only a very few at a time. They had not yet
seen them all. He only allowed them to see them as fast as they had time
to examine them thoroughly, and read about them and understand them.
But now he said to Rollo,

"I could let you have all the books of prints and engravings I have got,
and see them all at one time, and that would be giving you Aladdin's
lamp, exactly, so far as my pictures are concerned."

"Well," said Rollo, clapping his hands.

"But then, in a short time, you would get tired of looking at them; you
would become satiated, and would in fact spoil the whole pleasure by
attempting to enjoy it too fast. But then I think it would perhaps do
you good."

"How, father?"

"Why, by teaching you the value of moderation, and the uselessness of
Aladdin's lamps in all human enjoyments. It would be a very valuable
experiment in intellectual philosophy, which I think it very probable
might be of use to you. So, if you please, you may try it."

"Well, father, I am sure I should like to see the pictures."

"That is all settled then," said his father; "some day you shall."

THE GREAT BEETLE AND WEDGE.

Rollo was coming home one morning after having been away on an errand,
and he saw a large wood pile near Farmer Cropwell's door. Now it
happened that Rollo had once been on a journey pretty far back into the
country; it was at the time when Jonas told him and Lucy the stories
related in the book called "Jonas's Stories." On that journey, Jonas had
one day told him that the sap of the maple-tree was sweet, and had let
him taste of some, where it oozed out at the end of the log. Seeing
Farmer Cropwell's wood pile reminded Rollo of this; and he thought he
would look at the ends of all the logs, and see if he could not find
some drops of sweet sap there.

But he could not, for two reasons: none of those trees were maple-trees,
and then, besides, they were all dry. There was no sap in them of any
kind; at least, not enough to ooze out. While Rollo was looking there,
one of Farmer Cropwell's large boys came out with an axe in his hand. He
rolled out a pretty large log of wood, though it was not very long, and
struck his axe into the end of it, as if he was going to split it.

"I don't believe you can split that great log," said Rollo.

"I don't expect to do it with the axe," said the boy, as he left the axe
sticking in the log.

"How then?" said Rollo.

"I have got beetle and wedges here, round behind the