Part 1

A LITTLE GARDEN CALENDAR

A LITTLE GARDEN CALENDAR

_For Boys and Girls_

by

ALBERT BIGELOW PAINE

_Author of "The Little Lady, Her Book," "The Arkansaw Bear," Etc._

WITH FORTY-SIX ILLUSTRATIONS

PHILADELPHIA

HENRY ALTEMUS COMPANY

_Copyright, 1905, by Henry Altemus Published March, 1905_

BY THE SAME AUTHOR

The Little Lady, Her Book, $1.00

The Arkansaw Bear, 1.00

The Wanderings of Joe and Little Em, .50

A WORD TO TEACHERS AND PARENTS

WHEN Dr. S. P. Langley, Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, established the Children's Room in that great museum, he took for his motto, "Knowledge begins in wonder," and he put into this room a selection of specimens especially intended to excite interest in the young mind. The biggest bird and the littlest were placed side by side; curious eggs, nests, and insects--not many in number, but temptingly displayed--were ranged about to attract attention and to awake the desire to know more. It was the same Dr. Langley who had once declared that his chief interests in life were children and fairy stories, and it is in the little Washington room that we seem to find the thought embodied, for the children are there, and the fairy stories of nature are suggested on every hand.

It is with Dr. Langley's motto in mind that the "Little Garden Calendar" is offered to parents and teachers, and to children themselves who are old enough to read. The author has tried to tell in simple language a few of the wonders of plant life, and to set down certain easy methods of observation, including planting, tending, and gathering the harvests, from month to month, throughout the year. Along with this it has been his aim to call attention to the more curious characteristics of certain plants--the really human instincts and habits of some, the family relations of others, the dependence of many upon mankind, animals, and insects, and the struggle for existence of all. Simple botany plays a part in the little narrative, which forms a continuous story from chapter to chapter, interwoven with a number of briefer stories--traditions, fairy tales, and the like, all relating to plant life and origin. These are presented by way of entertainment--to illuminate fact with fancy--to follow, as it were, the path of knowledge through the garden of imagination.

The illustrations in this book are from excellent photographs--especially made for the various chapters--that the student of plant life may compare and identify with some degree of assurance as to varieties and particular specimens, especially in the matter of plant organisms. The volume is divided according to the calendar, for the reason that in the plant world there is interest for every month in the year if only someone is by to point the way, and it is for this purpose that the little story of Prue and Davy and their garden is offered to instructors in the schoolroom and at home, and to the young people themselves, with the greetings and good wishes of

THE AUTHOR.

CONTENTS

PAGE

JANUARY, 13

I You may begin your garden right away

II Your garden may not look as I have it here

III Many seeds are given wings

IV I think seeds know the months

FEBRUARY, 43

I Little plants won't stand much handling

II Hey for the merry little sweet pease

III Even clover belongs to the pulse family

IV Beans and morning-glories twine to the right

V The honeysuckle twines always to the left

MARCH, 73

I Still it was really a radish

II The sun swings like a great pendulum

III Long before there were any railroads and cities

IV Did you ever see the little man in the pansy?

APRIL, 103

I The yellow dust is a food for the seed

II The coming of the corn

III Cross by name and cross by nature

IV A peppery family

V For in that dish was Davy's corn

MAY, 131

I Sweet pease have to be put down pretty deep

II Different families of ants have different droves of cows

III There are many ways of producing species

JUNE, 159

I Then they went down into the strawberry patch

II How the rose became queen

III The sun is the greatest of all

JULY, 187

I A plant is divided into three principal parts

II There are exogens and endogens

III I don't see what weeds are for, anyway

AUGUST, 211

I There are just two kinds of leaves

II Sometimes I think plants can see and hear

III There are plants which do not bloom

IV The princess by the sea

SEPTEMBER, 241

I A flower really has clothes

II A flower has many servants

III A flower may really reason

IV Some flowers live off other flowers and plants

V The prince and the thread of gold

OCTOBER, 267

I Seeds are made to be planted

II There are bitter nuts and sweet ones

III There are many things called fruits

NOVEMBER, 291

I There are annuals, biennials, and perennials

II Plants know how to spread

III All thanks for the plants

DECEMBER, 313

I New gardens in the windows

II To the garden of sleep

III In the gardens of Christmas

IV Some verses, and then good-by

ILLUSTRATIONS

PAGE

_Frontispiece_

Davy's window--Prue's window 19

The beans at the end of two weeks 23

The morning-glories two weeks old 27

The pot of radishes 35

The pease two weeks old 37

The corn at the end of two weeks 47

The pease run up straight ladders 53

A member of the pulse family 59

The morning-glory twines to the right 65

The nasturtiums began to hide the little pot 75

The very small lettuce leaves 81

Davy's pot of radishes 93

"Davy's corn sent out a plume at the top" 97

"The morning-glories had bloomed and already had seed pods" 113

"Cabbage" was the fat fellow's name 115

"They called it nasturtium" 121

Alyssum--the sweetest of the "Cross" family 123

"Don't you think the blackberry looks a little like a wild rose?" 135

"And the apple blossom, too?" 139

Budding 149

The Chief Gardener's strawberries 161

Big, big berries that looked so good 165

The rose stamens and pistil which produce the seed 175

"Gardeners often take a rose of one kind and shake it gently over a rose of another kind" 178

