8oo POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



"Is -there any key of C flat ?" Not getting an answer, he con- 

 tinued: "I have asked you a good many times if there is a key 

 of C flat. Tell me." The same morning/ at the breakfast table, 

 he suddenly introduced a very inappropriate subject with the 

 question : " Do cannibals ever eat their friends ? Tell me." 

 " What made you think of that t" "I have heard people say that 

 cannibals eat other people, and so I asked." 



Most frequently his questions refer to some idea obtained 

 from what he has read some time previously. For example : 

 " What does prudent mean ? " " Where did you see that word ? " 

 "In the story about the Prudent Farmer in Harper's Third 

 Reader." " What does verb active mean ? " " Where did you see 

 that ? " " In the story about Squeer's school, written by Charles 

 Dickens, you know." " Is a merry heart better than wealth ? " 

 "Where did you read that?" "In Harper's Third Reader." 

 " What does effort mean ? " " Trying to do something. Where 

 did you see that word ? " " In the fable of the stork and the fox." 

 " What is wisdom ? " " Knowing many things. When a man has 

 many wise thoughts he has wisdom." " Yes," he said, " wiseness." 

 " Where did you see wisdom ? " " I saw it in the picture of a 

 door. Over the door was a card, and on the card it said, 'Wisdom 

 is strength/ I saw a picture of somebody whispering in an owl's 

 ear, and it said, ' A word to the wise/ Is the owl the wisest bird ? " 

 " What is honest milk ? " This last question was suggested by 

 his reading a milkman's circular. 



On the other hand, many of his questions can not be connected 

 with his reading, but appear to result from reasoning or a recog- 

 nized analogy. " How do plants make themselves bigger when 

 they grow ? " he asked when we were talking about planting his 

 garden. I heard him saying to himself, " Wildless, wildless." I 

 asked him what he was talking about, and he replied : " About 

 plants that are not wild. What are they called ? " " Garden or 

 cultivated plants," I answered. " What made you say wildless ? " 

 " Why," said he, " I knew that harmless meant something that 

 wouldn't do any harm, and so wildless means plants that are not 

 wild." He mentioned the fall, and I asked him what he meant 

 by fall. He replied : " The winter at first, the first of it. Do they 

 call it fall because everything is falling ? " There was some talk 

 about dressing him or putting on his dress, and, reasoning from 

 analogy, he asked, " When God puts the skin on people, is that 

 skinning them ? " I once read of the people in the moon being 

 like grasshoppers, and told him about it. When I had finished 

 the story, he said : " When we look up in the sky we see the moon 

 rolling on above us, and when the people in the moon look up in 

 the sky they see the earth rolling along above them. What is 

 the strange puzzle about that ? " I told him that his specimen of 



