Rollo's Experiments Part 7

In a few minutes, Rollo's mother came down stairs to see what was the matter. Rollo thought that his mother might suppose that he had hurt Nathan, and so he began to explain at once how it happened. But his mother held up her hand to him, as a signal for him to be silent. She knew that it was then no time to ascertain the facts.

She came up and looked at Nathan's forehead a moment, and she saw that it was not much hurt. Besides, she knew, by the sound of Nathan's cries, that they did not proceed from much pain. She therefore said to him, gently,

"Stop crying, Nathan!"

Now Nathan knew that his mother did not tell him not to cry, except when she was sure that he could control himself if he chose to do so; and he also knew that she punished him if he did not obey. So he began immediately to repress his sobs and cries, and very soon became still.

She then put a small plaster, of some sort, upon his forehead, and then carried him up stairs and laid him on the bed.

"There," said she, "Thanny, lie still there a little while, till your forehead has done aching, and you get pleasant again; then you may get up, and come to me."

Then she went to her work again, and Rollo came and stood by her side, and told her the whole story.

"Nathan did wrong," said she; "but it would have been better for you not to have run after him."

"Why, mother," said Rollo, "he was running away with my knife; and I can't split at all without my knife. One thing I know,--I shall not let him split any more with my beetle and wedges."

"That would be one way to treat him," said his mother; "but there is another thing you might do, if you chose."

"What, mother?" asked Rollo.

"Why, make him a beetle and wedge, for his own."

"Why, mother!" said Rollo, with surprise.

"Yes," said she. "You might make him one. Think how pleased he would be with it. Then he could sit down with you, and you could both be splitting together."

"But, seems to me, mother, that that would be rewarding him for being a naughty boy."

"It would be so, if you were to make him a beetle and wedge, _because he was a bad boy_; but I proposed that you should make it for another reason, that is, to _please_ him."

"But perhaps he would _think_ I did it because he ran away with my knife," said Rollo.

"I don't think there is any danger that he would imagine that you did it as a reward for that," replied his mother.

Here Rollo paused a moment. He did not feel quite ready to undertake to make Nathan a beetle and wedges; but he did not know exactly how to reply to his mother's reasoning. At length he said, in a timid and hesitating voice,

"But, mother, it seems to me that it would be better to punish Nathan, rather than reward him, or do any thing which would seem like rewarding him for acting so."

"That may be true," said his mother. "And it is true, also, that if you should refuse to let him split wood any more with your wedges, it would be punishing him; while, on the other hand, if you should make him a little beetle and wedge of his own, it would be forgiving him. Now I do not say that he ought not to be punished; but which do you think is _your_ duty towards him,--you, yourself, being only another child, a few years older than he,--to punish or to forgive?"

"Why,--to forgive,--I suppose," said Rollo, rather doubtfully.

"I am rather inclined to that opinion, myself," said his mother: "but you can do just as you please."

Rollo remained some minutes about his mother's chair, not knowing exactly what to do or say next. He sat down upon the floor, and began to play with some shreds of cloth which were lying there. Presently, he looked up and said,

"Mother, what was the reason why you would not let me tell you what was the matter with Nathan in the kitchen?"

"Because," said she, "he was crying then, and it is no time to learn how an injury happened, during the excitement of the moment. If you find Nathan crying out in the yard, for instance, and try to get him to tell you how he got hurt, you only make him cry the more. Get him quiet first, and then learn the story afterwards.

"Then, besides the difficulty of his speaking intelligibly," she continued, "at such a time, boys are very strongly tempted to misrepresent the facts, during the excitement of the first moments. They are very likely to be a little vexed or angry, and, under the influence of those feelings, not to give a correct and honest account. So that it is always best to put off inquiries till the trouble is all over."

Here Nathan came into the room. His forehead had ceased to give him pain, and so he had clambered down from the bed where his mother had placed him, and now came into the room, looking quiet and calm, though still not very happy.

Rollo went to him, and said, "Come, Nathan, now we will go down stairs to play again." And he began to lead him down stairs. As they walked along, Rollo said,

"I am going to make you a beetle and wedge for your own, Nathan, and then you and I can split together: only, it is not a _reward_, you must understand. It was wrong for you to keep my beetle, and run away with my knife, and you are sorry you did so, an't you, Nathan?"

"Yes," said Nathan.

"And you won't do so any more, will you, Nathan?"

"No," said Nathan, "I won't do so any more."

Whether Nathan was really sorry for what he had done, or whether he only said so because Rollo was going to make him a beetle, is very doubtful; though it is not impossible that he was a little sorry.

Rollo went down into the shed again with Nathan; and while he was at work making the new beetle and wedge, he let Nathan use his. The first piece of board had been split up; so he laid another one before Nathan, and gave him his beetle and wedges and knife, and then went away out to the barn to get some more wood for wedges, and an auger.

When he came back, he found Nathan standing at the shed door, with the little beetle in his hand, waiting for him. As Nathan saw Rollo coming, he called to him, saying,

"Come, Rollo, come and help me; the board won't split."

"What is the matter with it?" said Rollo.

"I don't know," said Nathan, "only it won't split."

So Rollo went in to see. He found that Nathan had gone to work wrong.

Instead of trying to drive the wedge into the _end_ of the board, so as to split it _along_ the grain, he had made the cleft with the knife in the side of the board, and was attempting to drive it in there, as if he supposed he could split the board _across_ the grain.

"Why, Nathan," said Rollo, "that isn't right. You can't split it across."

Then he put the wedge into the end, where it ought to be put, and set Nathan to driving it. _Now_ it began to split at once; though Nathan could not see why the board should not split one way as well as the other.

Rollo himself did not understand it very well. Nathan asked him why it would not split the other way, and he said that that was _across_ the grain. But when Nathan asked him what he meant by _grain_, he could not tell.

He took up the wood and examined it, and observed little lines and ridges, running along in the direction in which it would split; but at the ends of the board, where it had been sawed across the grain, it was rough. He determined to ask Jonas about it, or his father.

He then went to work, and made the wedges and a little beetle for Nathan. He made Nathan's beetle smaller than his own, because Nathan was not strong enough to strike hard with such a heavy beetle. He did not get it done in season to use that day; but, the next day, he and Nathan sat down upon the shed floor, and spent an hour in splitting up the boards. They split them all up into good, fine kindling wood. Then they piled the pieces up in a neat pile, and then brought Dorothy out to see them.

Dorothy seemed very much pleased, and promised the boys that, the next time she baked pies, she would kindle the fire in the oven with their kindling wood, and then she would bake them each a little apple turnover.

That evening, just before Rollo went to bed, he asked Jonas if he could tell him why boards would only split _along_ the grain.

"Yes," said Jonas, "I think I can tell you. But do you know what the grain is?"

"No," said Rollo, "I don't know any thing about it."