er it." Roger looked as if he did not know what to think about
it.

"I wish," said he, "I knew what he is going to do with that burr."

That afternoon, when the lessons had been all recited, and it was about
time to dismiss the school, the boys put away their books, and the
master read a few verses in the Bible, and then offered a prayer, in
which he asked God to forgive all the sins which any of them had
committed that day, and to take care of them during the night. After
this he asked the boys all to sit down. He then took his handkerchief
out of his pocket and laid it on the desk, and afterward he put his
hand into his pocket again, and took out the chestnut burr, and all the
boys looked at it.

"Boys," said he, "do you know what this is?"

One of the boys in the back seat said, in a half whisper, "It is nothing
but a chestnut burr."

"Lucy," said the master to a bright-eyed little girl near him, "what is
this?"

"It is a chestnut burr, sir," said she.

"Do you know what it is for?"

"I suppose there are chestnuts in it."

"But what is this rough, prickly covering for?"

Lucy did not know.

"Does any body here know?" said the master.

One of the boys said that he supposed it was to hold the chestnuts
together, and keep them up on the tree.

"But I heard a boy say," replied the master, "that they ought not to be
made to grow so. The nut itself, he thought, ought to hang alone on the
branches, without any prickly covering, just as apples do."

"But the nuts themselves have no stems to be fastened by," answered the
same boy.

"That is true; but I suppose this boy thought that God could have made
them grow with stems, and that this would have been better than to have
them in burrs."

After a little pause the master said that he would explain TO them what
the chestnut burr was for, and wished them all to listen attentively.

"How much of the chestnut is good to eat, William?" asked he, looking at
a boy before him.

"Only the meat."

"How long does it take the meat to grow?"

"All summer, I suppose, it is growing."

"Yes; it begins early in the summer, and gradually swells and grows
until it has become of full size, and is ripe, in the fall. Now suppose
there was a tree out here near the school-house, and the chestnut meats
should grow upon it without any shell or covering; suppose, too, that
they should taste like good ripe chestnuts at first, when they were very
small. Do you think they would