"Isn't it queer that whatever makes the plant grow knows enough to send the leaves up and the roots down," said Dorothy thoughtfully.
"That's the way the life principle works," agreed Helen. "This other little plant is a pea and I want you to see if you notice any difference between it and the bean."
She pulled up the wee growth very delicately and they all bent over it as it lay in her hand.
"It hathn't got fat leaveth," cried Dicky.
"Good for Dicky," exclaimed Helen. "He has beaten you girls. You see the food in the pea is packed so tight that the pea gets discouraged about trying to send up those first leaves and gives it up as a bad job. They stay underground and do their feeding from there."
"A sort of cold storage arrangement," smiled Ethel Brown.
"After these peas are a little taller you'd find if you pulled them up that the supply of food had all been used up. There will be nothing down there but a husk."
"What happens when this bean plant uses up all its food?"
"There's nothing left but a sort of skin that drops off. You can see how it works with the bean because that is done above the ground."