"And I'll use it on my beans so I can get the ten dollar gold prize!" cried Mab.
There were busy times in the Blake home for the next few weeks, for there was much canning to be done, so that the vegetables raised in the garden during the Summer would keep to be eaten in the Winter.
"For that," said Daddy Blake, "is why Uncle Sam, which is another name for our government, wants us to grow things out of the earth. It is so that there may be plenty of food for all."
So tomatoes were canned, or made into ketchup and chili sauce, while some were used green in pickles. Aunt Lolly brought into the house the cucumber which had grown inside the glass bottle. It was the exact shape of the glass flask, and when this had been broken the cucumber even had on its side, in white letters, the name of the drug firm that made the bottle. For the name had been painted black by Aunt Lolly and as the rays of the sun could not go through the black paint the cucumber was white in those places and green all over elsewhere. The children's cucumbers also grew to funny shapes in their bottles.
Mother Blake, with Mab and Hal to help, pulled up her carrots, of which she had a good crop. The long yellow vegetables, like big ice cream cones, Uncle Pennywait said, were stored in a dark place in the cellar.
"You have a fine crop of carrots," said Daddy Blake.
"Do you think I'll win the prize?" asked his wife.
"Well, I wouldn't be surprised," he answered.
"Oh, if she should!" exclaimed Hal to his sister.
"Well," spoke Mab, with a long sigh, "of course I'd like to have that ten dollar gold piece MYSELF, but we ought to want MOTHER to have it, too."