"Why, yes, they all belong to the Gourd family, and they will all look and taste like gourds if you give them a chance. It's really, of course, because the pollen of one blows into the bloom of the other, and the members of the Gourd family are so closely related that pollens blend and mix. Different kinds of corn will do the same thing. That is why we have our popcorn as far from our sweet corn as we can get it. There are other families that do not mix at all. We grow apples and plums and peaches and roses, side by side—even different kinds of each—and they never mix."
"But apples and plums and peaches are not roses, are they?" asked little Prue.
"Just as much as strawberries, and pears and quinces are," said the Chief Gardener.
The children looked at him rather puzzled.
"How about blackberries and raspberries?" asked the Chief Gardener. "Don't you think they look a little, a very little, like wild roses, only the flowers are smaller and white, instead of pink?"
"Why, yes, so they do!" nodded Davy.
"And doesn't the bloom of a blackberry look like the bloom of a plum, and a cherry, and a pear, and an apple, and all those things?"
"A good deal," said Prue, "and wild crab blossoms look just like little wild roses, and they smell so sweet, too."
"And the wild crab has thorns like a rose, only not so sharp," said Davy.