollo tells us so much about. You have seen him, I suppose, when you have been at my father s." 11 No, sir," said Jonas, " I never saw him." " Then how do you know any thing about his character ? " " I only judged from Rollo s letters, sir ; ^ 158 HOLLO S CORULSPONDENCE. you recollect that you have shown me his other letters home." " Yes ; but 1 had forgotten that Rollo had said any thing about his character." " No, sir," replied Jonas, " I only judged from circumstances." " O ; " said Mr. Holiday, " yes. Well, what circumstances led you to think that he was an intelligent, faithful, and trustworthy boy ? " " I thought, sir," replied Jonas. " that he must be intelligent, from his telling the boys to work slow, so as to be able to hold out longer. It takes most boys a great while to learn that, so as to act upon it. Then I knew he was faithful, by his not skating until aftei examination, so as to be thoroughly prepared in his fractions ; and as to his being careful, I thought he must be so, or else his father would not have trusted him with his gay horse." Mr. Holiday smiled at Jonas s shrewdness in detecting indications of character, and then sealed up the letter, with a wafer from a box upon his table ; saying, at the same time, that he presumed that Jo.nas was correct in his inferences in this case ; though it would THE RETURN. 159 not be always safe to conclude, that a boy was careful and trustworthy, from the cir cumstance that he was mounted on a gay hoi>o. Jonas then rose to go ; but Mr. Holiday stopped him a moment, by saying that it would be time, before long, for Rollo to come home. " I believe," added he, " I shall want to send you for him, with the horse and sleigh." " Yes, sir," said Jonas. " How much more wood is there to saw ? " " I should think there might be three or four cords ; and there are two more cords to come." "Four and two are six. Let s see, it will be a week or ten days, before you will have it all sawed, split, and piled. We will say week after next. You may be making your arrangements to go week after next, on Monday or Tuesday." : Yes, sir," said Jonas, "I will endeavor to be ready." So Hollo s father went on with his reading, and Jonas went away. At the appointed time, Jonas set off in the 160 sleigh to bring Hollo home. There had been quite a deep snow about a week before he went, and that had made very good sleigh ing. The morning when Jonas started from home, it was very mild and pleasant weather ; and when he was all ready to go, Mr. Holi day came out to see him safely off. " I think, sir, there is some prospect of a thaw," said Jonas. " Is there ? " said Mr. Holiday, looking around. " The wind is southerly, and there is a long fog-bank lying off south." " Well," said Mr. Holiday, " if it rains, you must wait there till there is good weather." Jonas got into the sleigh, and rode along. It continued pretty pleasant during most of the day ; but towards the middle of the af ternoon, clouds thickened over all the sky, and it began to rain. The horse s feet slumped through the deep snow, which had become very soft. Jonas found it somewhat difficult to get along. In an hour or two more it rained faster. This made it worse ; and Jonas did not arrive at the end of his jmrney until after dark. Hollo did not know whether to be glad or THE RETURN. 161 sorry, that Jonas had come to carry him home. He wanted to stay at his grandfather s, and he wanted to go home. " At any rate," said he to Jonas, " I am very sorry it rains, because I wanted you to go down and see our dam." " It would be too late to go and see it to night," said Jonas, " even if it did not rain." " O, no," said Rollo ; " we can go down in the evening. We had a capital time ska ting there examination night." " Did you ? " said Jonas. " Yes," replied Rollo. " The examination was day before yesterday, and in the evening we all went down and skated till nine o clock. We built a great bonfire upon the ice, and skated around it. I want you to see the place, to see if you can t make such a one at our house." Jonas said he would try to go and see it before he went home. The next morning, when he looked out of the window to see what the weather was, he found that it had cleared up in the night, and that the wind was blowing heavily from the north- west. " Ah," said he, " we are going to have it cold again." g* 14* 102 He went out into the barn, to feed and \vater his horse, and to help the men take care of the stock belonging to the farm. o O The wind blew high, and roared among the tops of the trees ; but it was warm and com fortable in the barn, under the great mows of hay, which stretched along on each side upon the long scaffolds overhead, hanging down towards the centre like the thatch of a cot tage. Jonas helped the men turn out the cattle, and he noticed that the wet snow was just beginning to stiffen. Jonas was preparing to go home that day, but the men said he had better not. They told him that it would be freezing all day ; but that the ice, which would be forming upon the top of the soaked snow, would not bear, but would be just hard enough to cut the horse s feet ; and that, if he would wait until the next day, it would probably be beautiful sleighing, for the roads would be smooth and icy. Jonas went in, just before breakfast, to ask Rollo s grandfather what he had better do ; and he told him, that he thought he ought to stii y by all means. So he concluded to stay. Rolio wanted him to go down immediately THE RETURN. 