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.

"THEY CLING TO EVERYTHING THAT PASSES"

"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.