"Sometimes the gardener takes up the pollen on a soft brush and lays it gently on the stigma of another rose" 179

The pistil and stamens of the lily 192

A pistil and calyx and a complete flower 193

A group of endogens--the lily, hyacinth, and daffodil 195

Some simple leaves 217

Pine-needles are leaves 218

There is a lot of kinds and shapes 221

"Beware of the vine with the three-part leaf" 253

The dandelion is bound to spread its seed 256

"So it blooms below the lawn-mower's cutting-wheel" 257

"They cling to everything that passes" 269

Three members of the acorn family 277

The apple is a calyx. The pistil is the core inside of it 283

A raspberry is a cluster of pistils without the core 285

The seed and sets of the onion 295

A black raspberry vine preparing to spread 299

"What are stuck-ins?--oh, slips!" 301

The wool that grows on the sheep's back is there because the sheep feeds on the green grass in summer 307

A Japanese fern-ball 316

The kind of a tree that nobody but Santa Claus ever raises 323

JANUARY

A LITTLE GARDEN CALENDAR

JANUARY

I

YOU MAY BEGIN YOUR GARDEN RIGHT AWAY

THIS is the story of a year, and begins on New Year's day. It is the story of a garden--a little garden--and of a little boy and girl who owned the garden, and of the Chief Gardener, who helped them.

And the name of the little boy was David, after his grandfather. So they called him Davy, because when grandfather was a little boy, he had been called Davy, and this little boy wanted to be just as his grandfather had been--just the same kind of a little boy, with the same name and all.

And the name of the little girl was Prudence, and she was called Prue. For when her mother was a little girl, _she_ had been called Prue, and the Chief Gardener still called her that, sometimes, when he did not call her just Mamma. And the little girl was five years old, and the little boy was 'most seven--"going-on seven" the little boy always said, when you asked him.

The garden was in a window, at first--in two windows, side by side--called a double window. It had to be in a window, because outside it was very cold, and the snow was white and deep on the beds where the Chief Gardener had flowers and vegetables in summer-time.

Prue and Davy were looking out on this white, snow-covered garden on New Year's afternoon. Christmas was over, and spring seemed far away. And there had been _so_ much snow that they were tired of their sleds.

"I wish it would be warm again," said Davy, "so there would be strawberries and nice things to eat in the garden; don't you, Prue?"

"And nice green grass, and dandelions and pinks and morning-glories," said Prue, who loved flowers.

Then the little girl went over to where the Chief Gardener was reading. She leaned over his knee and rocked it back and forth.

"Will it _ever_ be warm again?" she asked. "Will we _ever_ have another garden?"

The Chief Gardener turned another page of his paper. Prue rocked his knee harder.

"I want it to be warm," she said. "I want it to be so we can plant flowers."

"And things," put in Davy, "_nice_ things, to eat; pease and berries and radishes."

"Oh, Davy, you always want things to eat!" said the little girl. "We've just had our New Year's dinner!"

"But I'd be hungry again before the things grew, wouldn't I? And you like strawberries, too, and short-cake."

The Chief Gardener laid down his paper.

"What's all this about strawberry short-cake and morning-glories?" he asked.

"We want it to be warm," said Prue, "so we can have a garden, with pinks and pansies--"

"And pease--" began Davy.

"And a short-cake tree," put in the Chief Gardener, "with nice short-cakes covered with whipped cream, hanging on all the branches. That would suit you, wouldn't it, Davy boy?"

The very thought of a tree like that made Davy silent with joy; but Prue still rocked the knee and talked.

"When _will_ it be warm? When _can_ we have a garden?" she kept asking.

"It is warm, _now_, in this room," said the Chief Gardener, "and you may begin your garden right away, if you like."

The children looked at him, not knowing just what he meant.

"In the window," he went on. "There are two, side by side. They are a part of the garden, you know, for we always see the garden through them, in summer. You remember, we said last year they were like frames for it. Now, suppose we really put a little piece of garden in the windows."

Prue was already dancing.

"Oh, yes! And I'll have pansies, and roses, and hollyhocks, and pinks, and morning-glories, and--"

"And I'll have peaches, and apples, and strawberries, and pease--"

"And a field of corn and wheat," laughed the Chief Gardener, "and a grove of cocoanut trees! What magic windows we must have to hold all the things you have named. They will be like the pack of Santa Claus--never too full to hold more."

