"Mabel," said Colonel Ingham, "you are absolutely unbearable. If you do not keep in better order I shall be sorry that I dissuaded you from descending to the kitchen. I see nothing incongruous myself in indulging in mechanical experiments, and in throwing one's thoughts into the form of verse,"--here the old gentleman colored slightly, as though he recollected something of the sort,--"but it may be well to counteract the impression your conversation may have made by stating that Isaac Watts did not invent the steam-engine, nor did James Watt write the beautiful words you have just quoted.--Now, Clem, I believe you have the floor." "Well," said Clem, "I only want the floor for a short time in order to explain about Watt and the steam-engine, and how much he was the inventor of it, before we begin to read. "There are various points about the steam-engine which are really Watt's invention,--the separate condenser, for instance,--but the idea of the steam-engine was not original with him; that is, when he saw the steam in the teakettle raise the lid and drop it again, he was not the first to speculate on the power of steam." "Are you going to read us that part in the book, Clem?" asked Bedford, with some interest. "Yes, if you like," said Clem. "I guess it tells about it in Mr. Smiles's 'Life of Watt.'" So he began to overhaul the book he had brought, and shortly discovered the anecdote referred to by Mabel with such interest, and read it. "On one occasion he [James Watt] was reproved by Mrs. Muirhead, his aunt, for his indolence at the tea-table. 'James Watt,' said the worthy lady, 'I never saw such an idle boy as you are. Take a book, or employ yourself usefully; for the last hour you have not spoken one word, but taken off the lid of that kettle and put it on again, holding now a cup and now a silver spoon over the steam, watching how it rises from the spout, catching and counting the drops it falls into.' In the view of M. Arago, the little James before the teakettle, becomes the great engineer, preparing the discoveries which were soon to immortalize him. In our opinion, the judgment of the aunt was the truest. There is no reason to suppose that the mind of the boy was occupied with philosophical theories on the condensation of steam, which he compassed with so much difficulty in his maturer years. This is more probably an afterthought borrowed from his subsequent discoveries. Nothing is commoner than for children to be amused with such phenomena in the same way that they will form air-bubbles in a cup of tea, and watch them sailing over the surface till they burst. The probability is that little James was quite as idle as he seemed." "That is very interesting," remarked Mabel. "Don't you think now, Uncle Fritz, we had better go into the kitchen?" And she looked appealingly at the old gentleman, who merely held up his finger for silence as Clem continued his lecture.