Saib is now more than twelve years old; he has learnt to read, to write, to speak the truth, to try to be calm when rude boys tease him, and to feel grief when he has done wrong. To love his kind friends he has not to learn—his heart bids him do that.
He feels all that Mrs. Bright has done for him—he hopes he may not grieve her or Mr. Bright, but that he may be to them as a good son.—Then they will not part with him; then they will be paid back for all that they have done.
The thought of such a great and good deed must make them glad in this world, and bring them joy in the next.
THE EARTH.
The world we live on is a large round ball, made of all kinds of rocks and of earths; and on a great part of it there are seas and lakes. The earth turns round each day, and goes round the sun once each year. In the day, that part of the world where we live points to the sun, and when the earth turns from the sun, it is night.
When the earth goes round the sun, the heat at one part of the year comes from the sun more straight to that part where we live, and makes the days hot and long, and the nights short, as in June; and when the light and heat do not come to us so straight, there are cold and frost and long nights.
In some parts of the world it is much more cold than where we live. There are parts, too, where the sun is more hot at all times of the year than we feel it. It is the heat of the sun that makes the winds. His heat on the sea makes the clouds.
The clouds rise in the air and fly to the land, where they fall in rain, and make plants and trees grow, and the brooks and springs flow.
The sea is salt, but the heat does not take up the salt in the fogs and clouds; so that the rain is quite pure, and makes springs for us to drink from.