Chapter I: Don't See What Weeds Are For, Anyway (2)

"And all that night the prince tied and retied the true lover's knot, as the fairy had showed him, and next morning he hurried with it to the fisherman's cottage where Dodora lived. And when Dodora saw him coming, she did not dance away as she had always done before, but went forward to meet him, and took his hand. Then suddenly she snatched the golden thread from him and ran, with the prince after her. She ran fast, but he was about to overtake her, when Dodora dropped the knot into the weeds, and then all at once she stopped, for the wonderful thread had suddenly become a great tangle of gold that held Dodora fast, and she could not get away. So the prince overtook her, and led her to his palace, where they lived happily for a long time. And the thread of love grew as a wonderful vine that had no root in the earth, but twined about the weeds and spread over the country in many places. Some called it Dodora, after the princess, and this was changed at last to 'dodder' by those who did not know. Others called it golden thread, and still others called it love-vine, and tied true lover's knots in it which they threw over their shoulders on moonlight nights. If these knots grew they won their sweethearts. They did not always grow, but about the palace of the prince the vine flourished in a golden mass, and the prince, never forgetting the wonderful night when it had been spun for him out of moonbeams, let it grow through all the world, to become the golden thread of love."

OCTOBER

OCTOBER

I

SEEDS ARE MADE TO BE PLANTED

OCTOBER brought seedtime in the little garden. Many seeds had ripened during the summer, and Prue had already gathered some of the tiny black flakes from the opened pods of her precious pinks, and Davy had saved some seed pease. But October was the real harvest-time. The children took a lot of white envelopes, and upon them Davy printed the names of all the seeds they expected to gather. Into these envelopes they put carefully the different little black and brown and white seeds after they had picked and blown the husks all away, so, as Davy said, they would look just like seeds bought at the store.

And some of the seeds were big flat beans, or little long round beans; and some, like the sweet-pease, were very round, like shot; and some, like the cockscomb seeds, were tiny and shiny and black and so slippery that Prue lost more than she got in her envelope, though she got enough, for there is _such a lot of seed_ on a cockscomb. Some seeds were in funny little pods that snapped when you touched them, and sent the little black or brown shot flying in every direction, like a charge out of a bomb, and these had to be gathered very carefully. Then there were seeds with little wings, made to help them to fly, and there were seeds with little claws made to catch and hold on, so they would be carried and planted in many places. But these were mostly weed seeds, and were only gathered because they clung to the children's clothes, and stuck so fast that it was hard to pick them off.

"You see," said the Chief Gardener, who was watching them, "everything has a way of taking care of itself. Just as I told you about the dandelion, the plants have something which is very much like reason, or instinct, to guide them. These zinnia seeds do not have the little prongs, because the zinnia does not need them. It is a garden flower, and the seed will be taken care of. But those brown two-pronged little things you are picking off your coat-sleeve came from its very near relation, the Spanish needle, which is a weed, and must look out for its own planting. Those wild sunflowers turn top-side down, and the little yellow birds that peck and chirp about them all day are scattering the seed so thickly that next spring the garden will be covered with the young plants. The big tame sunflower doesn't take care of itself nearly so well. Of course, you remember how the dandelion seeds go drifting on the wind, while the thistle-down that goes floating by is carrying seed to some farmer's field, or fence corner. Then there are the maple seeds, which have two wings, or keys, as they are called, and there are many of these key seeds that are tossed here and there when the wind blows. The wind and the birds are the servants that sow the wild seeds, just as the bees and butterflies helped to make them."

"But there are some thistles," said little Prue, "that are not blown by the wind. They have stickery balls, and I make baskets out of them."

"Those are burs, and they are carried by sheep and cows, and by people. They cling to everything that passes. I have seen a horse's mane so full of them that it had to be cut off. The burdock is a very bad weed, and there ought to be a story about it, but I suppose if there was one, it must have been so unpleasant that it has been forgotten. There are many other weeds almost as bad. There are seeds with all kinds of hooks and claws to grab and stick, and there are many that are carried in the dirt which clings to the feet of animals and men and even birds."

"I should think some weeds would make their seeds look like flower seeds, to fool people."

"Well, that is just about what they do. There are cockle seeds in the wheat, and so nearly the same size that the threshing-machine will not take them out, and there are many little plants in the grass that have seeds so nearly like those of the grass itself that we are obliged to sow them with the grass seed. So, you see, men, too, become servants of the wise, persevering weeds. Certain beans and grains have been carried by water, and have been known to be brought across stretches of the sea to be scattered and planted upon a new shore."

"How many kinds of seeds are there?" asked Davy.

"About as many as plants, Davy."

"I don't mean that. I mean how many principal kinds--like flowers, you know--they are Exogens and Endogens."

"Oh, I see. You mean classes. Well, I suppose we might say two, fleshy and dry. Then we might divide the dry into seeds and nuts, and the fleshy into fruits and vegetables."

Davy and Prue were both thinking.

"I suppose my beans are dry," Davy said at last.

"Yes, of course."

"But we ate them green, and they were not dry then."

"That was before they were ripe. There are a number of things that are fleshy when eaten green, that become pods or hulls when the fruit is really ready to gather. Of course, there are fruits and nuts and vegetables that, like flowers, are hard to put in any class. Take the almond--you would call that a nut, of course."

"I just love almonds," said little Prue.

"And aren't they nuts?" asked Davy.

"Yes, the almond is a nut, but you would hardly call the peach a nut; yet they grow exactly alike, except that the outside of the almond is tough and not fit to eat. The walnut is a nut, too, of course, but the hull is quite fleshy, even after the nut is ripe; and there are certain sorts of foreign plums that have a sweet kernel, so they are really fruit and nut in one. But I think we shall have to go nutting next week, and then we can tell more what we think about them."

"Nutting! Oh, yes, we'll go nutting!" cried little Prue. "And we'll take baskets, and Mamma, and stay all day and bring home just bushels."

"We must take plenty of dinner in the baskets," said Davy, who remembered one time when the dinner had been less than he thought it should be. So then they ran into the house to put away their envelopes of seeds, and to tell the news.

II

THERE ARE BITTER NUTS AND SWEET ONES

HOW splendid it was in the October woods. Some of the trees were almost bare, some of them were a fine russet brown, and some were all crimson and gold; and the gold was so beautiful against the blue sky that it seemed to Davy and Prue that October, after all, might be the very best month of the year.

There was a brook that wound through the woods. On both sides of it were bottom lands, and here the hickory and walnut and butternut trees grew. Near the hillsides there were groves of hazel with their brown clusters, half opened by the frost, ripe for gathering. Camp was made near the brook, and then all hurried to the nut-trees; the children kicking their feet through the rustling leaves that covered the ground. The Chief Gardener found quite a large section of a young tree which he put on his shoulder for a battering-ram. Then he walked several steps, and butted one end of it against a tall hickory-tree, and down showered the nuts, clattering in the leaves--the hulls bursting and flying in all directions.

Then how the children scrambled and gathered.

"Let's clear the leaves away first, next time," said Davy, "so they will be easier to find."

And this they did, and so they went from tree to tree, gathering hickory-nuts, large and small, and walnuts, butternuts, and chestnuts, and these they emptied into sacks they had brought in the little wagon that was not hitched far away.

By and by, Davy spied a patch of hazel, and each with a basket, Prue and he gathered until they were tired, and it was lunch-time.

How very hungry they were! Is there really anything like nutting to make a little boy and girl hungry? And there was plenty of luncheon, this time. Davy ate until he did not care to get up right away, but was glad to lean back against a tree, and talk, while the Chief Gardener smoked and little Prue and big Prue put away the things, and hulled some of the hazelnuts, which little Prue said seemed to be more hulls than nuts, for there was only about enough to cover the bottom of one basket when they were all hulled.

"What makes all the nuts have such big, thick hulls, anyway?" she asked, as she tried to pound open a thorny chestnut-bur.

"I think the hulls must be to protect the young nuts from birds and squirrels," answered her mother. "The trees do not like to have them carried off until they are quite ripe, so they hold them very tight and enclose them in a very tough shell, and the shell is very bad-tasting, too. But when the nuts are ripe and sweet they let go of them very easily, just as other seeds are dropped, and the hulls open and the harvest is ready for whoever may come to gather it."

The Chief Gardener picked up a hickory-nut from one of the baskets.

"You see, we are eating flower-pistils all the time," he said.

"Are we? I don't believe I ever thought about that," said Davy.

The Chief Gardener pointed to the little black tip on the top of the nut.

"That was once the stigma," he said. "You see, it is quite like one, even now. Of course, it was soft then, and the pistil below was soft, too. Then as it grew it became harder and harder until the shell formed, and it was really a nut. The calyx hardened, and made the hull. The pistil and the calyx of a flower are the parts that last longest, but the stamens and the corolla are just as useful in their way. They form a separate flower on the nut-trees. We will have to come to the woods next spring when they are in bloom."

"Papa, don't hazelnuts and chestnuts belong to the same family?" asked little Prue, who had some of each in her chubby hands.

"Why, yes, but why did you think so, Prue?"

"Well, you see, they both have those white spots on them, and I thought mebbe it was a kind of family mark."

"Wise little head, Prue. And now what else is there that has the family mark--we might call it the family seal?"

The children were silent a moment, thinking. They were sitting under a big oak tree, and all at once Davy's eye caught something in the leaves, just by his hand.

"This!" he shouted, and held up an acorn.

"Right you are, Davy boy! The nut that stands at the head of the family. Few acorns are fit to be eaten, except by animals, but you see how round and perfect the family seal is, and though the acorn-cup is nothing like the chestnut-bur, or the husk of the hazel, it perhaps would be, if the green acorn itself was not so bitter that it does not need any other protection. The oak is one of the finest and most useful of all trees, and the hazel and chestnut and beech are probably very proud of belonging to the Oak family."

"And how about hickory and walnuts?" asked Davy.

"They are in a family together--the Walnut family. There are three kinds of walnuts--the English walnuts, the butternuts, and these. There are as many as half a dozen kinds of hickory nuts, and some of them are as bitter as the bitterest acorns."

"Pignuts--I know those," said Davy. "They're awful. I tried to eat some last year."

"You gave me one, too," said Prue. "I don't think that was very nice of you."

Davy blushed and grinned, as he recollected the round, puckered face of little Prue, after she had tasted the bitter nut.

"Never mind, Prue; we'll give him a mock-orange some day," said her mother.

"The pecan is a hickory-nut, too," said the Chief Gardener, "a nut that has left all its bitterness in the shell."

"Davy is a pecan-nut," said little Prue. "He's just bad outside."

Then the little party made ready to go home. They had a good way to drive, and it grows chilly on October evenings. How still it seemed to have grown in the woods when they were ready to go. A squirrel scrambled up a hickory-tree, and sat chattering at them as they drove away.

"He is scolding us for carrying off his winter food," said big Prue. "Oh, let's leave him some!" said little Prue, the tender-hearted.

"Pshaw!" said Davy. "There are enough nuts in these woods to feed all the squirrels in the world."

III

THERE ARE MANY THINGS CALLED FRUITS

TRULY October was harvest-time in the little garden. The winter apple-tree yielded several bushels of bright red fruit, and Davy's pumpkin-vine had great yellow pumpkins scattered all about. Some of them Davy could hardly lift, and when they were carried into the cellar, on the very last day of the month, they made a real pyramid of gold. Then there were some late tomatoes, too, and peppers, which big Prue made into pickles; also, a last gathering of green corn, besides several ears of ripe corn, for seed, and all the pop-corn--fifty-five ears of it from Davy's little patch.

There were some things to be taken up, too, and put into little pots for the window-gardens, which Davy and Prue were going to have all through the winter, this time.

There was a good open fire in the dining-room when Davy came in, after picking his pumpkins, for the nights were getting colder, and the bright blaze seemed so friendly and cheerful.

"I am going to try some of my pop-corn," he said suddenly, and started for the popper.

"I'll get some apples," said little Prue.

"I'll bring some nuts," added the Chief Gardener.

"And I'm afraid if you have all those things now, you won't care for tea afterwards," objected big Prue.

"Never mind tea," said Davy. "These are the very best things for a fire like this, and then if we don't want tea afterwards it'll save trouble."

So the pop-corn and apples and nuts were brought, and the little family gathered about the bright blaze.

"Just think," said Davy, "it's only a few months ago that I planted this corn, and saw it come up, just little green sprouts, and now it's ripe and in the popper."

"And just think," said his mother, "it's a little while ago that the apple-trees were all in bloom so sweet, and now the apples are ripe, and we have them here on a plate."

"I like to think about the summer," said little Prue. "It all seems so nice and shiny. It was hot, though, too, sometimes, in the garden."

The Chief Gardener picked up one of the apples.

"That is a pretty good calyx, Davy," he said.

Davy stopped popping corn a minute. His face was rather hot, anyway, from the glowing coals.

"Why, I thought that was the pistil," he said.

"The pistil is the core inside of it. It is the calyx of the apple-bloom that grows fleshy and makes the best part of the apple."

The Chief Gardener cut the apple in half, and showed the faint line that marked the core.

"That was the pistil," he said, "and at the end you see there are still the tips of the sepals and little traces of the stamens. The apple is one of our very finest fruits, and we ought to be glad that at least one of the Rose family has such a fine calyx. The rose itself gives us sweet flowers, but its apples would be pretty poor eating. They are called hips."

"But is the peach a calyx, too?" asked Davy. "It belongs to the same family."

"No, the peach is just the pistil, and it is the same with the plum and apricot and cherry. In the pear and quince it is the calyx, like the apple; in the raspberry each little part is a separate pistil with one seed, as I believe I showed you once, last summer."

"How about the strawberries?" asked Prue. "I like those best."

"I think I showed you that, too, but perhaps you have forgotten. The strawberry is still different. It is neither a calyx nor a pistil, but just the pulpy top of the stem that the flowers rest upon. It is covered with tiny pistils, though, of one seed each."

"That is why strawberry seeds are on the outside," said Davy.

"Yes, and the little pistils are called akenes, though you need not try to remember that now."

"It is strange," said big Prue, "how many things become fruits."

"Yes," said the Chief Gardener. "A fig, for instance, is simply a hollow stalk which grows thick and pulpy, and has a lot of little flowers inside that turn to seed when the fig ripens. A pineapple is a cluster of flower-leaves. A strawberry is the end of a flower-stem. A blackberry is the same, with a little cluster of pulpy pistils on the outside. A raspberry is the little cluster of pistils without the core; so that the blackberry is really the connecting-link between the strawberry and the raspberry. In gooseberries, grapes, cranberries, and huckleberries we eat the entire pistil, seeds and all. In peaches, plums, and cherries we eat only the outer part, and in apples, pears, and quinces we eat only the calyx, unless we eat the core."

"Well," interrupted Davy, "I am going to eat a nice big red calyx, now, core and all, and I'm going to eat some hickory-nut and pop-corn pistils, all but the shells and cob, and I feel hungry enough to eat those, too."

So then they drew closer around the bright blaze as evening gathered on the little faded garden outside.

NOVEMBER

NOVEMBER

I

THERE ARE ANNUALS, BIENNIALS, AND PERENNIALS

BUT November was not all brown and dry. The warm days lingered. The lawn kept green, and suddenly about the house there was the most wonderful glory of yellow and rose and white and crimson, for the radiant flower of autumn, the chrysanthemum, was in full bloom. How beautiful the flowers were when the sun was bright, and when it was cloudy they seemed to have kept some of the sunlight and cheer to make the dooryard glad.

"I don't remember when you planted the chrysanthemums," said Prue, one bright morning to the Chief Gardener.

"No, it was when you were a very little girl--about four years ago."

"I remember," said Davy. "I helped you."

"Why don't you have to plant them every year?" asked Prue.

"Because they are perennials--they live on, year after year."

Prue did not seem to understand very well, so the Chief Gardener explained.

"There are three kinds of plants," he said: "Annuals, biennials, and perennials. The annuals live but one season. They come from the seed each spring, and when they have grown and bloomed and made seed for another year they die. Sweet-pease and sunflowers and Davy's corn are annuals."

"And radishes and beets," said Davy.

"No, Davy. That is where you are mistaken."

"But we have to plant them every spring," said Davy.

"We do so to get good vegetables for our table. But if we were planting only for seed we would leave the roots in the ground, or take them up and reset them in the spring. Then they would send up long stalks to bloom and bear seed. Beets and radishes and turnips and most such things are biennials, which means that they bloom the second year and then die. They spend all the first year in laying up strength in the roots, to use in making seed the second summer. Some biennials, like the cabbage, lay up this strength in the thick stalk. The strength which they take up from the earth and from the air, through their leaves, they do not spend in flowers and show, but turn it into food for themselves, and the food is so good that men gather it for their own use."

"I don't think that is quite right," said Prue, "after the poor thing has worked so hard all summer to be ready to bloom next year, for us to take it and eat it."

The Chief Gardener smiled and shook his head.

"I'm afraid we do not think much about the plant's rights," he said, "unless they happen to be the same as our own. And after all there are plenty of seeds saved every year--more than are ever planted."

"And are potatoes biennials, too?" asked Davy.

"No, potatoes are perennials. In the right climate they would live on year after year, laying up new strength each year for the next season's growth. Dahlias are perennials, too, and most of the grasses, and, of course, all trees, and shrubs. Your pinks, Prue, and sweet-williams, and the hollyhocks, are perennial, and live through the winter, though they bear a great deal of seed, which shows how determined they are to live on. These chrysanthemums also bear seed, and most plants have at least two ways, and some as many as four ways of producing others like them. Your onions, Davy, can be produced in four different ways. They can be grown from seed, from sets--which are little seed-onions taken out of the ground and kept through the winter--from bulblets--which are the little onions you saw growing on the top of the stalk last summer--and from multipliers--which are large bulbs broken into several small parts."

"I should think an onion was surely perennial enough," said Davy, "with four ways of keeping alive."

"Can you name the three kinds of plants now?" asked the Chief Gardener, turning to little Prue.

"Yes," said Prue, putting out three fingers. "Annuals that have to die every fall, like my sweet-pease. Bi-yennials, that have to die every other fall, like Davy's turnips. Only we don't let 'em die--we kill 'em and eat 'em just when they are ready for their best time. Perennials, that have a lot of ways to live and never die at all."

The Chief Gardener laughed.

"Well, that's pretty good for a little girl. I think we might almost make a poem out of it.

"The annuals we plant each spring--
They perish in the fall;
Biennials die the second year,
Perennials not at all."

"I've made a rhyme, too," said Prue. "It's about the kinds of plants in a different way. This is it:

"The kinds of plants are these--
Herbs, shrubs, and trees."

"Why, I think we shall have to make up some more," said the Chief Gardener. "It will help us to remember."

II

PLANTS KNOW HOW TO SPREAD

IT was not many days after this that the Chief Gardener was digging among his vines, and he called to the children, who came running.

"We were talking the other day," he said, "about the many ways that old plants have of making new ones. See how this black raspberry vine is spreading."

The Chief Gardener pointed to a long branch that had bent over until the end touched the earth. This end had taken root, and now a new little plant was there all formed and ready to grow the coming year.

"There is another just like it," said Davy, "and another--why, there are lots of them!"

"Yes, the vine sends out many of those long slender branches with a heavy little bud at the end of each to weigh it down. Such branches are called stolons, and when the bud touches the earth it sends out roots. Strawberries have runners which do the same thing. You will find plenty of them if you look in the patch."

Davy and Prue went over to the strawberries and found that the vines, now red and brown from frost, had sent out runners, and made little new plants, like the black raspberries.

"You see," said the Chief Gardener, "we pick the berries, which are the seeds, so all berry vines must have some other way of spreading. The red raspberries do it in a different way. They send out runners, too, but they are from the roots, and when the sprouts come up, we call them suckers. Many kinds of plants have suckers, and there are some kinds of trees sprout so badly that they cannot be used for shade."

"What a lot of ways there are for plants to start!" said Davy.

"Suppose we try to think of as many as we can," said the Chief Gardener. "You begin, Prue."

"Seeds and roots and bend-overs and stuck-ins," said Prue. "That's four."

Davy and the Chief Gardener laughed.

"Well, that is a good start, but there are a good many kinds of roots and 'bend-overs,' and what are 'stuck-ins?'"

"Why, pieces stuck in the ground to grow. Mamma does it with her geraniums."

"Oh, slips! I see. Why, Prue, your answer covers about everything, after all. Now, Davy, suppose we hear from you."

"Well, seeds--that's one. Bulbs, all the kinds, like the three onion kinds, and maybe other kinds, roots like the red raspberries, that make suckers and other kinds of roots, like potatoes, and then all the runners and suckers that Prue calls 'bend-overs,' and slips and grafts and buds."

"Stuck-ins," nodded the Chief Gardener. "Prue was about right after all, for there are so many kinds of each different thing, and so many ways, that I am afraid we should never remember all the kinds and ways. 'Seeds and roots and bend-overs and stuck-ins' take in about all of them, and we are not apt to forget it. If you'll come now, we'll look at some of the kinds of roots."

They went down into the garden, and the Chief Gardener opened a hill of potatoes which had not been dug. Then he picked up one of the potatoes and showed it to Davy and Prue.

"That kind of a root is called a tuber," he said. "Those little spots on it are eyes, and make the sprouts. You remember we cut the potatoes we planted into little pieces, with one eye on each."

"I remember," said Prue, "and I asked if they had eyes so they could see which way to grow."

"The pieces we planted sprouted, and kept the sprout growing until it could send out roots. Besides the roots, there were little underground branches, and a potato formed on the end of each branch. When the soil and the season are both good there will be a great many of these branches and new tubers, but when the soil is poor and the season bad there will be very little besides roots."

The children followed the Chief Gardener, and dug up a bunch of thick dahlia roots, and he told them how these were really roots, and not tubers, like the potatoes. Then he dug up some sweet-flag, and they saw how the rough root-pieces were joined one to the other, in a sort of chain of roots, and these he told them were root-stalks, and that they kept a store of nourishment for the new plants, in the spring.

"There is a grass," he said, "which has such a root, and every time it is cut it sends up a new plant, so that every time the farmer tries to get it out of his grain-field he only makes more plants, unless he pulls up every piece and destroys it. You see, that grass has to fight to live, and it makes one of the very best fights of any plant I know, except the Canada thistle, which does very much the same thing. And that is what all plant life is. It is the struggle to live and grow and spread. The struggle with men and animals and heat and cold and with other plants. And in the struggle the plants, and especially the weeds, which have to fight hardest, have grown strong and persevering, and have learned a thousand ways to multiply their roots and to scatter their seed."

III

ALL THANKS FOR THE PLANTS

THANKSGIVING brought the usual good dinner, and upon the table and the sideboard there were many things to remind the little family of their garden and their summer-time. There was a large plate of red apples and a dish of nuts, and there was a pot of pinks, which Prue had saved for her window-garden. Then there was a fine little jar of pickles, made from Davy's tomatoes, besides dishes of tomatoes and turnips, all from the little garden that had come and gone, leaving these good things and many pleasant memories behind.

And after the dinner was over, and the pudding eaten and the nuts passed, the little family sat around the table to talk, as they often did.

"I am sure we have a great deal to be thankful for this year," said big Prue. "Two such nice healthy children, with plenty to eat and wear, and a fire to keep us warm, and a good roof over our heads."

"And all from the plants," said the Chief Gardener. "If we are thankful for the plants, we are thankful for almost everything we have."

Davy sat thinking silently about this, but little Prue did not quite understand.