"But can't we have all the things we like?" asked Davy, anxiously.

"Not _quite_ all, I'm afraid. The hollyhocks and roses that Prue wants do not bloom the first year from seed. It would hardly pay to plant them in a window-garden, and as for peach and apple trees, I am afraid you would get very tired waiting for them to bear. It takes at least five years for apple-trees to give us fruit, often much longer. Peach-trees bear about the third year. I think we would better try a few things that bloom and bear a little more quickly."

II

YOUR GARDEN MAY NOT LOOK AS I HAVE IT HERE

THE Chief Gardener took his pencil and a piece of paper, and drew a little plan. He was not much of an artist, and sometimes when he drew things he had to write their names below, so that Prue and Davy could tell which was the rabbit and which was the donkey, and so they wouldn't think the kitten was a lion. But a window was not so hard, and then he could put names under the plants, too. On the next page is the picture that the Chief Gardener drew.

While he was making the picture, the children had been asking questions.

"Which is my side? Oh, what's that in the center--that tall plant? What are those vines? What will we have in those littlest pots? Oh, I know what those are! Those are morning-glories! Oh, goody!"

The last was from Prue, when she saw the artist putting the flowers along the vines that he had made climbing up the sides of her window.

"Yes," said the Chief Gardener, "those are morning-glories. You can have two vines in each pot, if you wish, and in that way get four colors--blue, white, purple, and pink. On Davy's side I have made climbing beans--scarlet and white runners--because they are very pretty, and also very good to eat. Davy's is a vegetable, and yours a flower, garden. Then, if Davy wants some flowers, and you get hungry, you can give him flowers for vegetables."

"Oh, that will be playing 'market,' won't it? I just love to play 'store' and 'going to market.'"

"My beans look a good deal like Prue's morning-glories, all but the flowers," said Davy.

"So they do, Davy; and they really look something the same in the garden. The leaves are nearly the same shape, only that the morning-glory's is more heart-shaped, and then beans have three leaves to the stem instead of one. Sometimes I have taken a morning-glory for a bean, just at first."

"What else have we?" asked Prue. "What are the little flowers, and the big one in the center?"

If the Chief Gardener felt hurt because his pictures did not show just what all the flowers were, without telling, he did not say so. He said:

"Well, in the center of your window, Prue, the big flower is made for a sunflower. Not the big kind, but the small western sunflower, such as we had along the back fence last summer. I think we can raise those in the house."

"I just love those," nodded Prue.

"Then those two slender plants are sweet-pease on your side, and garden-pease on Davy's. I put two in each window, because I know that you love sweet-pease, while Davy is very fond of the vegetable kind."

"I'd like a whole bushel of sweet-pease!" said Prue.

"And I wish I had a bushel of eating pease!" said Davy, "and I know that's sweet corn in the middle of my window. I just love it!"

"Yes," said the Chief Gardener, "and a little pot of radishes on one side, and a pot of lettuce salad on the other. Do you think you like that, Davy?"

"Can't I have strawberries, instead of the salad?" asked Davy.

"Strawberries don't bear from seed the first season, and I can't remember any fruit that does, unless you call tomatoes fruit, and I don't think a tomato vine would be quite pleasant in the house. It doesn't always have a sweet odor."

"Oh, well, I can eat lettuce," said Davy. "I can eat anything that's good."

"What are in my other little pots?" asked Prue for the third or fourth time.

"Well, one is meant for a pot of pansies--"

"Oh, pansies! pansies! Can't I have two pots of pansies?"

"You can have three or four plants in one pot--perhaps that will do. Then you can put nasturtiums in the other little pot. They are easy to grow, and very beautiful."

"Yes," said Prue, "I never saw anything so _lovely_ as your nasturtiums by the house, last year."

The Chief Gardener looked at the sketch and tapped it with his pencil.

"Of course," he said, "your garden may not look just as I have it here. I don't draw very well, but I can make things about the right sizes to fit the windows, and that isn't so hard to do with a pencil as it is with the plants themselves. Plants, like children, don't always grow just as their friends want them to, and they are not always well behaved. You see--"

"But won't my bean vines and corn grow up like that?" asked Davy.

"And won't my morning-glories have flowers on them?" asked Prue.

"I hope they will, and we will try to coax them. But you see things may happen. Sometimes it comes a very cold night when the fires get low, and then plants are likely to chill, or perhaps freeze and die. We can only try to be very careful."

"How long will it take them to grow?" asked Davy.