163 after breakfast, and see the dam ; but Jo nas was so much interested in helping the men about their morning s work upon the farm, that he did not want to go. He told Rollo that he meant to have a farm himself, one of these days, and he wanted to learn how to manage it. But Rollo was so urgent to have him go, that he concluded to run down a few minutes, as soon as the potatoes had been put into the great boiler, in the yard, and the fire had been built under it. Jonas and Rollo then went along a path way, which led down a woody valley, until they came to the old mill-pond. Jonas liked it very much indeed. The water lay upon it several inches deep, and it was pouring over the old log, which the boys had laid for the top of the dam, in torrents. Rollo threw a stone over upon the water, and he found, when it struck, that a thin and tender ice was just beginning to form all over it. Jonas was very much pleased with the place, but he was in haste to get back to the farm ; and even Rollo did not wish to stay very long, for it was getting to be very cold. So they both came back to the house ; and Rollo spent the rest of the forenoon in building 1G4 houses in the kitchen, of corn-cobs, whkh he found in a corner of the granary, and brought in, in a basket. He built one tower a little higher than his head, and then it all tumbled down. It grew colder and colder all day ; but at night, just before sundown, the wind abated, and the air gradually became calm. So Jonas and Hollo went down to see the ice. They found it frozen quite hard. Jonas went upon it first, with a pole in his hands, and struck the ice with the end of the pole, and Hollo observed that it was quite strong. So Hollo went on himself. Presently some other boys came down, and they built a fire upon the ice, close to the shore, under some large trees which here overhung the water. Rollo went up and got his skates, and lent them to Jonas ; and he himself used the pair which Charles had lent him. Jonas made ludicrous work trying to skate. He knew nothing about it, and he accordingly slipped and staggered about, to the great amusement of Rollo and his companions, though Jonas made more slips and tumbles than he need to have done, for the very pur pose of making fun for the boys. THE RETURN. 165 At length, however, Jonas said he had had skating enough ; and he accordingly took off his skates, and occupied himself in collecting wood and making a greater fire. Before nine o clock, Rollo bade his skating- place farewell, gave Charles his skates, and thanked him for the use of them ; and then he and Jonas went to the house. The next morning they set of*" -jpon their return. The road was icy, arid the morning was cold ; but it was calm, and therefore it was comfortable riding. They passed along the same road where they had driven the cow and calf some months before. When they had got nearly home, Rollo said he wished he had such a skating-place as that at his grandfather s ; and he asked Jonas what made him take his skates off so soon the evening before. " O, because," replied Jonas, " I could riot skate, you know ; and, of course, there was not much pleasure in trying." "Yes; but, Jonas," said Rollo, "if you had kept on, you would have learned ; and so the next time, perhaps, you would have taken pleasure in it. I don t think you had much patience and perseverance." IGG ROLLO S CORRESPONDENCE. " I did not undertake to learn to skate," said Jonas. " I only put on the skates a few minutes for amusement. If I had really be gun to learn to skate, and had then given up in a few minutes, that would have been want of perseverance." " Why don t you learn to skate ? " said Rollo. " O, I don t know," replied Jonas. " Do you think it would be a good plan ? " " Yes," said Rollo; " I like skating very much indeed." "I suppose it is good play," said Jonas; 11 but I don t have much time to play ; and it would not be best for me to play much, if I had time. I must spend my leisure in learn ing something which will be of more use to rne than learning to skate." " What do you mean to be when you are a man ? " said Rollo. " A farmer," answered Jonas. " That is, I expect to be a farmer, though I have not quite decided." " And what are you going to learn in youi leisure hours, which, will be of use to you in farming ? " asked Rollo. " O, a great many things," said Jonas. " I THE RETURN. 