Mabell S. C. Smith

“ There was a slice of the stem of a small plant there and it looked just as if it were a house with a lot of rooms. Each room was a cell, Helen said."
"A very suitable name," commented Ethel Brown.
"What are you people talking about?" asked Helen, who came in at that instant.
"I was telling the girls about that time when I looked through the high school microscope," answered Ethel Blue.
"You saw among other things, some cells in the very lowest form of life. A single cell is all there is to the lowest animal or vegetable." ”

“ Dorothy decided. "What's yours, Ethel Blue?"
"I know mine is hepatica. See the 'hairy scape' Helen talked about? And see what a lovely, lovely color the blossom is? Violet with a hint of pink?"
"That would be the best of all for a border. The leaves stay green all winter and the blossoms come early in the spring and encourage you to think that after a while all the flowers are going to awaken." ”

“ Helen has told me a lot of botanical terms, but I forget them,"
"I try hard to remember everything I hear any one say about flowers or vegetables or planting now. You never can tell when it may be useful," and Dorothy nodded wisely.
"Shall we take up this wake-robin?" asked Ethel Blue.
"Let's not," pleaded Ethel Brown. "We shall find others somewhere and there's only one here." ”

“ He insisted but at last he agreed not to do it until the last leaf had fallen in the autumn. All the trees meant to hold On to their leaves so as to ward off the awful disaster, but one after the other they let them go—all except the oak. The oak never yet has let fall every one of its leaves and so the Evil Spirit never has had a chance to put his threat into execution."
"That's a lesson in success, isn't it? Stick to whatever it is you want to do and you're sure to succeed."
"Watch me make my garden succeed," cried Dorothy. "If 'sticking' will make it a success I'm a stick!" ”

“ A lovely vine waved from a wall vase of exquisite design and vines trailed around the wide door as naturally as if they grew there instead of springing from bottles of water concealed behind tall jars of pink hollyhocks.
"It is perfectly charming, my dears, and I can't tell you how obliged I am," said their hostess as she pressed a bill into Ethel Brown's hand. "I know that every woman who will be here will want you the next time she entertains, and I shall tell everybody you did it." ”

“ They all laughed, for Ethel Blue's struggles with mathematics were calculated to arouse sympathy even in a hardened breast.
"It's all true," agreed Helen, who had been listening quietly to what the younger girls were saying, "and I believe we ought to show people more than we do that we like them. I don't see why we're so scared to let a person know that we think she's done something well, or to sympathize with her when she's having a hard time."
"O," exclaimed Dorothy shrinkingly, "it's so embarrassing to tell a person you're sorry." ”

“ Emerson. "Almost all the autumn plants are stocky and sturdy, but cosmos is as graceful as a summer plant and as delicate as a spring blossom. You can wind up your floral year with asters and mallow and chrysanthemums and cosmos all blooming at once."
"Now for the blue beds," said Tom, excusing himself for looking at his watch on the plea that he and Della had to go back to New York by a comparatively early train.
"If you're in a hurry I'll just give you a few suggestions," said Mr. Emerson. "Really blue flowers are not numerous, I suppose you have noticed." ”

“ Violets were born!'"
"That's pretty; what's the rest of it?" asked Ethel Brown, on her knees taking up some of the plants with her trowel and placing them in her basket so carefully that there was plenty of earth surrounding each one to serve as a nest when it should be put into Helen's wild flower bed.
"It's about something good happening when everything seems very bad," explained Ethel Blue. ”

“ There was, in truth, a figure down in the field beside the brook, and he was leaning over and thrusting a stick into the ground and examining it closely when he drew it out.
"That can't be a werwolf," remonstrated Ethel Brown. "That's a man."
"Perhaps in the twentieth century wolves turn into men instead of men turning into wolves," suggested Dorothy. "This may be a wolf with a man's shape but keeping the feelings of a wolf, instead of the other way around."
"Don't, Dorothy!" remonstrated Ethel Blue again. "He does look like a horrid sort of man, doesn't he?" ”

“ They were in a gay mood as they gathered up their baskets and trowels and gently laid pieces of newspaper over the uprooted plants.
"It isn't hot to-day but we won't run any risk of their getting a headache from the sun," declared Dorothy.
"These woodsy ones that aren't accustomed to bright sunshine may be sensitive to it," assented Ethel Blue. "We must remember to tell Helen in just what sort of spot we found each one so she can make its corner in the garden bed as nearly like it as possible."
"I'm going to march in and quote Shakespeare to her," laughed Ethel Brown. ”