"That is not easy to say. When everything is just right, some seeds start very soon. I have known radishes to pop up within three days, when the weather was warm and damp. Corn will sprout in about a week, in warm weather. Sweet-pease take a good deal longer, though we can hurry them a little by soaking them in warm water before we plant them. But we will talk about all that later. First, let's see about the pots and earth, and the seeds."

III

MANY SEEDS ARE GIVEN WINGS

THE Chief Gardener took Davy and Prue down in the basement, where in one corner he kept his flower-pots and garden-tools.

"I'm going to use the hoe," said Davy, reaching for the long handle.

"I'll have the rake for my garden," said Prue.

The Chief Gardener smiled.

"I don't think we'll need either for this gardening. A small weeder or an old kitchen-knife will be about the largest tool you can use."

Then he picked out some pots, set them side by side on a table, and measured them to see how long a row they made. Then he changed them and measured again.

"There," he said, "those will just fit one window. Now, another set for the other window and we are ready for the soil."

"Where will you get dirt? Everything is frozen hard," said Davy.

The Chief Gardener took up a spading-fork from among the tools.

"We'll get our hats and coats, first," he said, "then we'll see what we can find."

Outside it was really very cold, but the children, with their thick wraps, did not mind. They raced in the snow across the empty little garden, and followed the Chief Gardener to a small mound in one corner. Here he pushed away the snow, and with the fork lifted up a layer of frozen-looking weeds; then another layer, not quite so frozen and not quite so weedy; then still another layer that did not seem at all frozen, but was just a mass of damp leaves and bits of grass. And under this layer it must have been quite warm, for steam began to rise white in the cold air.

"Oh, see!" said Prue. "What makes the smoke?"

"That's steam," said Davy, wisely; "but what makes it warm?"

"Fever," said the Chief Gardener, "just as you had, Davy, that night you ate too much layer-cake. You said you were burning up, but it was only nature trying to burn up the extra food. That is what nature is doing here--trying to burn up and turn to earth the pile of weeds and grass I threw here last summer for compost. Next spring the fire will be out, and leave only a heap of rich soil for the garden."

Beneath the last layer there was warm, dark earth. The Chief Gardener filled the basket he had brought, and they hurried back to the basement to fill the pots.

"Not too full--we must leave room at the top for digging and watering, without spilling dirt and water on the floor. Then the plants will help fill up by and by, too, and I think we would better put in a little of this compost at the bottom. When the roots run down they will be glad to find some fresh, rich food. Don't pack the earth too tightly, Davy; just jar the pot a little to settle it, and it should be fine and quite dry. Perhaps we'd better dry it a little," the Chief Gardener added, as he saw by the children's hands that some of the earth was rather damp and sticky.

So he brought out a flat box, emptied all the pots into it, and set the box on top of the furnace.

"While it's drying, we'll go upstairs and pick out the seeds," he said.

"Oh, see my beans! How pretty they are!" cried Davy, as the Chief Gardener pointed out the purple-mottled seeds of the scarlet runners.

Prue looked a little envious. She was fond of pretty things.

"But my pease are better-looking than those crinkly things of yours," she said; "mine are most like little beads; and see my nasturtium seed! They look good to eat, like little peanuts."

It was Davy's turn now to be envious. Anything that looked like peanuts must be very good to eat.

"People often pickle nasturtium pods," said the Chief Gardener. "They are fine and peppery. So Prue will really have something to eat in her garden, while Davy will have beautiful flowers on his scarlet runners."

"See my morning-glory seed, like quarters of a little black apple, and how tiny my pansy seeds are!" cried Prue, holding out the papers.

Davy was looking at the little round, brown kernels that the Chief Gardener had said were radish seeds, and the light little flakes that were to grow into lettuce.

"What makes seeds so different?" he asked soberly.

"Ah, Davy, that is a hard question," answered the Chief Gardener. "A great many very great people have tried to answer it."

He opened a little paper and held it out for them to see.

"What funny little feather-tops!" said Prue.

"Like little darts," said Davy. "What are they?"

"Marigold seeds. They are very light, and the little tufts or wings are to carry them through the air, so they will be scattered and sown by the wind. Many seeds are given wings of different kinds. Maple seeds have a real pair of wings. Others have a tuft of down on them, so light that they are carried for miles. But many seeds are hard to explain. Plants very nearly alike grow from seeds that are not at all alike, while plants as different as can be grow from seeds that can hardly be told apart, even under the magnifying-glass."

The pots filled with the warm earth were brought up and ranged in the windows.

"How deep, and how many seeds in a pot?" asked Davy.

"That depends," the Chief Gardener answered. "I believe there is a rule that says to plant twice as deep as the seed is long, though sweet-pease and some other things are planted deeper; and you may plant more seeds than you want plants, so that enough are pretty sure to grow; four beans in each pot, Davy--two white and two colored, and three grains of corn in the large center pot."