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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Woodside, by Caroline Hadley
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Woodside
+       or, Look, Listen, and Learn.
+
+Author: Caroline Hadley
+
+Release Date: April 25, 2006 [EBook #18256]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WOODSIDE ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Susan Skinner, Ross Wilburn and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
+
+
+
+
+
+
+WOODSIDE
+
+
+
+[Illustration: THE VISIT TO THE WATCH-DOG.
+_Page 13._]
+
+
+Thomas Nelson and Sons,
+
+_LONDON, EDINBURGH, AND NEW YORK._
+
+
+[Illustration: THE ARRIVAL AT GRANDPAPA'S.
+_Page 10._]
+
+
+
+WOODSIDE
+
+OR,
+
+_Look, Listen, and Learn._
+
+BY
+
+Caroline Hadley,
+
+AUTHOR OF "CHILDREN'S SAYINGS," "STORIES OF OLD,"
+"STORIES OF THE APOSTLES,"
+ETC. ETC.
+
+London:
+
+T. NELSON AND SONS, PATERNOSTER ROW.
+EDINBURGH; AND NEW YORK.
+1902
+
+
+"And Nature, the old nurse, took
+  The child upon her knee,
+Saying: 'Here is a story-book
+  Thy Father has written for thee.
+
+"'Come wander with me,' she said,
+  'Into regions yet untrod,
+And read what is still unread
+  Of the manuscripts of God.'
+
+"And he wandered away and away
+  With Nature, the dear old nurse,
+Who sang to him night and day
+  The rhymes of the universe."
+
+H. W. LONGFELLOW.
+
+
+Contents.
+
+
+I. GRANDPAPA'S HOUSE,                                                  9
+
+II. LISTENING IN THE WOODS,                                           17
+
+III. TOM'S BIRDS' EGGS,                                               27
+
+IV. JACK AND THE GARDENER,                                            36
+
+V. HIVING THE BEES,                                                   47
+
+VI. WASPS AND THEIR WAYS,                                             58
+
+VII. CHARLEY FOSTER'S PETS,                                           66
+
+VIII. A TALK WITH AUNT LIZZIE,                                        80
+
+IX. AFTER THE RAIN,                                                   95
+
+X. THE SIX CLOSED DOORS,                                             105
+
+
+List of Illustrations.
+
+
+THE ARRIVAL AT GRANDPAPA'S,       _Frontispiece_
+
+THE VISIT TO THE WATCH-DOG,        _Vignette_
+
+THE VISIT TO THE PONY,                                                13
+
+TOM SHOWING THE REDBREAST'S EGGS,                                     29
+
+JACK AND THE THRUSH'S NEST,                                           36
+
+REYNARD HARD PUSHED,                                                  45
+
+CHARLEY FOSTER'S COLLECTION,                                          68
+
+THE TEA ON THE LAWN,                                                  82
+
+
+
+
+
+
+WOODSIDE.
+
+
+
+
+I.
+
+_GRANDPAPA'S HOUSE._
+
+"Now for the dear, dear country,
+  Its trees and meadows fair,
+Its roses, cowslips, violets,
+  Whose sweetness fills the air.
+
+"'Tis there we hear the music
+  Of lark's and blackbird's song,
+And merry little finches,
+  Singing the whole day long."--C. H.
+
+
+One bright spring day, not so very long ago, three little children
+arrived at their grandfather's house. They had come to pay a long visit,
+as their parents were travelling abroad for two or three months.
+
+Now grandpapa lived less than twenty miles from London, yet his house
+was quite in the country,--indeed you might have thought that it was a
+hundred miles away from any town,--and it was called Woodside.
+
+You may be sure that Jack, Mary, and Annie--for those were the names of
+the children--thought the change from London most delightful.
+
+Jack was the eldest--that is why I have put his name before those of his
+sisters--and he was ten years old. Mary was the next in age, and she was
+nearly nine; while Annie, the youngest, was seven.
+
+On the day they arrived they felt very quiet, all was so strange after
+London; besides, they were busy unpacking their toys and picture-books,
+and in finding places for all their treasures in the rooms grandmamma
+had set apart for them.
+
+They went to bed early too, and never once woke till their nurse called
+them in the morning. At first they felt sorry it was time to get up, but
+when Jane drew up the blinds, and they saw the bright sunshine and the
+clear blue sky, they made haste to dress, so that after breakfast was
+over they might go out of doors.
+
+Each of them had visited at Woodside several times before, but they had
+not been all together there at the same time. They knew very well how
+many interesting things there were to see out of doors, and they hoped
+that there would be something new. There was sure to be a difference
+among the animals and flowers.
