The diving bell has been used for a good many useful purposes—­to lay the foundations of docks and the piers of bridges; to collect pearls at Ceylon, and coral at other places.

I am not sure but the diving bell is getting somewhat out of use now.  People have found out another way of groping along on the bottom of rivers and seas.  They do it frequently, I believe, by means of a kind of armor made of India rubber.  But so far as my book is concerned, it is of no consequence whether the diving bell is out of use or not.  I shall use the title, at all events.

If, after my account of the diving bell, you still ask why I choose to give such a name to the budget I have prepared for you, I can answer your question very easily.

I think you will find something worth looking at in the budget—­not pearls, or pieces of coral, or lost treasures, exactly, but still something which will please you, and something which, when you get hold of it, will be worth keeping and laying up in some snug corner of your memory box.  I say when you get hold of it; for the valuable things I have for you do not all lie on the surface.  You will have to search for them a little.  That is, you will have to think.  When you have read one of my stories, or fables, you may find it necessary to stop, and ask yourself “What does Uncle Frank mean by all this?” In other words, you will have to use the diving bell, and see if you can’t hunt up something in the story or the fable, which will be useful to you, and which will make you wiser and better.  Now you see why I have called my book The Diving Bell, don’t you?

II.

Thinking and laughing.

It is Uncle Frank’s notion, that it is a good thing to laugh, but a better thing to think.  A great many people, however, old as well as young, and young as well as old, live and die without thinking much.  They lose three quarters of the benefit they ought to get from reading, and from what they see and learn as they go through the world, by never diving below the surface of things.  I don’t suppose it is so with you.  I hope not, at all events.  If it is so, then you had better shut up this book, and pass it over to some young friend of yours, who has learned to think, and who loves to read books that will help him about thinking.  No, on the whole, you needn’t do any such thing.  Just read the book—­read it through.  Perhaps you will get a taste for such reading, while you are going through the book.

I must tell you an anecdote just here.  You will not refuse to read that, at any rate.

Not long ago I was in a book store, looking over some new books which I saw on the counter, when a fine-looking boy, who appeared to be about nine years old, came in.  He had a shilling in his hand, and said he wanted to buy a book.

“But what book do you want?” one of the clerks asked.