167 have been studying geometry lately, but I don t get along very fast." - What is geometry about ? " asked Hollo. " O, it is about angles, and squares, ?.nd all sorts of shapes. My book says it is the sci ence of magnitude and form." " Have you learned any lessons in it yet ." " said Hollo. " Why, yes two or three. It begins about a point. A point, in mathematics, has no length, or breadth, or thickness." " What is it, then ? " said Rollo. " O, it is nothing," said Jonas, " only a mere point, with no breadth at all." Hasn t it any breadth at all?" asked Rollo. " No, none at all," said Jonas. " If there were a thousand of them placed close to gether, so as to touch, they wouldn t extend along at all, but would only make a single point." " O, Jonas ! " said Rollo, in a tone of in credulity. " What if there were a million ? " " That would not make any difference/ said Jonas. "A point is position without magnitude." " Magnitude ? " repeated Rollo, musing a 168 moment, that he might think of the meaning of the word "size, O yes, no size. Then how can it prick ? " "Prick?" said Jonas. " Yes," replied Rollo ; " a point will prick, if it is ever so fine." Jonas laughed at this reply, and concluded that he must give up the attempt to convey to Rollo an idea of a mathematical point, until he should be a little older. After this, they rode along without any further adventures or conversation, until they safely reached home, about an hour before supper-time. Rollo found a long letter from his cousin Lucy ready for him when he arrived. 169 CHARLES. LETTER I. Lucy to Rollo. " Thursday Even np " My dear Cousin Rollo, " I have missed you very much indeed, since you have been gone to your grandfa ther s. I went over to your house, to see if you had not returned, but you had not come, and the house looked desolate and forsaken. Jonas was gone, and Nathan was asleep ; and Mary and your mother were busy. I went around from room to room, but I could not find any body to play with, or any thing to do. I went to the back door, at the end of the entry, and looked out into the garden-yard ; but it was cold and desolate. The snow was blowing about the yard, and the leaves had all gone from the trees ; and there was a great snow-drift all over your sand-garden, in the corner. " It was too :old for me to stay there, and so I came in ; and, by this time, Nathan h 15 170 waked up, and aunt told me I might play with him. She said he had got some new blocks, and that he and I might go out and play with them, in the back kitchen ; and that I might first build a fire there, to make it warm. I did not care much about playing with the blocks, though I thought I should like very well to build the fire ; so Nathan and I went out. We carried out Nathan s blocks in a basket. He helped me bring in the wood, and the kindling-sticks ; arid we made a capital fire. I wished very much that you had been there. "I helped Nathan build him a farm, first. We built a house and a barn, and then we made fences, by means of some long blocks, which we laid down, end to end. Then Nathan took his little horse and cart, and played haul wood, and hay, and potatoes, about his farm. He had sticks for wood, and beans for potatoes. He had his beans in a little bag. " But, pretty soon, I got tired of Nathan s clocks, and I went into the kitchen, to see what Dorothy was doing. She was making some bread ; and she gave rne a little of the dough, and I carried it out to the back kitchen. CHARLES. 171 Nathan let me have one of his blocks to knead it on. It was a large, flat piece of wood, and it did very well indeed. " We made a number of little cakes, and then we baked them in our little oven. " We made our oven ourselves, in the back kitchen. Dorothy showed us how. The way we did it, was this. We scraped away the coals and ashes, and then put our cakes down, and covered them over with an old saucer, bottom upwards, which Dorothy gave us. This was our oven, and it baked very well. " Good by. " LUCY. "P. S. We put hot ashes on the top of the saucer." LETTER II. Rollo to Charles. "Friday Evening. " Dear Charles, " I am much obliged to you for the pains you took to make me and the other boys such a good skating-place, when I was at my grandfather s. I have concluded to 172 HOLLO S coRi<ESPorci>ENCf:. write you a letter, to let you know what a good ska ting-place we have had here. " You remember it rained the day before I come home from grandfather s ; and that made a freshet in the brook. Well, great rains make freshets in rivers, as well as * brooks ; and there is a river opposite my fa ther s house. First, right before my father s house is a road ; across the road there are great meadows ; and away over in the mid dle of the meadows, the river flows, winding along in a very crooked course. There are a great many elm trees scattered all about the meadows. " Day before yesterday there was another great rain ; and the river began to rise. Pres ently the water began to run into some low places, and spread all around them more and more ; and this made some great ponds. I watched them out of the parlor windows. I told my father I was very glad. " Why? said my father. " Because, said I, now I can have a noble, great skating-place. " That is not certain, said he. " Why not ? 7 said I. " < Because, said he, the water will begin CHARLES. 