+
+The old house looked the same as they drove up to it, with its twenty
+oak trees in a semi-circle and the gates in the middle. There was the
+same watch-dog, Lion; and on the parlour hearth-rug, lying curled up in
+the sunshine, lay Smut, grandmamma's large black cat.
+
+A very respectable old gentleman was Smut, with his sleek, glossy coat;
+but he stood too much on his dignity ever to play. The children coaxed
+him and patted him; yet he took no notice, he just curled himself round
+and went to sleep again.
+
+A proud old cat was Smut; he would never touch food or milk in the
+kitchen. His food was put on a plate for him out of doors, and he had
+his milk in a saucer in the parlour. When he was out of doors, he always
+came in again by the front door, never at the back.
+
+The children soon spied something new in the shape of a long-haired
+kitten, whose fur was gray and soft. She was bright and lively, and was
+very pleased to play with the children; for Smut would never take any
+notice of her, or play with her one bit: so she and the children became
+very good friends, and had many a game together.
+
+After breakfast was over, grandmamma told the children they might put on
+their hats and go out of doors. They did not need to be spoken to twice.
+
+First of all they had a run round the garden, peeped into the
+greenhouse, and said "How do you do?" to the gardener. But they did not
+stop long among the lovely spring flowers, for they were in such haste
+to see the animals.
+
+[Illustration: THE VISIT TO THE PONY.
+_Page 13._]
+
+Jack said, "We must pay our first visit to the pony;" so away they went
+to the stable.
+
+The pony was very sober and steady, and, I am sorry to add, rather lazy;
+so the children did not get much fun out of him. He lifted up his head
+and gave a little neigh to Jack, for he seemed to remember him; and then
+he went on eating his hay in the most unconcerned manner.
+
+They then went to see the large dog in the yard. Lion was very glad to
+see them. He harked with delight, wagged his tail, rattled his chain; in
+fact he seemed as if he would break away from it, in his eagerness to
+meet the children.
+
+"Lion is ever so much nicer than the pony," they said.
+
+The fact was, the pony had not much work to do, and his chief thoughts
+were about his hay and his corn and his nice warm stable. Now Lion,
+although he was generally chained to his kennel, had to watch for
+others. He was always listening to hear if any one came upon the
+premises who had no business there; and he barked so loudly that tramps
+and idle people thought it best to go away. He always welcomed the
+gardener and the servants, and especially his master, whenever they came
+to see him; so that every one about the place would give a pat or a word
+to the friendly dog whenever they passed that way.
+
+"Now let us go and see the fowls," said Mary.
+
+On the right hand side of the drive up to the house was a wide strip of
+grass planted with shrubs. Here, standing back, were some wire
+enclosures inside of which were some choice broods of chickens.
+
+The girls could have stopped here "for hours," they said, watching the
+little chickens, that looked like balls of white or yellow or gray down
+running about or hiding under their mothers' wings.
+
+However, most of the fowls were in the orchard, close by which was the
+hen-house. Fancy what a pretty sight that orchard was this sunshiny
+spring morning! How alive with different sorts of fowls running hither
+and thither--black, and gray, and speckled; old motherly hens, and pert,
+lively young ones; while the cocks strutted about and crowed one against
+another. Then a hen would come out of the hen-house, where the nests
+were, telling all the world, by her loud, proud cackling, that she had
+laid an egg. What noise there was then, for cocks and hens would all
+join in chorus. Some of the hens seemed to get together to have a quiet
+chat, as if they were talking over their family affairs; about which
+they did not always seem to agree, if you might judge by their noise.
+
+By this time grandpapa had finished reading his newspaper and came to
+the children. He took them to the cow-house to see the new calf, and he
+lifted Annie up to let her stroke it; but the mother looked so fierce
+that they did not care to stay long there. Then they went into the yard
+to see the pigs. The little pigs looked so funny running about the
+large, clean sty, as if they loved the bright sunshine and liked to play
+about in it. But when they fed they would put their feet in the trough,
+and this was not very mannerly of them.
+
+By the time the children had paid a visit to all the old places they
+were getting rather tired, and then they went back to the house.
+
+
+
+
+II.
+
+_LISTENING IN THE WOODS._
+
+"I hear the blackbird telling
+  His love-tale to his mate;
+And the merry skylark swelling
+  The choir at 'heaven's gate.'
+The cuckoo away in the thicket
+  Is giving his two old notes;
+And the pet doves hung by the wicket
+  Are talking with ruffled throats.
+The honey-bee hums as he lingers
+  Where shadows on clover heads fall;
+And the wind with leaf-tipped fingers,
+  Is playing in concert with all."
