1.“Father，Tom said I was not worth my salt.What did he mean？”
2.“Well，dear，I hope no one will ever be able to say that of you again.A girl who is not worth such a cheap thing as salt，is not worth very much.
3.”But for all that we could not do without salt any more than I could do without you.“And he drew his little girl closer to him.
4.”No one will grow big and strong who does not have salt in his food.Even animals need it.Farmers often put a lump of salt in the fields for the horses and the cows and the sheep to lick.
5.“In Africa，hunters are sure of having wild animals to shoot if they wait quietly near a salt spring.
6.”But salt is not cheap in Africa，for it is very scarce.There children are as pleased with a little salt as you are with some sweets.
“7.”Where does salt come from，father？““We get a great deal of it from the sea.Shallow pits are dug and filled with sea water.The sun dries up the water，and the salt is left behind.
8.”But we also get salt out of mines.There are salt mines in our country，just as there are coal mines and iron mines.
9.“The largest salt mine in the world is a wonderful place.It is far from here.Men have been digging salt out of it for six hundred years，and yet there seems as much left as ever！
10.”In this mine there are miles and miles of streets.There are houses all made of salt，where the miners with their wives and children live.
11.“Hundreds stay down in the mine all their lives，and hardly ever see the blue sky or the green grass.
12.”There are churches，too，made of salt，where the miners pray and sing.
13.“Horses are needed to draw trucks of salt in the mines.When they are once taken down they never come up again.The glitter of the salt and the glare of the lamps blind them，but they go on doing their work all the same.”