NEWTON'S CHILDHOOD.
Sir Isaac Newton is the greatest of modern philosophers and mechanics. When he was born, December 25, 1642, three months after his father's death, he was so small and feeble that no one supposed he would live a day; but the weak infant grew to be a healthy, robust man, who lived until he was eighty-four years old. He began to invent or contrive machines and to show his taste for mechanics in early childhood. He inherited some property from his father, and his mother, who had married a second time, sent him to the best schools, and to the University of Cambridge. At school he soon showed his natural taste; he amused himself with little saws, hatchets, hammers, and different tools, and when his companions were at play spent his time in making machines and toys. He made a wooden clock when he was twelve years old, and the model of a windmill, and in his mill he put a mouse, which he called his miller, and which turned the wheels by running around its cage. He made a water-clock four feet high, and a cart with four wheels, not unlike a velocipede, in which he could drive himself by turning a windlass.
His love of mechanics often interrupted his studies at school, and he was sometimes making clocks and carriages when he ought to have been construing Latin and Greek. But his mind was so active that he easily caught up again with his fellow-scholars, and was always fond of every kind of knowledge. He taught the school-boys how to make paper kites; he made paper lanterns by which to go to school in the dark winter mornings; and sometimes at night he would alarm the whole country round by raising his kites in the air with a paper lantern attached to the tail; they would shine like meteors in the distance, and the country people, at that time very ignorant, would fancy them omens of evil, and celestial lights.
He was never idle for a moment. He learned to draw and sketch; he made little tables and sideboards for the children to play with; he watched the motions of the sun by means of pegs he had fixed in the wall of the house where he lived, and marked every hour.
At last, when he was about sixteen, his mother placed him in charge of a farm, and every Saturday he went with a servant to Grantham market to sell his corn and vegetables. But the affairs of the farm did not prosper; the young philosopher hid himself away in a room in a garret which he hired, studying mechanics and inventing a water-wheel or a new model, while the sheep wandered away in the field, and the cattle devoured his corn.
Next he went to Cambridge University, and became a famous scholar. At the age of twenty-four he began his study of the spectrum, as philosophers call that brilliant picture of the colors of the rainbow, which is shown by the sun's rays shining through a three-sided piece of glass, called a prism. It is one of the most beautiful objects in science or nature, and Newton's study of its splendid colors led to his greatest discoveries in optics, or the science of the sight. In our own time the use of the prism and its spectrum has shown us of what the sun and moon are composed.
One day, as Newton sat musing in his garden at his retired country home, an apple fell from a tree to the ground. A great idea at once arose in his mind, and he conceived the plan of the universe and of the law of gravitation, as it is called. He was the first to discover that famous law. He showed that the heavier body always attracts the lighter; that as the apple falls to the earth, so the earth is drawn toward the sun; that all the planets feel the law of gravitation, and that all the universe seems to obey one will. Newton soon became the most famous of living philosophers. But at the same time he was the most modest of men; he never knew that he had done anything more than others, nor felt that he was any more studious or busy. Yet he never ceased to show, even in late old age, the same love for mechanical pursuits and the study of nature he had shown when a boy. His most famous work, the Principia, proving the law of gravitation and the motion of the planets, appeared in 1687. He made beautiful prisms of glass and other substances, and fine reflecting telescopes, the best that were yet known. He wrote valuable histories and works. He was always a devout Christian and scholar. He died in 1727, and was buried in Westminster Abbey.
Thus the puny babe that was scarcely thought worth the care of his nurses became an active and healthy boy and man, with the clearest mind of his time. He was stout, ruddy, healthy, and never, it is said, lost a tooth. But he preserved his health by avoiding all that was hurtful. He was a philosopher at twelve years old, and the world owes much of its progress to Newton's well-spent childhood.
[TIM AND TIP;]
OR, THE ADVENTURES OF A BOY AND A DOG.[1]
BY JAMES OTIS,
AUTHOR OF "TOBY TYLER," ETC.