“ From a vase of flowers and leaves and ferns which Mrs. Morton contributed to the game each selected what he wanted to draw. Then, holding his leaf so that the light threw a sharp shadow upon his pad, he quickly painted the shadow with the ink, thinning it with water upon the saucer so that the finished painting showed several shades of gray.
"The beauty of this stunt is that a fellow who can't draw at all can turn out almost as good a masterpiece as Ethel Blue here, who has the makings of a real artist," and James gazed at his production with every evidence of satisfaction. ”

“ I'll leave them to Mother, but I am really going to plant a garden this summer. I think it will be loads of fun."
"We haven't much room for a garden here," said Helen, "but we always have some vegetables and a few flowers."
"Why don't we have a fine one this summer, Helen?" demanded Ethel Brown. "You're learning a lot about the way plants grow, I should think you'd like to grow them." ”

“ One tablespoonful in two gallons of water!"
"Grandfather says he wouldn't ask for plants to blossom better than ours are doing." Ethel Brown repeated the compliment with just pride.
"It's partly because we've loved to work with them and loved them," insisted Ethel Blue. "Everything you love answers back. If you hate your work it's just like hating people; if you don't like a girl she doesn't like you and you feel uncomfortable outside and inside; if you don't like your work it doesn't go well."
"What do you know about hating?" demanded Dorothy, giving Ethel Blue a hug. ”

“ Emerson. "I remember when people always made a bouquet perfectly round and of as many kinds of flowers as they could put into it."
"People don't make 'bouquets' now; they gather a 'bunch of flowers,' or they give you a single bloom," smiled her daughter. "But isn't it true that we get as much pleasure out of a single superb chrysanthemum or rose as we do out of a great mass of them?" ”

“ If we have acres of sweetpeas we'll all have to help Roger pick."
"I'm willing to," said Ethel Blue. "I'm like Roger, I think they're darling; just like butterflies or something with wings."
"We'll have to cast our professional eyes into the garden and decide on the best place for the sweetpeas," said Roger. "They have to be planted early, you know. If we plant them just anywhere they'll be sure to be in the way of something that grows shorter so it will be hidden."
"Or grows taller and is a color that fights with them." ”

“ It will be the next best thing to building a house yourself!"
"There will be a garage behind the house."
"A garage! Is Aunt Louise going to set up a car?"
"Just a small one that she can drive herself. Back of the garage there's plenty of space for a garden and she says she'll turn that over to me. I can do anything I want with it as long as I'll be sure to have enough vegetables for the table and lots of flowers for the house."
"O, my; O, my; what fun we'll have," ejaculated Della, who knew that Dorothy could have no pleasure that she would not share equally with the rest of the Club. ”

“ Some of the villages among the coal mines are hideous from the waste that has been thrown out for years upon a pile never taken away, always increasing. No grass grows on it, no children play on it, the hens won't scratch on it. The houses of the miners turn one face to this ugliness and it is only because they turn toward the mountains on another side that the people are preserved from the death of the spirit that comes to those who look forever on the unlovely. ”

“ The U.S.C. never let grass grow under its feet. The Ethels and Dorothy, Roger and Helen went to the office of the Star that very afternoon.
"You seem to be a delegation," said the editor, receiving them with a smile.
"We represent our families, who are citizens of Rosemont," answered Roger, "and who want your help, and we also represent the United Service Club which is ready to help you help them."
"I know you!" responded Mr. Montgomery genially. "Your club is well named. You've already done several useful things for Rosemont people and institutions. ”

“ Emerson; "that's the 'chalk-lover,' gypsophila."
"What is it?"
"The delicate, white blossom that your grandmother always puts among cut flowers. It is feathery and softens and harmonizes the hues of all the rest.
'So warm with light his blended colors flow,'
in a bouquet when there's gypsophila in it." ”

“ Margaret contributed to the general stock of knowledge. "You can get pretty, pale, pink petunias now, and they blossom at a great rate all summer."
"I know a plant we ought to try," offered James. "It's the plant they make Persian Insect Powder out of."
"The Persian daisy," guessed Mr. Emerson. "It would be fun to try that."
"Wouldn't it be easier to buy the insect powder?" asked practical Ethel Brown.
"Very much," laughed her grandfather, "but this is good fun because it doesn't always blossom 'true,' and you never know whether you'll get a pink or a deep rose color. ”