+
+ELIZA COOK.
+
+
+Now grandpapa's house, Woodside, stood on the side of a wood; in fact
+there was only a grassy road between the gates and the wood itself.
+
+Such a wood! with large old elms and oaks and other trees. In the more
+open spaces were trees and bushes of hawthorn, now completely covered
+with white blossom, the pretty May-bloom. There too grew primroses,
+violets, wild hyacinths, besides a long list of other wild flowers,
+ferns, and feathery green moss.
+
+One fine day grandmamma took the children herself across the road into
+the wood. She sat down in one of the open spaces upon the trunk of a
+fallen tree, while the children played at hide-and-seek among the bushes
+or picked the wild flowers.
+
+By-and-by they came back to grandmamma, who was reading while they were
+playing about, and said, "Grandmamma, will you tell us about papa when
+he was a little boy?"
+
+Grandmamma took off her spectacles, shut her book, and the children sat
+down quite close to her, on the grass at her feet.
+
+Then she began:--"When your father and your uncle and aunts, were about
+as old as you are now, they came with me into this very place one summer
+day.
+
+"After they had played awhile they came to me, and I said to them,
+'Children, what do you hear?'
+
+"'Hear, mother?' they said; 'why, nothing in particular. What _is_ there
+to hear?'
+
+"'Well,' I said, 'now all of you shut your eyes and listen, and don't
+speak till I tell you.'
+
+"After a short time I told them to open their eyes; and I asked John,
+who was the eldest, what he had heard.
+
+"'First of all I heard the birds singing, then I noticed that there were
+different sorts of birds singing: I heard the blackbird, the thrush, the
+little finches, and the warblers--I could not tell you how many; some of
+them singing as if they could not make sound enough, and others sung a
+low song, with twitterings and chatterings all to themselves. Some
+seemed calling to birds a long way off; then I heard those other birds
+answer, but the sound was so faint that I should not have heard it at
+all if we had not been so still. I was trying to catch a faint sound of
+a bird some distance down the wood, which sounded like the coo of the
+wood-pigeon, when you said, "Open your eyes."'
+
+"Then I turned to Harry--your father, children--and he said, 'Of course
+I heard the birds, but I thought, I can hear them any day; I shall
+listen for all sorts of odd sounds. I heard the distant rumble of a
+farmer's waggon, and the cows lowing at Brown's farm; every now and
+again I heard the sound of the village blacksmith's hammer, the faint
+puffing of a train, a man's footsteps coming through the wood, and the
+voices of boys--after birds' nests, I suppose.'
+
+"'Well, Lizzie, what did you hear?' I asked, turning to one of the
+girls.
+
+"'I heard the wind moving very gently among the trees, making a soft
+rustling noise. I could scarcely believe in the difference there is
+between this quiet sound and the roaring of the wind in a storm. Then I
+heard the wild bee's hum, and the little tiny noises made by the small
+creatures that live in the wood. I heard our gardener sharpening his
+scythe, and the trickling of the brook in the hollow.'
+
+"'Now, little Fanny, tell us what you heard.'
+
+"'I heard the hens cackling and calling to their chickens. I thought I
+heard our dog bark; but all was so warm, and still, and sleepy, that I
+felt as if I should go to sleep too if I kept my eyes shut much longer.
+I heard the birds though, and a great bumble-bee that flew by when our
+eyes were shut.'
+
+"'Now, children,' I said, 'you have all heard something, and yet a
+little while ago you told me there was nothing particular to hear; nor
+is there, if you hear without listening.'"
+
+Here grandmamma stopped awhile, then, looking at the grandchildren at
+her feet, said there was a poet once who wrote about a little girl
+called Lucy. She lived among all the beautiful things that are to be
+seen in the country, and she loved them dearly. The poet thought how, as
+she grew up, she would be yet more and more charmed by them, and that
+loving all grand and beautiful natural objects would make her charming.
+Among other things he said,--
+
+       "She shall lean her ear
+  In many a secret place,
+And beauty born of murmuring sound
+  Shall pass into her face."
+
+"How can sound show itself in a face, grandmamma?" asked Jack.
+
+"Supposing you heard a loud, sudden scream, you would be startled and
+frightened by the cry; if you heard a tremendous clap of thunder, you
+might look a little frightened too, but you would also look solemn and
+still as you heard the grand sound; but you would have quite another
+look if you were lying on your back under a shady tree some calm summer
+evening, listening to the low song of the birds, and to the many sounds
+that are almost silence."
+
+"Cuckoo! cuckoo!"
