Year: 1871

know it had any shape"


"Oh, but it has though; listen, and /
will tell you all about it. First, however,
what is night, think your"


Darkness"


Every true, so far, but what makes the
darkness? Stand up, now, with your back
to the bright fire, and tell me what makes
that darkness, like the picture of a black
giants baby on the opposite wall?


Your shadow, certainly.


"Well, then, cannot you guess what the
darkness of night is? Do you suppose
your plump little person can cast that
terrible-looking shadow, and the great
round earth, so thich and so solid, cast none
at all, but let the sunlight through it, like
bit of glass or drop of rain-water? No
indeed. The earth casts a mighty shadow
of its own, for little children to lie down
and sleep in, when they are tired of work
and play. 1t always has its fire-which i
the sun on one side, and its shadow,
stretching far, far away, beyond the
mountain-tops, and yeyond the clouds
and beyond the moon on the other.


"1f the earth stood quite still before the
fire-1 mean the sun-it would have day
on the same side and night on the same
side all the time, SO that, after you had
eaten your supper, if you wanted to sleep





night, you would have to travel ever SO
many miles to go to bed, and when YOU
had had your sleep out, all the way back
again into the bright borders of the busy
day. That would be very inconvenient in
deed, but by no means the worst psrt of it
for nothing could grow on one half The
earth if the sun never shone there, because
it would not only be dark-and plants
cannot live without light-but also colder
than the coldest winter night Other ter
rible things, too, would come to pass
more than you or have any idka of.


"The dear old motherly earth knows
better how to take care of her children,
and spins constantly round and round like
a huge top, so very, very fast that in
twenty-four hours she has turned quite
round, and has given us the whole of one
day, and the whole of one night, full oi
warm sunshine and sweet, quiet sleep
without our even having to go out of ouI
own homes in search of either


"If were to tell you, in figures, just
how big the world is, and just how fast il
turns round, am afraid you would no,
be much the wiser, because you are moi
used to think of such large numbers, and
would not understand at all how great
they really are. Perhaps, however, it will
give you some idea of the size of the
earth if L tell you that tine deepest seas and
highest mountains upon it are less in pro
portion to its whole bulk than the little
roughnesses on the skin of an orange are
to the size of the fruit.


oceans and rivers are like the scratch.
es; mountains that pierce the clouds like
the uneven places in your football.


"You can well imagine that such mon
strous top as that must spin pretty fss
to turn all the way round in few hours
If it does not spin faster than your topl
and tetotums, our nights would last Sc
many years that long before one of then
was over we should die of cold and star
vation.


"Think, too, what great, long shadow
ball so large. and at such a vast distance
from the sun, must cast! Dear mel i
you thought of it all the days of your life
you could never think of anything half SC
long as the shadow of the earth.


Now that you know what night is
that it is really only q shadow, you will
not be so surprised to learn that it has 6
distinct form, for l am sure you never il
your life saw or heard of shadow thai
had no shape at all.


"You will wonder, perhaps, how people
know so much about the size and form o.
it when no one has ever been where the
whole of it could be seen at once, even i
it were possible to see it in that way
which, for reasons that will explain tC
you some day, it is not. But there are
always a good many wise men in the world
who spend their whole lives in reading anC
writing, and looking at the stars through
telescopes, and ciphering and thinking
| and putting this and that together, unit
they find out a great many wonderful
things; and all that little folks, like yoi
and me, can do, is TO believe what they
| tell us, and try to understand as much a
We can.


"Let us believe, then, that they have
discovered exactly how large the sun, anC
earth, and moon are, and exactly how fal
they are apart, and that they are al
round, like balls, or nearly so, and think
after we have taken this for granted, We
can manage to understand something
about the form of the shadow that oul
earth casts out into space; but you mus
be very attentive, or you may not hear al
| have to say, and learn nothing from it
and that would be pity.


"lf you had small light behind you
the flame of lamp, for instsnce-and 6
wall before you, at some distance, YOU
shadow, cast by the small light on the
wall, would be larger than yourself; i
there were another wall farther oil, you
shadow on that would be larger still, anC
if you could have one sufficiently far off
YOU would cast a shadow upon it large
enough to cover the whole earth; neither
would it stop there, but go on and on
growing bigger and biggeras it went So
YOU see, when you have light behinC
you smaller than yourself, your shadow
continues to increase in size the farther /
extends.


elf, however, you had a very larg,
light behind you say as large as the sid'
OF house-and wall before you, you
| shadow would be smaller than yourself
on wall at greater distance it woulC
be smaller still, and SO on, until 1t would
at last come to a point and vanish. Now
this is exactly the case with the shadow
of our world, for the sun is great dea
larger than the earth, so that, although it.
shadow is very long indeed, it yet grows
gradually smaller all the way, and comes
at last to a point. II you think of il
| for minute, you will not find it hard tC
understand that such shadow, cast by 6
round ball, must be what is called cone
shaped-that is, shaped like a sugar loaf
or the extinguisher of candle, or the
paper cornucopia you had last Christina:
full of sugar-plums.


at is, then, under this great cone.
shaped shadow you sleep every night, and
while you are dreaming it passes swiftly
over your bed, lifting its mighty head up
up, farther than your thoughts can follow
it, beyond the pathway OF the distant
moon.


"That reminds me to tell you, what
dare say you have already guessed, that
the moon in its regular travels round US
sometimes passes through the earth's
night-shadow, and becomes what we cal