“ Ethel Brown nodded, and Ethel Blue explained the conversation to Dorothy.
"We thought Roger's scheme was pretty hard for us youngsters to carry out and we felt a little uncertain about it, but we made up our minds that people are almost always successful when they want like everything to do something and make up their minds that they are going to put it through and learn how to put it through." ”

“ I'm game to make it or eat it," responded Roger instantly.
"Spider cakes."
"Spiders! Ugh!" ejaculated Della daintily.
"Hush; a spider is a frying pan," Ethel Brown instructed her. "Tell us how you do them, Tom," she begged.
"You use the kind of flour that is called 'prepared flour.' It rises without any fuss."
The Ethels laughed at this description, but they recognized the value in camp of a flour that doesn't make any fuss.
"Mix a pint of the flour with half a pint of milk. Let your spider get hot and then grease it with butter or cotton seed oil." ”

“ Some we cut open and examine carefully inside to see how the new leaves are to be fed, and then we plant others and watch them grow."
"I'd like to know why you never told me about that before?" demanded Ethel Brown. "I'm going to get all the grains and fruits I can right off and plant them. Is all that stuff in a horse chestnut leaf-food?"
"The horse chestnut is a hungry one, isn't it?"
"I made some bulbs blossom by putting them in a tall glass in a dark place and bringing them into the light when they had started to sprout," said Ethel Blue, "but I think this is more fun. ”

“ There are blue crocuses and hyacinths and 'baby's breath' for your earliest blossoms, and blue columbines as well as pink and yellow ones! and blue morning glories for your 'climber,' and blue bachelors' buttons and Canterbury bells, and mourning bride, and pretty blue lobelia for low growing plants and blue lupine for a taller growth. If you are willing to depart from real blue into violet you can have heliotrope and violets and asters and pansies and primroses and iris. ”

“ We can't do much planning about the new garden until we go out in a body and make our decisions on the spot," said Margaret. "We'll have to put in vegetables and flowers where they'd rather grow."
"That's what we're trying to do here, only it's on a small scale," Roger reminded her. "Our whole garden is about a twentieth of the new one."
"I shouldn't wonder if we had to have some expert help with that," guessed James, who had gardened enough at Glen Point not to be ashamed to confess ignorance now and then.
"Mr. Emerson has promised to talk it all over with me," said Dorothy. ”

“ Ethel Brown shook her head with a murmured "No." It was Della who offered an explanation.
"The stems aren't pretty enough to look at," she suggested. "When you use a glass bowl or vase the stems you see through it ought to be graceful."
"I think so," responded Mrs. Smith. "That's why we always take pleasure in a tall slender glass vase holding a single rose with a long stem still bearing a few leaves. We get the effect that it gives us out of doors." ”

“ The big bones are called ribs and the fine ones are called veins. Now, will you please all hold up your leaves so we can all see each other's. What is the difference in the veining between Ethel Brown's oak leaf and Ethel Blue's lily of the valley leaf?"
After an instant's inspection Ethel Blue said, "The ribs and veins on my leaf all run the same way, and in the oak leaf they run every which way."
"Right," approved Helen again. "The lily of the valley leaf is parallel-veined and the oak leaf is net-veined. Can each one of you decide what your own leaf is?" ”

“ One has a lively taste and the other is flat. These qualities are given to the pot of tea of course."
"That's all news to me," declared James. "I'm glad to know it."
"I used to think 'tea and toast' was the easiest thing in the world to prepare until Dorothy taught me how to make toast when she was fixing invalid dishes for Grandfather after he was hurt in the fire at Chautauqua," said Ethel Brown. "She opened my eyes," and she nodded affectionately at her cousin.
"There's one thing we must learn to make or we won't be true campers," insisted Tom. ”

“ Emerson was as fond as Roger was of sweetpeas and the girls decided to give him a surprise by having such a succession of blooms that they might invite him to a picking bee as late as the end of October. Nasturtiums also, they planted with a liberal hand in nooks and crannies where the soil was so poor that they feared other plants would turn up their noses, and pansies, whose demure little faces were favorites with Mrs. Morton, they experimented with in various parts of the gardens and in the hotbed. ”