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Read Ebook: A House Divided Against Itself; vol. 1 of 3 by Oliphant Mrs Margaret
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Ebook has 892 lines and 31673 words, and 18 pages
"O, walk right along," said Jonas; "the ground is pretty dry now. Go up a little farther, and you will find my canal, and then you can follow it directly along."
So Rollo walked on a little farther, and found the canal where it opened into the brook. He then began slowly and cautiously to walk along the side of the canal, into the marsh; and he was surprised to find how firm and dry the land was. He thought it was owing to Jonas's canal.
"Jonas," said he, as he came up to where Jonas was at work, "this is an excellent canal; it has made the land almost dry already."
"O, no," said Jonas, "my canal has not done any good yet."
"What makes the bog so dry, then?" said Rollo.
"O, it has been drying all summer, and draining off into the brook."
"Draining off into the brook?" repeated Rollo.
"Yes," said Jonas.
"But there is not any drain," said Rollo; "at least there has not been, until you began to make your canal."
"But the water soaks off slowly through the ground, and oozes out under the banks of the brook."
"Does it?" said Rollo.
"Yes," said Jonas; "and the only use of my canal is to make it run off faster."
"Ah! now I know," said Rollo, half talking to himself.
"Know what?" asked Jonas.
"Why, where all the water of the brook comes from; at least, where some of it comes from."
"How?" said Jonas. "I don't know what you mean."
"Why, I could not think where all the water came from, to keep the brook running so fast all the time. But now I know that some of it has been coming all the time from this bog. Does it all come from bogs?"
"Yes, from bogs, and hills, and springs, and from the soakings of all the land it comes through, from where it first begins."
"Where does it first begin?" said Rollo.
"O, it begins in some bog or other, perhaps; just a little dribbling stream oozing out from among roots and mire, and it continually grows as it runs."
"Is that the way?" said Rollo.
"Yes," said Jonas, "that is the way."
During all this time Rollo had been standing with his lantern and his dipper in his hands, while Jonas had continued his digging. Rollo now put the lantern down, and handed the dipper to Jonas, telling him that he had brought him some raspberries.
Jonas seemed quite pleased with his raspberries. While he was eating them, Rollo asked him if a raspberry was a seed.
Rollo determined to pick some seeds out, and see how they looked; but Jonas told him that the way to get them out was to wash them out in water.
"Take some of these raspberries," said he, "in the dipper to the brook, and pour in some water over them. Then take a stick and jam the raspberries all up, and stir them about, and then pour off the water, but keep the seeds in. Next, pour in some more water, and wash the seeds over again, and so on, until the seeds are all separated from the pulp, and left clean."
"Is that the way they get raspberry seeds?" said Rollo.
"Yes," said Jonas, "I believe so. I never tried it myself; but I have heard them say that that is the way they do with raspberries, and strawberries, and all such fruits."
Rollo immediately went and washed out some seeds as Jonas had directed, and when he came back he spread them out upon a piece of birch bark to dry. While they were there, Jonas let him kindle the pile of brush wood, which he had been intending to burn. It had been lying all summer, and had got very dry. In the mean time, Jonas continued digging his canal, and was gradually approaching the pool of water. When he had got pretty near the pool, he stopped digging the canal, and went to the pool itself. He rolled a pretty large log into the edge of it, for him to stand upon; and with his hoe he dug a trench, beginning as far in the pool as he could reach with his hoe, while standing upon his log, and working gradually out towards where he had left digging the canal. The bottom of the pool was very soft and slimy; but he contrived to get a pretty deep and wide trench out quite to the margin, and a little beyond.
"Now," said he to Rollo, "I am going to dig the canal up to the end of this trench, and then the water will all run very freely."
There was now a narrow neck of land between the end of the canal and the beginning of the trench; and as Jonas went on digging the canal along, this neck grew narrower and narrower. Rollo began to be impatient to see the water run. He wanted Jonas to let him hoe a little passage, so as to let it begin to run a little.
"No," said Jonas.
"Why not?" said Rollo.
"There are two good reasons," he replied. "The first is, it will spoil my work, and the second is, it will spoil your play."
"What do you mean by that?" said Rollo.
"Why, if I let the water run a little now, it will flood me here, where I am digging, and make all muddy; and I cannot finish my canal so easily; so it will spoil my work. Then, besides, we want to see the water run in a torrent; but if I let you dig a little trench along across the neck, so as to let it off by degrees, you will not take half as much pleasure in seeing it run, as you will to wait until it is all ready. So it will spoil your play."
Rollo did not reply to this, and Jonas went on digging.
"Well," said Rollo, after a short pause, "I wish, Jonas, you would tell me how the bubbles of air get down into the mud, at the bottom of the brook."
"I don't know," said Jonas.
"It seems to me it is very extraordinary," said Rollo.
"It is somewhat extraordinary. I have thought of another extraordinary phenomenon somewhat like it."
"What is that?" said Rollo.
"The rain," replied Jonas.
"The rain?" said Rollo; "how?"
"Why, the rain," replied Jonas, "is water coming down out of the air; and the bubbles are air coming up out of the water."
"Then it is exactly the opposite of it," said Rollo.
"Yes," said Jonas.
"Well, and so it is," Jonas replied.
"Like it, and yet exactly opposite to it! Jonas, that is impossible."
"Why, yes," said Jonas, "the air gets down into the water, and you wonder how it can, when it is so much lighter than water. So water gets up into the air, and I wonder how it can, when it is so much heavier. So that the difficulty is just about the same."
"No," said Rollo, "it is just about opposite."
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