"And we'll all go with him this very afternoon, sir," says Walt Ray, "with your permission, and by night-fall the Snow place will be as good as ever."
"And we'll pay for the broken flower-pots, sir," says little Al Smith—the best little chap in the world—can't bear to see any one punished.
The Professor smiled. That was enough. We all smiled, and then we gave him a rousing cheer, and rushed down to Snow's.
Snow wasn't half bad. He laughed right out when he saw us coming, and in less than two hours, we'd done all the work he said he wanted us to do, and were eating fresh-baked gingerbread—Mrs. Snow made it—and drinking milk in the barn. Jerry O'Neill ate so much that he had awful dreams that night—thought a whole procession of elephants was walking over him.
And I've never forgotten a promise since that Hare-and-Hounds day. It was the best lesson my memory ever got.
[HOW TO MAKE A MAGIC LANTERN.]
After the lens has once been procured, which may be purchased from any optician, the price ranging from fifty cents upward, according to the size and quality of the glass, a magic lantern may be constructed out of a few simple materials by an ingenious boy.
Procure from a tinman several sheets of tin and a small piece of tin pipe, into which the lens will fit nicely. Then go to work with a soldering-iron and construct a square box, the dimensions of which may be a foot or a foot and a half each way. There must be a round opening on one side into which the pipe holding the lens is fitted, a door at the back to admit a lamp, and a hole in the top for a chimney. A reflector fits in the opposite side to the door, and can be drawn forward at pleasure; and a space is left to allow the introduction of the slides.
The room, when prepared for exhibiting, must be entirely darkened, and the slides, are then slipped in, upside down. The lens brilliantly reflects and magnifies the figures, previously painted on the glass, on to a white sheet suspended from the ceiling. Thus any subjects—landscapes, figures, or animals—become enlarged, according to the distance the lantern is removed from the sheet, and the size and quality of the lens.