Chapter XI.
ONE COOK SPOILS THE BROTH.
The question of what was to make up the dinner bill of fare appeared to be an important one to all, and many were the suggestions made to the cooks. Some proposed that the work of raising the tent be intrusted to other hands, so that Bill and Tip could go out and bring in a deer or a bear; others thought the old hen should be killed at once, and served up as a roast; while one portion of the party seemed to think it Captain Jimmy's duty to get his ship under way, and go after some fish for a chowder.
But Tim and Bobby did not allow any of these remarks to trouble them; they were the legally elected cooks, and they proposed to do the work in their own way.
"We'll get the dinner," said Tim, with some dignity, "an' after it's done, if you fellers don't like it, you can cook one to suit yourselves."
But the cooks did listen to what Bill had to say, since he was one of the high officials, and he was strongly in favor of making the first dinner in camp a "big" one, even going so far as to propose in all earnestness that the hen be killed.
"We might jest as well eat her," he said, as he looked murderously toward the unhappy fowl, which was struggling to free herself from her bonds at the risk of breaking her leg. "'Cause jest as likely as not she'll get away, an' then we sha'n't so much as have a smell of her."
"It will take us too long to fix her up for dinner," said Tim, who was just the least bit afraid that he was not cook enough to serve the hen properly. "We can get enough to eat to-day without havin' so much fuss."
"I don't care how long it takes; what we want is a bang-up dinner, an' I go in for havin' it now," said Bill, decidedly.
Bobby was on the point of throwing the weight of his opinion against the proposed feast, when a bark of triumph was heard from Tip, and the question was settled without further discussion. The dog, which had been struggling to get free from the time he had been tied so near the hen, to which he seemed to think he had a perfect right, finally succeeded in releasing himself. There was a sudden rush on his part, a loud cackling protest from poor Biddy, and then she was tossed in the air a dead chicken.
Bill had presence of mind enough, fortunately for the dinner prospects, to seize his hen before Tip made his lunch from her, and he said, as he handed her to Tim:
"There, you see Tip knew we ought to kill her, an' so he did it for us. Now we can have a good dinner."
Tim made no reply, and perhaps for the first time in his life he was angry with Tip for having meddled in matters which did not concern him. It was necessary now to cook the hen, and as he stood with her in his hand the terrible thought came to him that he did not even know enough to prepare her for cooking.
"Do you think we had better have her roasted or boiled?" he asked, in a low, reckless way, of Bobby.
Now this other cook was quite as perplexed about the matter as Tim was, and he was thoroughly well pleased that he had allowed his partner to take the lead in other matters, so that the latter would now be obliged to take all the responsibility of the hen's appearance at the dinner table.
"I think we had better roast her," he said, in a careless sort of way, as if to him one style of cooking was as easy as another.
Again was Tim disappointed. He had hoped Bobby would propose boiling her, in which case all he would be obliged to do would be to pop her in the kettle, letting her stay there until she was done. But since Bobby was so cruel as to propose the hardest way of cooking the hen, roasted it must be, or gone was his reputation as cook.
"I'll pick the feathers off," said Bill, gleefully; and Tim handed him the fowl.
"I don't seem to see how we're goin' to get along," said Tim to Bobby. "We ain't got any dishes to cook her in."
"We don't want any, do we?" asked his assistant, in some surprise. "I always thought when folks that were campin' out cooked anything, they stuck it on a stick in front of the fire an' let it sizzle."
"We can do it so now," he exclaimed; and since this suggestion had been made, roasting chickens did not appear to be any very hard matter after all.
He piled the wood on until he had a fire large enough to roast a pig, cut a long sharp stick on which to spit the hen, and had hardly completed these preparations when Bill Thompson re-appeared with the now featherless victim of Tip's blood-thirsty nature.