+
+"O grandmamma, there's the cuckoo!" cried all the children at once.
+
+"Yes; there are a great many cuckoos about here. They say it is only the
+male bird that calls 'Cuckoo,' that the female simply makes a chattering
+sound."
+
+"Did you ever see a cuckoo, grandma?"
+
+"No, never a live bird, only one stuffed. I will tell you a story of how
+I heard one once. It was about five-and-twenty years ago. I wanted some
+primroses for a nosegay. I used to pick the long feathery moss that
+grows in these woods and put the primroses among it. I ran across the
+road outside of our gates--for I could run in those days--and soon
+filled my basket with as many primroses as I wanted. As I was standing
+under a large tree, I heard all at once, exactly over my head, a loud,
+gruff cry of 'Cuckoo.' I was so startled, the cry was so near, that I
+thought it must be a rude man, and I dropped all my primroses and ran
+back to the gates.
+
+"Then I thought, 'How foolish of me to be frightened; it is the 18th of
+April, the right time for the cuckoo to come back to England from the
+warm country where he has been all the winter,--of course it is a real
+cuckoo.' So I went back and picked up my primroses, but I heard no more
+of that cuckoo.
+
+"I told my children when I came indoors about my adventure; and how they
+did laugh at their mother for being frightened at a bird.
+
+"I shall always think, though, that that particular cuckoo must have
+caught a bad cold on his long journey to England, or soon after his
+arrival, for his voice sounded as if he had a sore throat."
+
+"Now children," said grandmamma, rising from her seat, "it is time we
+walked homewards."
+
+As they came near to the house they saw Smut sitting on the door-step,
+waiting patiently to be let in at the front door.
+
+Within a short distance of the house was a brook, almost hidden in
+places by overhanging bushes and long reedy grass. Then it flowed into
+more open ground; but it was very quiet in its flow, for the bed was
+soft and not stony.
+
+Of course the next day the children set off for this brook, to listen to
+its "murmuring sound." Jack lay down upon the ground and leaned his
+head over the brook, thinking he could hear better in that fashion. Mary
+said she should sit down by a bend in the stream and be comfortable, for
+she was sure she could not listen well if she were afraid of rolling
+into the water; while little Annie sat by her sister's side, holding her
+hand and shutting her eyes.
+
+If you had seen those children then, you would have wondered what they
+were doing, they were so serious and intent; but by the quiet look upon
+their faces they seemed to enjoy the music of the softly-flowing stream.
+So low was the sound, that you would hardly have noticed it if you had
+not been thinking about it.
+
+Often during this visit they would have games at "harking," as they
+called it; for they said, "We may as well hear as much as we can, as our
+father and uncle and aunts did when they were children." They would shut
+their eyes for some minutes, and then they would tell each other what
+they had heard. I can tell you their ears grew very sharp with all this
+practice; for, like other children, they had their quiet moods, when
+under the lofty forest trees or in the garden nooks they would listen,
+not for fun but for enjoyment.
+
+
+
+
+III.
+
+_TOM'S BIRDS' EGGS._
+
+"The goldfinch, and blackbird, and thrush,
+  Are brimful of music and glee;
+They have each got a nest in some bush,
+  And the rook has built his on a tree."
+
+BERNARD BARTON.
+
+
+About a mile off, at the other end of the wood, was a village, which
+joined an old town so closely that they seemed to be only one place.
+
+The old town was quiet now; but it had been a very busy place many years
+ago, in the old coach days. I cannot tell you how many coaches daily ran
+through it, or changed horses at the different inns, on their way from
+London to towns in distant parts of England.
+
+Now the railway had stopped every coach, and in the valley, through
+these very woods, the trains rushed along, panting and puffing as if
+they were running a race with Time.
+
+Fortunately, the trains ran through a tunnel at this spot, so the beauty
+of the woods was not disturbed.
+
+There was a large green belonging to the village, on the edge of which
+lived the children's aunt Lizzie, who had married a doctor. She had two
+children--Tom, who was eleven years old, and Katey, who was nine. They
+went to school daily in the adjoining town, so they were unable to see
+much of their cousins, excepting upon half-holidays, as it was now
+school time.
+
+But you must not suppose that Jack and his sisters did nothing but play
+during this long visit. As soon as they had settled down, grandmamma
+engaged a young lady to come to teach them for about two hours every
+morning. Woodside was too far from the town for the children to go to
+school with their cousins. When they were at home they went to a
+kindergarten school, where they learned in the wisest and pleasantest
+fashion.
+
+[Illustration: TOM SHOWING THE REDBREAST'S EGGS.