173 to run off again, when the storm is over, and the river subsides. " I was disappointed when I heard this, for I was in hopes those great ponds would stay on the meadows until they had time to freeze over, and so make me a great skating- ground. However, my father told me that some of the ponds would remain, and that, perhaps, a great deal of the surface of the water would freeze over, before it would have time to run off. " I asked him if that would keep the wa ter from running off. He said no ; but that the water would run out from under the ice, and let the ice settle down upon the ground ; and that, perhaps, I could skate upon it then. " It turned out just as father had foretold. For, in the night, it cleared up, and the wind blew very cold from the north. The next, morning, as soon as I got up, I looked out of the window, to see if the ponds had all gone away ; but they had not. They were there, all together in one great pond, stretching all around the meadow. They were beginning to freeze over, and there was a white fringe all around the edges. " After breakfast, Jonas and I went down 15* 174 to see them. Jonas is the boy that came af ter me to grandfather s. I found out what the white fringe was. I could not think, when I first saw it. It was thin, white ice, lying all along the margin. Jonas told me that the water was higher when it began to freeze, in the night, than it was then, when we went down to see it, and that it had skimmed over with thin ice ; and that, then, the water had settled, and let the ice down upon the edges of the pond, all around ; and this was what made the white fringe. I asked him what made it white, and he said it was because there was air under it. He said he had observed that ice, which had air under it, generally looked white ; and ice that had water under it generally looked black. I asked him why it was so, but he said he did not know. Do you know ? " It is not always so, for we found some white ice, in one place, which was resting upon water. < Good by. " HOLLO." CHARLES. 175 LETTER III. Rollo to Charles. " Saturday. fi Dear Charles, " I wrote you a letter, yesterday, about the water rising on the meadows, and begin ning to freeze there ; and now I am going to write you more about it. I sent the first letter this morning, by a man who was going to my grandfather s; but I do not know when I shall be able to send this. The rea son why I write such good long letters is, that my mother lets me write in my study hours ; because, she says, she wants me to learn to write letters. " I have forgotten, exactly, where I left off. I bc ieve that Jonas and I were down, looking at the ice. It was just beginning to freeze, and the water was running away slowly from underneath. Jonas said that Jack Frost had caught the water up on the bank, and was trying to chain it there as fast as he could ; and that the water was try ing to get away underneath, and escape back into its old place, in the bed of the river, again. " We could see how much it had fallen, by the trees around there ; because, when the water was up at the highest, it froze a little around all the trees ; and when it settled, it left the ice there, and that made a mark by which we could tell how high it had been. " But it was too cold for us to stay long, and so we came in. I was glad it was so cold, for I thought that Jack Frost would be able to seize so much more of the water. I expect it froze very hard, indeed, last night. After lessons, I am going down to try it. My boots are down at the fire, warming, and my skates are all ready. Jonas is going down with rne to try the ice. It is now a little more than half past ten. As soon as it is eleven, we are going. " Sincerely yours, "ROLLO." LETTER IV. Charles to Rollo. "Jan. 4. "Dear Rollo, " I was very glad to find that you had remembered our old skating-ground, and the good times we used to have when CHARLES. 177 you was at your grandfather s; and I was much interested in your account of your freshet ponds on the intervals. As to the question about the color of the ice, I never had thought of it before ; though, when I read your letter, I remembered that I had often observed that, where the water had run out from under ice, or where a great bubble of air had got in, the ice generally looked white ; but I could not think of any reason why it should be so. I accordingly thought I would ask the master of our school. " When I first asked him, he said that he had never thought of the subject before, and was not prepared to express an opinion ; but he said he would think of it, and look into some of his books, and tell me the next day. So the next day I went to him again ; and he said that he believed the rea son was, that when water was under ice, and in contact with the under surface of it, the light from above passed down through into the water; but when there was air below, then the light from above, when it got to the lower surface of the ice, was reflected, that is, turned back, and the light thus re- J 78 ROLLO S CORRESPONDENCE. fleeted made an appearance of whiteness. That is what he said. I did not understand it very well ; but he said I should under stand it better when I should come to study optics. " I asked him what optics was, and he said it was the science that related to light and colors. I asked him how soon I should study it, and he said, not for some time yet, because I did not know algebra and ge ometry. I have begun geometry already, though I don t see what it has to do with light and colors. " Good by. "CHARLES." LETTER V. Rollo to Charles. " Monday Morning. " Dear Charles " When we went down, on Saturday, to try our ice, we had a fine time. Jonas went with me. When we got pretty near the edge of the ice, Jonas stopped, and said, Now I must call for the ferryman. 7 Then he called out, in a loud voice, ; Ferry 5 ahoi ! ferry, ahoi ! CHARLES. 