Bill's work might have been done more neatly; but what did a few feathers amount to when a dozen hungry boys were waiting to be fed? Tim was not quite sure whether he had better cut off the head and legs or not; but as they did not seem to be in the way, he concluded they might as well be cooked. Neither did he think any cleaning necessary, but plunged the stick through her, and stuck one end in the ground in front of the fire with all the grace of an experienced cook.
The remainder of the party watched this work with hungry eagerness; and when Tim filled the kettle with potatoes, they settled themselves down contentedly to wait for the "bang-up" dinner, which they in a measure owed to Tip.
The water in the pot bubbled and boiled merrily; the murdered hen began to steam and sizzle, until every boy's mouth watered; while Tim and Bobby bustled around in an important manner, feeling that they were looked up to as the head men of the party, and enjoying the honor immensely.
They piled on the wood, stirred the potatoes, as if that was the important part of cooking that vegetable, while every few moments Tim would smell of the hen, nearly singeing the hair from his head each time. They were certainly good cooks, if keeping up a big fire could make them so.
PREPARING THE GREAT FEAST.
The hen did not appear to be revengeful at having been so suddenly deprived of life, for in a short time her rather lean body began to turn brown, and a most delicious odor arose on the air, even if she was thickly crusted with ashes.
As Tim turned her carefully, he thought with surprise that he was a really good cook, and blamed himself for having been so distrustful of his own ability.
Thus matters went on, successfully but slowly, until some of the boys showed such plain signs of impatience that Tim thought it necessary to display more evidences of the dinner, even though the hen was far from being roasted.
He and Bobby selected from the cooked provisions enough in the way of pies and cake to make twice as large a party feel very uncomfortable. They spread this feast at one side of the fire, where it would be out of the way of the smoke, and Tim was trying to calculate how it would be possible to cut an apple pie in eleven pieces, and have them all of equal size, when a sound as of water thrown on fire, accompanied by a cry of dismay from Bill Thompson, caused him to start violently.
The sight that met his startled gaze was a sad one, and it did not seem any less so to him than it did to all the others of that hungry party.
The kettle of potatoes had been hung to the pole by a rope, which had burned slowly, until it broke, letting the potatoes, water, and kettle into the fire, deluging the half-roasted hen, and basting it with cinders, until it looked like a huge ball of mud.
The steam and smoke were so dense that it was impossible to attempt any rescue. All that could be done was to wait a few moments, and Tim spent that time dancing around the ruins like a crazy Indian.
It was a horror-stricken party that stood around the drowned fire, watching the cooks as they fished up first the muddy hen, and then the potatoes, all looking very sorry for their plunge into the ashes.
"Now all you've got to do," said Bill Thompson, with the air of one who knew, "is to put the potatoes right back, an' wash the hen. They'll cook jest as well as ever, only it'll take a little longer, that's all."
Surely there was nothing so serious about the accident, if it could be repaired with so little trouble, and the spirits of that party rose as rapidly as they had fallen. The hen was given a sea bath, which took nearly all the ashes off, and those which remained, Bill Thompson thought, would make her taste the better. The potatoes did not need any cleansing, so Tim thought, and were put into the pot again, looking quite dirty, but in very nearly a cooked condition.
Another fire was built, rocks were placed in such a way around it that the kettle could rest on them, the hen was put on another stick, and again the chances for dinner looked promising.
The food which had been spread out on the ground looked very tempting to the idle ones of that hungry party, and every now and then one would try to get a piece of pie or cake, until Tim, who was determined that no one should have anything to eat until all could be served, was almost at his wits' end to prevent them from making a perfect raid on the larder.
Finally, worn out with running from the fire to the table every time he saw one of the party moving innocently up that way, he told Bobby to keep strict guard over the food, and that young gentleman wiped the ashes and perspiration from his face with an air of relief, as he seated himself near the largest pie, prepared to act the part of watch-dog.
