Trust agreed and the burdock stuck some of her burs on to his back and said:
“Would you just rub yourself against the stile here, inside the field? But that’s not where you’re to look for the hare, for I saw him run into the wood a little while ago.”
Trust carried the burs to the field and ran off to the wood.
“So now I’ve got my seeds settled,” said the burdock and laughed to herself contentedly. “But goodness knows how the thistle is going to manage and the dandelion and the bell-flower and the poppy!”
4
Next spring, already the rye stood quite high.
“We are well off, considering all things,” said the rye-stalks. “Here we are in a great company that contains none but our own good family. And we don’t hamper one another in the very least. It’s really an excellent thing to be in the service of men.”
But, one fine day, a number of little poppies and thistles and dandelions and burdocks and bell-flowers stuck their heads up above the ground in the midst of the luxuriant rye.
“What’s the meaning of this now?” asked the rye. “How in the world did you get here?”
And the poppy looked at the bell-flower and asked: