Albert Bigelow Paine

“ Very wise men make mistakes sometimes, mistakes that even a little girl would not make, just because they have not happened to see something which a little girl with sharp eyes has seen and thought about. It is a wonderful and beautiful sight on the prairies of the West to see miles of wild sunflowers in full bloom. They are like a great sea of gold, and in [83] the early morning, when the air is still, every bloom is faced toward the sunrise, as bright and fresh and faithful as the sun itself."
"I should think there would be a story about the sunflower," said Davy, half speaking to himself. ”

“ 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. ”

“ If it were not [309] 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. ”

“ Now, Prue, why did you think it was an Exogen?"
"Because the stem is hollow, and makes a ring when you cut off a little slice of it, and because the bloom part is in five pieces."
"Sharp eyes," nodded the Chief Gardener, "but Davy is right. There is not always a pith in the endogens. Pipe-stems and fish-poles are hollow, but the cane we make them of is an Endogen, too. And as for the bloom part of this grass, it is a sort of a tassel, like that of the corn. The real blooms are very tiny—too small for us to examine. ”

“ Do you think you like that, Davy?"
"Can't I have strawberries, instead of the salad?" asked Davy.
"Strawberries don't bear from seed the first season, and I can't remember any fruit that does, unless you call tomatoes fruit, and I don't think a tomato vine would be quite pleasant in the house. It doesn't always have a sweet odor."
"Oh, well, I can eat lettuce," said Davy. "I can eat anything that's good."
"What are in my other little pots?" asked Prue for the third or fourth time.
"Well, one is meant for a pot of pansies—"
"Oh, pansies! pansies! Can't I have two pots of pansies?" ”

“ I think those wise men, perhaps, never saw the wild western sunflowers, but only the big tame ones that have heavy, coarse stems and are so big and clumsy and fat that they couldn't well turn, even if they wanted to. I have seen whole fields of wild sunflowers—little ones like yours, and long before they were in bloom—with every stem bent toward the sunrise, when there was not a breath of wind blowing; and I have seen the same flowers straighten their little stems as the sun rose higher, and then bend them again to the west in the evening ”

“ Sometimes, instead of shaking the rose, the gardener carefully takes up the pollen on a tiny soft brush and lays it gently on the stigma of the other rose, all of which has to be done as soon as the bloom is open. ”

“ 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. ”

“ 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. ”

“ Prue's pinks and sweet-pease bloomed on and on, and her alyssums and the other sweets became sweeter every day.
"Do you think all these things like to be together?" Prue asked, one afternoon, as they sat looking at them from the shade of the peach-tree.
"I think those that grow well do," said Davy. "They seem to, anyway."
"And they do, Davy," said the Chief Gardener. "A plant that doesn't like a place will not grow in it, and in the woods and fields we only find those plants together which like that particular spot. ”

“ A FLOWER REALLY HAS CLOTHES
THE little gardens were in quite a bad way when Davy and Prue came back from the seashore. Everything had done well, even to the weeds, and that was just the trouble. It took two whole days, working when the sun was not so very hot, to get the beds in shape, and the Chief Gardener had to work, too, very hard. But by and by everything was clean and beautiful again, and the seat under the peach-tree was a finer place than ever, because there were more things in bloom, and everything had become more beautiful. ”

“ THE SEED AND SETS OF THE ONION
"I should think an onion was surely perennial enough," said Davy, "with four ways of keeping alive."
[296]
"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." ”

“ 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. ”

“ And I'll have pansies, and roses, and hollyhocks, and pinks, and morning-glories, and—"
"And I'll have peaches, and apples, and strawberries, and pease—"
"And a field of corn and wheat," laughed the Chief Gardener, "and a grove of cocoanut trees! What magic windows we must have to hold all the things you have named. They will be like the pack of Santa Claus—never too full to hold more."
"But can't we have all the things we like?" asked Davy, anxiously.
"Not quite all, I'm afraid. The hollyhocks and roses that Prue wants do not bloom the first year from seed. ”

“ The same earth holds them, the same rain wets them, the same air is above them. Then the sun shines, and with that earth and water and air and that tiny seed, it makes something different of its own. Of one it makes a flower, of another a fruit, and of another a vegetable. Of the flowers it makes many kinds and colors—of the fruits and vegetables it makes many shapes and flavors. The sweet red strawberry and the fiery red pepper grow side by side. It makes food of the roots of the beet, and the parsnip, and carrot, and of the seed of the bean, and of the corn. ”

“ LITTLE PLANTS WON'T STAND MUCH HANDLING
YET the little garden seemed to grow slowly. The sun in February was getting farther to the north, and came earlier and stayed later than it had in January, and was brighter, too. But for all that, to Davy and Prue, each new leaf came quite slowly—just a tiny point or bud at first, then a little green heart or oval or crinkly oblong with a wee stem of its own. It was very hard to see each morning, just what had grown since the morning before. ”

“ 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." ”

“ So you see, Nature makes new kinds herself, sometimes. You know, don't you, that the pansies you love so much, Prue, are one kind of violet, cultivated until they are large and fine?"
"Why, no, are they violets? Are my pansies violets?" ”

“ It is so in every flower, the yellow dust is a food for the seed. In most plants the seed-pod and the food-dust or pollen are all in one flower, but with the corn they are separate, as you see. Did you ever notice, Davy, how much a cornstalk looks like an Indian, with plumes, and its ear, like a quiver for holding arrows? ”

“ The Chief Gardener was not at home that day, so they brought their discovery to big Prue to explain.
"Why," she said, "that is dodder, or love-vine. It is what is called a parasite, for it has [259] no root in the ground, but lives from the plant it grows on."
Then she showed them where the small, tough little rootlets were really embedded in the stalk of the golden-rod from which it drew its strength and life.
"Oh," said Prue, "that is what Papa meant when he told us once that some flowers lived off other flowers and plants, just as some people live off other people." ”

“ I don't remember any real weeds in the Lily family, Davy, though almost any plant will become a weed if allowed to run wild and live in fence corners, like a tramp. They become [206] prodigals then, like the man's son in the Bible. And sometimes they come back to the garden, as the prodigal son did, to become well-behaved and useful flowers again. Of course, there are many others that have always lived wild in the woods and fields, and are not called weeds, because they do not spread and destroy other plants. ”

“ But it is too hard a study for a little boy, and it is enough to learn now that they do all belong to the big flowerless or Crip-tog-a-mous class."
"Papa, is it true that if you put fern seeds in your shoes, nobody can see you?" asked little Prue.
"Why, I don't very well see how 'nobody' could see you, but I think somebody might."
"It says in my fairy book that the princess put fern seed in her shoe, and then there wasn't any one who could see her. I wish it was like that. ”

“ Each flower had two green sepals and five colored petals, also five stamens, so they knew it was an exogen, though it would have been harder to tell this from the thick, pulpy leaves and stem. The little seed-pod of each had a tiny cap which lifted off when the seeds were ripe, leaving a perfect cup, heaping full.
"You see, children," said the Chief Gardener, "weeds do not care to be either useful or ornamental. So they become rank and common, and lose their beautiful flowers. But somehow they never have any less seed. ”

“ Plants, like children, don't always grow just as their friends want them to, and they are not always well behaved. You see—"
"But won't my bean vines and corn grow up like that?" asked Davy.
"And won't my morning-glories have flowers on them?" asked Prue.
"I hope they will, and we will try to coax them. But you see things may happen. Sometimes it comes a very cold night when the fires get low, and then plants are likely to chill, or perhaps freeze and die. We can only try to be very careful."
"How long will it take them to grow?" asked Davy. ”

“ The Chief Gardener picked up a red clover leaf, and pointed to a little thin pale-green husk where the stem joined the main stalk.
"Those are stipules," he said. "In the clover they grow together, as one. The stipules are a part of the outside of the leaf-bud. When the bud opens, and the leaf goes out into the world, the stipules stay behind. Sometimes they [221] are like little leaves, and take up air for the plant, just as the leaves do. Sometimes they almost take the place of leaves, and are quite large. Sometimes they are very tiny, and some plants have no stipules at all." ”

“ The root and a little of the lower stalk is from a seed, and upon this has been grafted or spliced with soft bands and wax, a bud from some choice kind of peach or apple or plum, or whatever the tree is to be, and this new bud grows and forms the tree. Sometimes a bud of the choice kind is merely inserted beneath the bark of another tree and grows and forms a new limb. By and by, when it bears fruit, the fruit will be of the kind that was on the choice tree, but the seed, though it looks just the same, may be altogether different. ”

“ Davy, too, had made a fine garden, with six hills of sweet-corn, one hill of cantaloupes, a row of pease, a little row of onions, lettuce, and radishes, besides a very small row of sweet herbs, such as marjoram, fennel, and thyme. Each garden was fully eight feet square, which is really quite a good-sized garden, when you remember that it must be kept nicely tilled and perfectly clean of weeds. ”

“ So, you see, there we have another way that plants are like people—they have their proper company, and, perhaps, their societies and friendships. I am sure they have their friendships, for there are certain little plants, and big ones, too, that you will nearly always find together. Violets and spring-beauties and adder-tongues must love each other, I am sure, for you seldom see one without the others, and there are certain vines, like the Virginia creeper and the poison-ivy, that are nearly always together, though why the Virginia creeper should care for the poison-ivy I don't see. ”

“ Along with this it has been his aim to call attention to the more curious characteristics of certain plants—the really human instincts and habits of some, the family relations of others, the dependence of many upon mankind, animals, and insects, and the struggle for existence of all. Simple botany plays a part in the little narrative, which forms a continuous story from chapter to chapter, interwoven with a number of briefer stories—traditions, fairy tales, and the like, all relating to plant life and origin. ”

“ People sometimes try to raise more on a small piece of ground by having more plants on it, but it does not pay, for the plants do not produce as much as if there were only half as many on the same soil. Give everything plenty of room and air, and they will grow and thrive like children who have a good playground and plenty of wholesome food."
"Papa," said Prue, "you were talking the other day of the different kinds of one thing: what makes them?—the different kinds of roses, I mean, and pansies, and—"
"And peaches and apples," interrupted Davy, "I want to know that, too." ”

“ The little boy was quite skillful with a hoe, and could take care of his vegetables almost as well as the Chief Gardener, so the Chief Gardener thought.
"You must not hoe your beans when the dew is on them, Davy," he said one morning. "The vines are tender and it causes them to rust or blight, but you may hoe most of the other things, and you may hoe around most of your vegetables as often as you want to. Loosening up the soil about young plants makes them grow. It gives the roots a chance to spread, and lets sun and air into the soil. ”

“ In a water-lily, too, the petals gradually become stamens, so, perhaps, the leaf came first, ages and ages ago, and little by little it has changed, first to sepals, then petals, then to stamens and pistils, so that it could make seeds and scatter them to the wind. Gardeners make double flowers out of single ones by a process of turning stamens and even pistils into petals. The double flower is sometimes very beautiful, but it is not the most perfect flower. The wild rose is more perfect than the finest double American Beauty. ”