Lucy said she should like to do this very much, and so Mary recommended to her to go and get as many flowers as she could find, and press them between the leaves of some old book which would not be injured by them. Lucy did so. She was a week or two in getting them ready. Then she brought them to Mary. Mary looked them over, and said that many of them were very pretty indeed, and that she could make a very fine collection from them.
“Now,” said she, “you must have a book to keep them in.”
So Mary went and got two sheets of large, light-colored wrapping paper, and folded them again and again, until the leaves were of the right size. Then she cut the edges.
“Now,” said Mary, “I must make some false leaves.”
“False leaves!” said Lucy; “what are they?”
“O, you shall see,” replied Mary.
She then cut one of the leaves which she had made into narrow strips, and put these strips between the true leaves at the back, where they were folded, in such a manner, that, when she sewed the book, the false leaves would be sewed in with the true. But the false leaves, being narrow strips, only made the back thicker. They did not extend out into the body of the book between the leaves; but Mary showed Lucy that when she came to put in her flowers between the true leaves, it would make the body of the book as thick as the back. They would make it thicker, were it not for these false leaves.
“Yes,” said Lucy, “I have seen false leaves in scrap books, made to paste pictures in. I always thought that they made the leaves whole, first, and then cut them out.”
“No,” said Mary, “that would be a great waste of paper. It is very easy to make them by sewing in narrow strips.”
Mary then asked Lucy to sit up at the table, and select some of her prettiest flowers,—some large, and some small,—enough to fill up one page of her book; and then to arrange them on the page in such a way as to produce the best effect; and Lucy did so. Then she gummed each one down upon the page, by touching the under side, here and there, with some gum arabic, dissolved in water, but made very thick. When she had done one page, she turned the leaf over very carefully, and laid a book upon it, and then proceeded to make selections of flowers for the second page. In this manner she went on through the book, and it made a very beautiful book indeed. Mary put a cover and a title-page to it; and on the title-page, she wrote the title, thus:—