Page:The Swiss Family Robinson, In Words of One Syllable.djvu/118

100 the rain, the boys would oft lay by their work, and sit to hear Jane talk of what she had seen in the East, and Ernest and Fritz would read to her by turns such books as she might choose. I was glad to see that this wrought a great change in my sons, whose mode of life had made them rough in their ways and loud in their speech—faults which we did not think of so long as there was no one to see or hear them.

When the spring came, the boys went in our boat to the spot where they had found Jane, which we now knew by the name of "Jane's Isle," and brought back some beans, which were new to them. These we found to be.

Jane told us that they were by no means scarce, but that she had not made use of them, as she knew no way to roast or grind the beans, which she found in a green state.

"Do you think," said my wife, "that the plant would grow here?"

I then thought for the first time how fond she was of it. There had been some bags on board the ship, but I had not brought them from the wreck; and my wife had but once said that she would like to see the plant in our ground. Now that we knew where to get it, she told me that it was one of the few things that she felt the loss of. When the boys heard this, they set out on a trip to Jane's Isle, and while there