"I suppose you mean that the plants made us healthy to work in them," she said.

"I mean that, and I mean a great many other things. In the first place, plants furnish all the food in the world. Not only the vegetables, but the animal-food. Our turkey would not have been here to-day if he had not been fed on grain, and even the oysters must live from a sort of plant-food in the sea. Every creature that walks or flies or swims lives either on plants themselves or from some creature that does live on them."

"Do sharks live on plants, too?" asked Prue.

"Of course!" said Davy. "Sharks eat men, and men eat plants."

"I don't suppose sharks live altogether on men," laughed big Prue, "and the little fish they eat may live on other little fish, but if you go far enough you will find that somewhere the beginning is plant-life."

"Plants also warm and light us," went on the Chief Gardener. "Every stick of wood, or bit of coal, or drop of oil we burn, comes from plant-life. The coal was vegetation long ago--very long ago--and the heat and light that come from it were stored there in that far-away time by the green leaves that drew in life and light from the sunbeams."

"Do the leaves really take up light?" asked Davy.

"They really do. With every particle of vegetable matter that is made, a portion of the sun's heat and light is laid up in it. The light is still in the coal, though it looks so black. We have only to burn it, to get back the sunlight."

That was a very wonderful thought to the children, and they had to talk about it a great deal before the Chief Gardener went on.

"Every bit of clothing we wear comes from the plants," he said at last. "The cotton grows like the down about the thistle seed, and the wool that grows on the sheep's back is there because the sheep feeds on the green grass in summer and upon hay and grain in the winter-time. Silk is made by worms from mulberry leaves, linen is from the flax plant, and leather from the cattle that grow in the same way that the sheep grows.

"Then there is our house. A great deal of it is made from wood, and even the bricks have vegetable matter in them, while the stones are shaped by tools that have wooden handles, and the bricks and stones are hauled in wooden carts."

"But the iron doesn't grow, Papa," said little Prue.

"No, but without heat to forge it--heat that comes from wood and coal--it would be of no use."

"But there is one other thing that is more to us than all the rest. Plants purify the air we breathe. Air that we have breathed once is not fit for us again. We have used the oxygen from it, and turned it into carbonic acid gas. But carbonic acid gas is just what the plants need, so they take our breathed air and turn it into oxygen again and give it back to us fresh and pure, so that we can keep our life and health."

"Don't forget the flowers, Papa," said little Prue.

"I haven't forgotten them. If it were not for the flowers many of the plants would die out, and besides being so useful, the flowers feed the bees and make the world beautiful, and our lives happier and sweeter, by filling them with color and perfume and loveliness. No, I could hardly forget the flowers, Prue. They are the crowning glory of the plants that feed and clothe and warm and shelter us. So let us be thankful for the plants, every part of them, and especially for the flowers."

"We ought to be thankful for the sun that makes them grow, too," said Davy.

"And we must not forget the One to whom all thanks are due," added his mother.

And as the November day closed in they gathered around the big open fire, and were happy and cheerful in the blaze of the same sunbeams that had shone on the great forests which had perished so many ages ago.

DECEMBER

DECEMBER

I

NEW GARDENS IN THE WINDOWS

DECEMBER was a month for putting things away. The envelopes of seeds which Davy and Prue and the Chief Gardener had gathered were all put into separate tin boxes, and these boxes were put in a dry place on the top cupboard shelf, where they would not be disturbed. The bulbs and roots were also put into dry boxes in the basement, and the different kinds labelled in large plain letters by Davy, who could print very nicely indeed.

The bulbs were quite interesting. Some, like those of the Easter lily, had small bulbs formed inside of them. Others, like the crocus, had tiny bulbs formed on the outside, and then there were bulblets which had formed above the ground, just where the leaf joins the stalk. These were little lily bulbs.

So all the seeds and bulbs and roots were put away for the winter, except a few that Davy and Prue planted in some pots for their window-gardens.

They decided to have different things this year. Instead of scarlet runners to climb on the sides of his window, Davy had decided to have melon vines. His cantaloupes had not done very well in the garden, for the reason that the pumpkin had sent its long tendrils across the cantaloupe bed, and the pollen had been carried from the flowers of one to the other by the busy bees, and this caused all his cantaloupes to have a flavor of pumpkin. Davy had eaten them, though, and even little Prue had said they were not so _very_ bad, and had really eaten nearly all of one piece. Now, Davy was going to have two cantaloupe vines, and let them climb on each side of his window, and see if he couldn't raise some melons that folks would be glad to get a piece of.

In the middle of his window he was going to have an eggplant, which he very much wanted to try, and in the little pots at the sides, there were to be a peanut, which he wanted to try, too, and a special little red pepper which had looked very nice in the seed-catalogue. Then there were two little pots, one holding a small turnip and the other a radish, which Davy wanted to see bloom and go to seed.

