It was decided to begin with Apple-sauce.

"How happy," exclaimed Mr. Peterkin, "that this should come first of
all! A child might be brought up on apple-sauce till he had mastered
the first letter of the alphabet, and could go on to the more involved
subjects hidden in bread, butter, baked beans, etc."

Agamemnon thought his father hardly knew how much was hidden in
the apple. There was all the story of William Tell and the Swiss
independence. The little boys were wild to act William Tell, but Mrs.
Peterkin was afraid of the arrows. Mrs.

Peterkin proposed they should begin by eating the apple-sauce, then
discussing it, first botanically, next historically; or perhaps first
historically, beginning with Adam and Eve, and the first apple.

Mrs. Peterkin feared the coffee would be getting cold, and the griddles
were waiting. For herself, she declared she felt more at home on the
marmalade, because the quinces came from grandfather's, and she had seen
them planted; she remembered all about it, and now the bush came up to
the sitting-room window.

She seemed to have heard him tell that the town of Quincy, where the
granite came from, was named from them, and she never quite recollected
why, except they were so hard, as hard as stone, and it took you almost
the whole day to stew them, and then you might as well set them on
again.

Mr. Peterkin was glad to be reminded of the old place at grandfather's.
In order to know thoroughly about apples, they ought to understand the
making of cider.

Now, they might some time drive up to grandfather's, scarcely twelve
miles away, and see the cider made. Why, indeed, should not the family
go this very day up to grandfather's, and continue the education of the
breakfast?

"Why not indeed?" exclaimed the little boys. A day at grandfather's
would give them the whole process of the apple, from the orchard to the
cider-mill. In this way they could widen the field of study, even to
follow in time the cup of coffee to Java.

It was suggested, too, that at grandfather's they might study the
processes of maple-syrup as involved in the griddle-cakes.

Agamemnon pointed out the connection between the two subjects: they were
both the products of trees--the apple-tree and the maple. Mr. Peterkin
proposed that the lesson for the day should be considered the study of
trees, and on the way they could look at other trees.

Why not, indeed, go this very day? There was no time like the pre