179 c; Then he answered himself in another voice, as if it was somebody at a great dis- tunae calling out to him in reply, " The ferry is shut up. " How, then, shall I get across the river ? u You must come across on the bridge. " i Who is building this bridge ? " Captain Jack Frost? " And who is Captain Jack Frost? He is a great bridge builder. " Then Jonas began to pretend to talk to Captain Jack Frost. " How do you do, Captain Jack Frost ? said he ; * I am very glad to see you building a bridge here. c Yes, I have got one begun. " It is not finished, then, yet ? " No, I have not finished it yet ; I am at work upon it. " What are you doing to it now? " l O, I m strengthening it underneath ? " Do you think it will bear this boy, here, and me, to go across on it ? " Why, yes, I rather think it will. " Then Jonas began to go cautiously upon the ice, and it began to crack j but Jonas did not seem to mind the cracking, t it went on 180 HOLLO S CORRESPONDENCE. farther and farther, and presently it cracked a good deal. Then Jonas stopped, and said, " Captain Jack Frost, seems to me your work isn t strong. " Why, I told you it was not finished. " Suppose it breaks through, and I get in, will you pay all the damages ? " No, indeed; nothing like that. " What shall you do, then ? " I shall bite your toes in the water till they ache well. " Then I had better be pretty careful. " However, Jonas told me to come on, and I did. It bore me rather better than it did Jonas. In fact, Jonas said that the cracking was not owing altogether to the weakness of the ice, but to its gradually settling, as the water subsided. He helped me put on my skates, and then he went sliding about. " We followed the ice along on the inter val until we came to where it passed under a high bank overhung with trees. I skated, and Jonas ran along by my side. He could run and slide as fast as I could skate. We found some beautiful, round, white spots in the ice, perfectly round, and as while as silver. I asked Jon^s what they were, and CHARLES. 181 he said lie supposed it must be Captain Jack Fros . s money. But afterwards I found out what they really were ; for, as I was looking down through some very clear ice, I saw a little stream of bubbles come up from under an old log on the bottom. The bubbles rose until they reached the under side of the ice, and there they had to stop, for, of course, they could not rise any higher ; but they be gan to run along under the ice towards Jo nas. They made round, white spots, just like those we had seen before. " That s strange, said I ; what is the rea son they move off that way, Jonas ? " That must be up, said Jonas. " Up? said I; I did not know what Jonas could mean. " Yes. he said, up. Bubbles always run up ; and so, when I see them moving along the under side of the ice, I know the ice must lie sloping upwards a little in the direction that the bubbles go. " The bubbles did not go very far ; they got caught against some blades of grass ; but we looked along in the direction they were moving in, and we found quite a large bulge in the ice. It was where the ice rested on the 16 104 HOLLO S CORRESPONDENCE. end of a log ; and so, when the water settledj it bulged it up in that place, and so the bub bles ran up the slope upon the under side of the i^, " Good by. " ROLLO." 183 ADVICE. LETTER I. Rollo to his Father. " Saturday, Jan 1. " Dear Father, " This is New Year s ; and I send you, in this letter, a little pen-wiper for a new year s present. It is for you to keep ir. the little drawer in your desk, so that you need not take so much trouble to find a piece of paper always, when you want to wipe your pen. Mary showed me how to make it, and mother gave me the silk for the leaves. " I wish you would be kind enough to write me a letter, sometime, or at least a note. Mother has written me a good many letters. Perhaps, if you have not got any thing else to say, you might give me some advice. I should like a letter of advice very much. " Very affectionately, your son, " ROLLO." 184 LETTER II. Rollo s Father to Rollo. ^ Jan. 12. " Dear Rollo, " You know I have been very busy lately, and I have not been able before this to answer your little note, though I have been intending to write you a letter of advice, according to your request. I, however, regret this the less, for now I can write it on your birth-day, and that will be as well as if it had been written at New Year s. To-day, you are ten years old. " In the first place, I thank you very much for the pen-wiper. It will be very convenient for me indeed, and I shall often think of you when I am using it. I do not see, however, that I have now any thing to give you in re turn , except some of the advice you asked me for ; but I can give you plenty of that. For, as this is a very important birth-day of yours, and as I am at leisure this evening, I am go ing to write you a pretty long letter. "I say this is an important birth-day of yours ; but perhaps you have never supposed that one birth-day is any more important than another. The circumstance which leads me to consider this peculiarly important, is, that ADVICE. 