ion as to what he meant by
digesting the book.

"Why, sonny," returned David, knitting his brows very hard, for the
question was somewhat of a puzzler, "he means that you've got to stow
away in your brain the knowledge that's in the book, an' work away at
it--di-gest it, d'ee see--same as you stow grub into yer stummick an'
digest that."

Billy pondered this a long time till a happy thought occurred to him.

"_I'll_ digest it," said he, slapping his thigh one day when he was left
alone in the house. "We'll all di-gest it together!"

He jumped up, took the lid off a pot of pea-soup that was boiling on the
fire, and dropped the hated book into it.

"What's this i' the soup, Nell?" said David that day at dinner, as he
fished a mass of curious substance out of the pot. "Many a queer thing
have I fished up i' the trawl from the bottom o' the North Sea, but
ne'er afore did I make such a haul as this in a pot o' pea-soup. What
is't?"

"Why, David," replied the wife, examining the substance with a puzzled
expression, "I do believe it's the primer!"

They both turned their eyes inquiringly on the boy, who sat gravely
watching them.

"All right, father," he said, "I put 'im in. We're a-goin' to di-gest
it, you know."

"Dirty boy!" exclaimed his mother, flinging the remains of the boiled
book under the grate. "You've ruined the soup."

"Never a bit, Nell," said the skipper, who was in no wise particular as
to his food, "clean paper an' print can't do no damage to the soup. An'
after all, I don't see why a man shouldn't take in knowledge as well
through the stummick as through the brain. It don't matter a roker's
tail whether you ship cargo through the main-hatch or through the
fore-hatch, so long as it gits inside somehow. Come, let's have a bowl
of it. I never was good at letters myself, an' I'll be bound to say
that Billy and I will di-gest the book better this way than the right
way."

Thus was the finishing touch put to Billy Bright's education at that
time, and we have described the incident in order that the reader may
fully understand the condition of the boy's mind as he stood gazing
round the library of the West End mansion.

"Books!" exclaimed Billy, afterwards, when questioned by a Yarmouth
friend, "I should just think there _was_ books. Oh! it's o' no manner
o' use tryin' to tell 'ee about it. There was books from the floor to
the ceilin' all round the room--books in red covers, an' blue cove