So, you see, Davy's garden was going to be quite different this year, and Prue's was different, too. For Prue did not have morning-glories to climb, this winter. Not because she did not like them, but because she wanted her window, like Davy's, to be different from the window of the winter before. She had a cypress vine planted this year, on one side, and a moon vine on the other. And in the center of her window, she was to have a cosmos flower, with a fuchsia and a hyacinth and a tulip at the sides, and one of her precious pinks brought in from the summer garden. Of course, the tulip and the hyacinth were to grow from little bulbs, while the fuchsia was a small plant which she had bought at the greenhouse. And in this way both the windows were to be very different from the winter before, and many new things were to be learned in seeing the seeds and the bulbs and the roots sprout and grow and bloom.

And there was one thing more which was to be different, for Prue and Davy had put their money together and bought a Japanese fern-ball to hang between the windows, and a hook to hang it on. The ball they soaked in warm water, as the directions had said, and then hung it on the hook. As often as it seemed dry they soaked it again, and one day it was sending out little green points, and soon, even before the rest of their window-garden was fairly started, there were feathery little fern leaves all over the ball, and before Christmas it was very beautiful indeed.

II

TO THE GARDEN OF SLEEP

_December_ was not a very bright month for Davy and Prue. Very little snow fell, so they could not use their sleds. If it had not been for their gardens and their lessons, which took several hours each day, they would have been rather lonely, looking out on brown woods and meadows.

But there was the joy of Christmas coming, and this thought made them happier, as each day brought it nearer. They counted the weeks first, then the days, and at last the hours. And then they had secrets. Secrets from big Prue and the Chief Gardener, and secrets from each other. Sometimes little Prue whispered to big Prue, and did not want Davy to hear. Sometimes Davy whispered to the Chief Gardener, and stopped very quick and began to whistle, if Prue came into the room. Packages began to be brought in after dark, or when everybody else was upstairs, and then, one afternoon--the afternoon of that wonderful eve when stillness and mystery seem to gather on the fields--there was a row of stockings along the mantel, hanging ready for somebody to fill. Santa Claus, of course, must do that, but there were packages hidden here and there for the good old Saint to find and put where they belonged. And Prue and Davy were in bed almost before dark, because you see the time passes quicker if you are asleep, and the sooner to bed the sooner to sleep. But when big Prue came in to kiss them good-night she told them a story--the old sweet story of the Little Child who was born so long ago, and to whom the first gifts were brought by the wise men. And then she told how that little baby boy in the manger had become a sweet child, with games and playmates like other children, with toys and, perhaps, a little garden of his own, something as they had made during the summer-time. And she told also a little story which, perhaps, is only a story, but it is what it would seem might have happened to the Little Child of Bethlehem.

"Once," she said, "when he was playing he grew very tired and thirsty, and his playmate was very thirsty, too. So Jesus ran to the well for a cup of water, and hurried back with it without stopping to drink. But his playmate was greedy, for he seized the cup and drank it all, except a few drops at the bottom. Then he gave the empty cup to Jesus, who took it and let the last few drops fall on the grass, when suddenly from where they fell there flowed a little clear stream of water, with lilies-of-the-valley blooming along its banks."

"Please sing the verse about the story of old," said Davy, when she had finished.

So his mother sang:

"I think, when I read that sweet story of old,
How Jesus was here among men,
How he called little children as lambs to his fold,
I should like to have been with them then."

And it was only a moment longer that the Christmas Saint had to wait on the sand-man, for presently the door closed softly on the singer. Davy and Prue had entered the fair garden of sleep.

III

IN THE GARDENS OF CHRISTMAS

_I cannot_ tell you all the wonders of that Christmas. I can only tell you that the presents which the little family had bought for one another were all in their proper places next morning, and that there were ever so many things that nobody but Santa Claus could possibly have brought. There was a Christmas tree, for one thing, the kind of a tree that nobody but Santa Claus ever raises, or brings, and there was everything upon it and about it that a little boy and girl could want, unless they wanted a great deal more than a little boy and girl ought to have, at one time.

But the very finest Christmas gift of all was a splendid great big snow-storm, which had begun in the night and was still going on, as fast and as thick as the big, soft, fleecy flakes could fall. Every few minutes the children left the beautiful tree to look at the beautiful snow. They could hardly wait until breakfast was over, and the Chief Gardener had made a photograph of the tree with them in it, before they wanted to rush out with their sleds.

All at once Davy called Prue to the window.

"Look," he said, "some of these flakes on the window-sash are like little white flowers!"

Then every one came to see, and, sure enough, some of the snowflakes that had fallen next to the glass were wonderfully shaped, and did look like tiny blossoms. The Chief Gardener got a magnifying-glass and they looked at them through it, when they saw how really beautiful they were.