185 it is the commencement of your second decade. A decade of years is a period of ten years. You have completed one decade, and now commence another. And the one which you now commence is probably the most important of all the decades of life ; that is, your char acter and happiness for the rest of life depend more upon it than upon any other. Hitherto you have been merely a boy. Now, although you will continue for some time longer to be a boy, you are nevertheless beginning to form the character of the man. A child spends only two decades under his father s care. One of yours is already gone; and now 1 see very clearly that your whole character, your standing in life, your happiness, youi usefulness, every thing depends upon the means of improvement which I shall provide for you for the ten years to come, and the manner in which you avail yourself of them. I have been thinking of the subject myself, and have resolved to do the best that I can, to furnish you with the facilities for moral and intellectual progress ; and I want you to see the subject in the same light that I do, and so do the best that you can to improve them. For, if either of us fail to do so, when this h* 16* HOLLO S CORRESPONDENCE. decade is once passed, it will be forever too late to repair the injury. I am going to give you advice in respect to three particulars. 1. Your Studies. During the ten years now past, you have laid a foundation for future improvement, and that is all. You have learned to read, and write, and spell, and to calculate in figures. These attainments are the instruments with which you are now going on to acquire knowledge. Hereafter, you will have to study more regularly and systematically than you have done. We do not confine a young child very closely to study, because we wish his health and strength to become firmly established ; and this can be effected only by a good deal of exercise in the open air. But henceforth I shall make arrangements for you to study with more regularity and system than you have done, both at home and in the schools that you will be sent to. And you must not expect that these studies will always be in teresting or agreeable. It is true that, in advancing in knowledge, we find, in general, that our progress becomes more and more easy and pleasant, as we go on ; and there is, perhaps, no part of one s education more irk- ADVICE. 187 some than the very beginning of it, the learning of the ABC. Still your studies will riot yet be alluring enough to lead you to go forward efficiently of your own accord. You will get tired of them a great many times ; out still you must persevere. You must not *eel discouraged because you are tired of them ; but press on. Acquire knowledge as fast at> you can, and lay broad and deep foundations for future acquisitions. Knowl edge will be more valuable to you than any other woildly advantage which you can pos sess. Knowledge, of the right kind, will always command subsistence, respect, influ ence, and honor. And it is a very safe pos session. Thioves cannot steal it ; fire can not burn it ; storms at sea cannot sink it. Men cannot dtprive you of it in any way. God only can take it away from you by bod ily or mental disease. I hope, then, that, for the ten years to come, you will cooperate pleasantly and }jefeveringly with me, in my efforts to store your mind with useful knowledge. 2. Manners. I v^ant to have you ac quire, during the nevt ten years, not only the Knowledge of a scholar, but the manners of 188 a gentleman. A gentleman is one whose manners and habits are such as tend to pro mote the happiness of those who have inter course with him. Some persons contrive to make those around them feel uncomfortable or unhappy, by neglecting them, or not showing proper regard to their wishes or feelings, or saying unkind or disagreeable things, or being rude or noisy, or in any way unpleasant in manners. Others are so kind, and attentive, and gentle, and unassuming, that their very appearance and address give pleasure. This is being gentlemanly. Now, perhaps, the best period of life for the forma tion of gentlemanly manners and habits, is the very period which you are now entering upon, viz., the second ten years of life. So that I hope you will now pay more strict and careful attention than ever before to this sub ject, so as to form and fix the very best of manners and habits, and thus carry with you, and diffuse around you, as you go "on through life, a constant atmosphere of en joyment. 3. Character. Your moral and religious feelings and character will probably be fixed during the next ten years. Shall you form ADVICE. 189 the habit of humbly looking to God, through the Savior, for the forgiveness of your sins, and for your future protection, and try to live in obedience to his commands, denying yourself every improper pleasure, and seeking the happiness of others ? Or shall you live without God in the world, and be left to wander away into the paths of sin and vice ? This great question you will begin now to settle ; and it will, probably, be finally set tled before this ten years have passed away. We try to train you up in the fear of God, and in habits of obedience to his commands. It gives us great pleasure to perceive that you generally cooperate with us in these ef forts. We hope you will do so more and more ; so that, when this next ten years are gone, we can see that you are growing up to be a well-educated, gentlemanly, virtuous, and pious man. "I am " Yours, very affectionately. " FATHKK- * 2 3 2. 9 7 LLJ i QL LU Z O o 2 P (^ cc, & CC, CO ^ CM ID S CC. c LU E - 3 ^ o c/) 111 O LU cc LU CD BERKELEY LIBRARIES