Tip, who had been running about in everybody's way, and seriously troubling his master, now came toward the fire, and sat down on his little stubbed tail in such a suspicious manner that Tim felt reasonably certain it was his purpose to steal the hen whenever a good opportunity presented itself.
Such base action on Tip's part caused Tim more delay, as he tied him securely to a tree out of reach of temptation, and by the time the tired cook got back to his work again, a great commotion was raised by Captain Jimmy and Bobby.
When Bill Thompson had quelled the tumult, it was learned that Captain Jim had doubted Bobby's honesty from the first moment he had been appointed guardian of the food, and had watched him from behind a tree. He stated positively that he saw Bobby's eyes fixed on the apple-pie in such a way as no officer of the company should look at a pie, unless the time had come to eat it, and at a time when he thought no one was looking, Jim was sure he saw him put his fingers under the crust, pull out two slices of apple, and eat them.
Of course such a charge as this caused intense excitement, and the majority of the party thought Bobby ought to be punished in some way as a warning to others, and more especially to show that the officers of the party should be above reproach, or, failing in their duty, be punished severely.
Some of the party proposed that the culprit be condemned to go without his dinner; others, not quite so blood-thirsty, believed he should be deprived of his office, while there were those who believed that to forbid him eating any pie would be punishment enough.
It is hard to say just how Bobby would have been obliged to atone for the sin if the hand of justice had not been stayed by the dinner itself.
"You'll have to let him go this time, for he must help me," said Tim. "We'll make him work all the harder to pay for what he's done."
Once more over the smoky fire and amid the flying ashes Bobby labored for the good of others, working out the punishment for his sin.
The kettle of potatoes was taken from the fire, and while Bobby picked out the pieces—for they had boiled until they were discouraged, and had burst their skins—arranging them on two shingles, Tim took the well-blackened remains of poor Biddy from the spit, laying them on a short bit of board in great triumph.
Then the hungry party gathered around the place which represented the table, and waited impatiently to be served to some of the savory roast.
Bill Thompson, with his hunting knife, proceeded to carve the fowl, which was a work of some time, owing to its exceeding toughness.
In order to show proper respect for the office he held, Bill waited on Captain Jimmy first, and that young gentleman did not waste much time before he began to eat.
The roast was quite raw inside, even though it was burned outside, but that, in Captain Jimmy's hungry condition, made very little difference. He cut off the first mouthful and began to eat in a ravenous manner, when suddenly he stopped, looking very queer.
"What is the matter?" asked Tim, anxiously, quick to notice the change in the Captain's face.
"I dunno," said Jim; "but it tastes kind o' funny."
"That's 'cause you ain't used to hen," said Bill, almost savagely, not pleased that any one should find fault with his fowl.
Just then another of the party, who had received his portion and begun eating, laid down his knife and fork with an unmistakable air of discomfort.
"Perhaps you don't like hen," said Bill, now growing angry that food of his providing should be refused.
By this time several of the party had shown signs of disliking the roast, and Bill proceeded to taste and try for himself.
He cut off a large mouthful, and began eating it with the air of one who thinks he knows just what he is about to taste, and has made up his mind beforehand to be pleased. But he stopped as suddenly as the others had, and looking sternly at Tim, he asked,
"What did you put on this hen?"
"Nothin'; perhaps it tastes queer 'cause the taters tipped over on it."
"It don't taste like taters," said Bill; "it tastes a good deal worse."
Then he examined the uncarved portion of the fowl, and the mystery was explained.
"I know what the matter is, an' I don't think you're much of a cook, Tim Babbige. You've cooked the hen without cleanin' her, an' of course she's spoiled."
Tim could make no reply, for as soon as Bill spoke he remembered how chickens ought to look when ready to be roasted, and he knew he could no longer hope to be considered a good cook.
That day the party made their dinner of boiled potatoes and pastry, while Tip feasted on the half-roasted fowl he had so ruthlessly slain.