"I have heard them called 'the flowers of winter,'" said big Prue. "There is a little story about how the flowers complained that they must all die when cold weather came, and never see the winter. So then their spirits were allowed to come back as snowflakes."

That was a glorious Christmas. All day the snow came down outside, and all day the big fire blazed and the Christmas tree gleamed and shimmered and sparkled inside. And then, in the afternoon, there was a Christmas dinner which was quite as good as any of the rest of the things, even to the snow. And after the dinner was over, and they sat around the fire, the Chief Gardener said:

"We have had a happy year. I know it has been happy, for the time has gone so fast. It seems not more than a few weeks ago that we were keeping last Christmas, and almost no time at all since Prue and Davy started their first little gardens in the window. Yet, a week from to-day, and that will be a year ago, too. Now, I have a plan. It was Prue who made me think of it. She said something not long ago that I made into a little verse, about annuals, biennials, and perennials. Then Prue made one, too, about herbs and shrubs and trees. Now I propose that we each make some rhymes for New Year's day to celebrate the starting of the window-garden, and also the little garden which Prue and Davy had outside. The rhymes must tell something that has been learned during the year, and they must be short, and easy to remember. Of course, we won't expect very much, but Prue has done so well, that I am sure the rest of us can do something, too."

"I never made any rhymes," said Davy.

"I'll help you," said Prue. "It's just as easy."

So they all agreed, and during the holidays, when the children were not busy with their sleds or books or gardens, they were making rhymes.

IV

SOME VERSES AND THEN GOOD-BY

AND these are the rhymes that were read and recited after dinner on New Year's day, just a year after the first little window-garden was started. I shall not tell you whose they were.

Of course, you will all remember little Prue's:

"The kinds of plants are these,
Herbs and shrubs, and trees,"

and the Chief Gardener's:

"The annuals we plant each spring--
They perish in the fall;
Biennials die the second year,
Perennials not at all,"

but the writers of the others you will have to guess.

THE PLANT

The parts of every plant are three--
The root, and stem, and leaf they be.
The flowers are only leaves more fair,
Which nature makes, to bloom and bear.

THE ROOT

Most roots are hidden in the ground,
As they should _always_ be, by rights,
But some in other plants are found,
And these belong to parasites.

THE STEM

The stem may be a stalk or vine
To stand erect, or creep, or twine--
For frailest plant, or firmest oak
That's ne'er by storm of winter broke.

THE LEAF

A leaf has a stem, and of stipules a pair,
Though the stipules are often quite small, or not there.
A leaf has a blade, and of ribs one or more;
While of veins and of veinlets it has many score.
A leaf may be simple, or it may be compound,
And a million small pores for its breathing are found.

THE FLOWER

The blossom has a calyx
That is very often green,
And just above the sepals
The corolla bright is seen.
And above the pretty petals
May be stamens eight or nine--
Slender filaments, and anthers,
To hold the pollen fine.
While in the blossom's center
Doth the sturdy pistil grow,
With stigma and with style that lead
To seed-cups just below.

HOW PLANTS INCREASE

From seed and from runner, from stolon bent low--
From sucker and slip and from layer they grow--
From bulb and from bulblet--from tuber and root,
They give us the flower and the grain and the fruit.

All thanks to the plants for the clothes that we wear--
The food that we eat and the home that we share--
For the air that we breathe and the fuel we burn--
All thanks to the plants, 'tis our only return.

Davy rather objected to the last line of these verses. He said that it was some return to take good care of plants, especially in the hot summer-time, when it was ever so much nicer to sit in the shade. So another little rhyme was made, like this:

A plant should have the sun and air
And water, and the proper care.
If it has these, and doesn't die,
We'll reap the harvest, by and by.

Then to end the day they all sang a little song about the snowflakes, that Jack Frost sends out of his gardens of winter-time:

THE SNOWFLAKES

Jack Frost, he makes the snowflakes,
He paints the snowflakes white.
He sent them Christmas morning
To make our landscape bright.

For in the deepest winter
The world is bleak and bare--
Jack Frost, he sends the snowflakes
To make our winter fair.

And so ends the story of a year, and of its little gardens. Also of Prue and Davy, who owned the little gardens, and of her who was called big Prue and of him who was called the Chief Gardener. Other years will bring other gardens, and other summers. Prue and Davy will grow older, and learn more and more with each year that passes. But no year will ever be happier and no gardens ever brighter than those to which we are now saying good-by.

* * * * *

Transcriber's Notes

Minor punctuation errors corrected on pages 16, 68, 104, 105, 214, 219, 276, 285, 294, 297, 328.

Slight discrepancies in some of the titles given in the Table of Contents and those given at the beginning of each section have been retained here.

Original spellings and hyphenation have been retained except in the cases of these apparent typographical errors:

Page 23, "lovelly" changed to "lovely." (I never saw anything so lovely...)

Page 60, "no" changed to "not." (...not to look at their garden...)