Prue and Davy watered them a little every morning, and were quite sure the room had been warm, but it takes sunshine, too, to make seeds think of waking from their long nap, and the sun does not always shine in January. Even when it does, it is so low in the sky, and stays such a little time each day, that it does not find its way down into the soil as it does in spring and summer time.
"You said that corn sprouts in a week," said Davy to the Chief Gardener, one morning, "and it's a week to-day since we planted it, and even the radishes are not up yet."
Prue also looked into her little row of pots, and said sadly that there was not even a little teeny-weeny speck of anything coming up that she could see.
"I'm sorry," said the Chief Gardener, "but you know I really can't make the sun shine, and even if I could, perhaps they would be slow about coming, at this season. Sometimes I think seeds know the months as well as we do, for I have known seeds to sprout in June in a place where there was very little warmth or moisture and no sunshine at all. Yes, I think the seeds know."
"And won't my pansies come at all?" whimpered little Prue.
"Oh, I think so. They only need a little more coaxing. Suppose we see just what is going on. You planted a few extra radish seeds, Davy. We will do as little folks often do—dig up one and see what has happened."
So the Chief Gardener dug down with his pocket-knife and lifted a bit of the dirt, which he looked at carefully. Then he held it to the light and let the children look. Sticking to the earth there was a seed, but it was no longer the tiny brown thing which Davy had planted. It was so large that Davy at first thought it was one of his pease, and on one side of it there was an edge of green.
"It's all right, Davy boy. They'll be up in a day or two," laughed the Chief Gardener. "Now, we'll try a pansy."
"Oh, yes, try a pansy! try a pansy!" danced little Prue, who was as happy as Davy over the sprouting of the radish.
