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.

One day Davy came to the seat, where little Prue and the Chief Gardener were resting, with a double carnation in his hand.

"I wish you would look at this," he said. "I can't tell petals from stamens."

The Chief Gardener took the flower, and slowly pulled it to pieces.

"Well, no," he said; "it isn't the easiest thing to do, though, of course, those anther-looking things must belong to stamens."

"But the filaments are like petals," objected Davy.

"Yes, and here are others like them, though they have no anthers. Those are supposed to be stamens, too, or, at least, they were stamens, once."

Davy looked puzzled.

"You remember I told you once, Davy, that a flower was only one form of a leaf—a leaf intended to make the plant beautiful, and to make it bear seed. Well, in some plants, especially cultivated ones, the flower-leaves seem to get rather mixed in their parts."

The Chief Gardener picked a scarlet canna that grew near.

"Here is a flower which has three little petals and four large flower-leaves which you would think were petals, wouldn't you? But the stamens and petals and sepals are so mixed that even botanists can hardly decide which is which. 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. Perhaps double flowers came before single ones, a long time ago, when the leaves were turning to blossoms, so that the gardeners who make the wonderful double blooms now are really going backward instead of forward. But that is all too hard. I'm afraid—especially for a little girl who likes very double carnations."

"I know everything you're talking about, just as well as Davy does," said the little girl, sitting up quite straight. "And I like single flowers, 'specially lilies, and wild roses; but I think double flowers are nice, too, because they seem dressed up, like folks—queens and princesses, all with nice dresses—velvet and chiffon and lacey stuff."

"Why, that is just what they are, Prue. They are dressed up, and, of course, the more anything, or anybody, is dressed up the less they are really like themselves. The petals and sepals of a flower are really fine clothes, you know, just as you sometimes play they are, when you make hollyhock dolls, and it wears them for just about the same reason that we wear ours. It might grow and be useful without them, but it would not be very attractive, and some of its friends and servants might pass by without seeing it."

"Servants! But flowers don't really have servants. That must be just a story."

"No—at least, it is all very true. Flowers are like people in very many ways. They really have servants and friends, and some of them live off other flowers and plants, and some of them eat and sleep, very much as we do. I will tell you something about that another time."