+_Page 29._]
+
+The children always looked forward to the half-holidays, when they
+either went up to their cousins' home, or Tom and Katey came down to
+them.
+
+One Saturday afternoon, when they went to the green, Tom showed them his
+collection of birds' eggs. He kept them in shallow boxes full of bran,
+so that they should not get broken, for he was very careful over them.
+
+Tom's mother told him never to take more than one egg from each nest,
+unless there were a great many, as there are in wrens' nests, so that
+the mother bird might not grieve.
+
+"Please show us a robin redbreast's egg," said little Annie.
+
+Tom took two or three from under the bran, and showed her the eggs,
+which were yellowish-gray mottled with red-brown.
+
+"Mrs. Redbreast has not nearly so red a breast as Robin," he said.
+
+"I suppose you have plenty of sparrows' eggs," said Mary, "they are such
+common birds."
+
+"Yes; here they are. They are rather large for the size of the bird;
+they are spotted and streaked all over with gray and brown."
+
+"What a lovely pale greenish-blue egg that is!" exclaimed Mary.
+
+"Yes, that it is," said Tom; "and it belongs to a dear little brown
+bird--the hedge-sparrow. It is not at all the same kind of bird as the
+house-sparrow, for it is one of the warblers. It is a prettier bird, and
+has prettier eggs than the common sparrow. He builds his nest very
+early, before the hedges are covered with leaves; so his nest often gets
+stolen. He is one of the birds that stay in England all through the
+winter.--These speckled eggs of a bluish-gray belong to the linnet,
+which has a very sweet song, although not very powerful.--These belong
+to the chaffinch; they, you see, are greenish-purple spotted with
+brown. See here! I have a nest made by this bird."
+
+"It is perfectly lovely," said Mary.
+
+"It is, indeed; it is one of the most beautiful of all the birds'
+nests--such a nice round shape, and so firm that it does not easily fall
+to pieces. Inside it is lined with hair and feathers, and downy things,
+which make it ever so soft. Just put your finger inside, Annie, and feel
+it. Outside it is made of moss, fine dry grass, and wool, all matted
+together, and covered all over with the lichen which grows on the trunks
+and branches of trees. It is often very difficult to find this bird's
+nest, it looks so exactly like the part of a tree."
+
+"Have you a blackbird's egg?" asked Jack. "I know his note, for it is
+clear and louder than that of most of the other birds."
+
+"Yes, here are some. You see they are of a bluish-green colour, with
+dark blotches; and very pretty they are too.--Those blue eggs with a few
+black spots on them belong to the thrush. You must have heard the
+thrushes singing about grandpa's garden; there are plenty of them
+there."
+
+"I'm afraid you haven't a cuckoo's egg, Tom," said Annie.
+
+"I am so lucky as to have one, Annie. It is very small for the size of
+the bird, and not particularly pretty. You see it is a dull-looking egg,
+whitish, with pale-brown markings. This particular egg was taken from
+the nest of a hedge-sparrow; but cuckoos' eggs have been found in the
+nests of many other birds--robin's, and skylark's, and chaffinch's,
+linnet's, blackbird's, and wren's, and many more besides."
+
+"Why does not the cuckoo build a nest for herself?" asked Annie.
+
+"Nobody seems to know why she doesn't; but there's the fact. When the
+cuckoo has laid an egg, she carries it in her wide, gaping mouth, and
+puts it into the nest of another bird that she has chosen for it. When
+the egg is hatched, the young cuckoo grows so fast that he wants all the
+nest to himself. He turns the other young birds that have been hatched
+with him out of the nest, and the true parents of these little birds
+have to spend all their time in feeding the cuckoo. It takes a great
+deal to feed him, because he grows so fast, and is so much larger than
+they are. They don't seem to mind it though.--Those pale-green eggs with
+dark-brown spots belonged to a rook's nest in the elm-tree at the bottom
+of the garden. There's a curious story about those rooks down there, for
+they have not been there long. There is an old rookery belonging to the
+Rectory close by our house; and one day the rooks from there came to our
+elm-tree. It was in the spring. At last they came frequently, and
+chattered, and cawed, and flew round and round, as if they did not know
+what to do about building their nests in it. By-and-by their visits
+ceased, and they built their nests as usual in the Rectory trees. That
+very summer, during one still night, a large branch, almost a third of
+the elm-tree, fell to the ground. The rooks seemed to know that the
+tree was not safe, and so they would not build in it. That was two years
+ago; and this spring they have begun to build, and there are several
+nests now in our elm-tree. It is most interesting to watch the ways of
+rooks; they seem to have a lot of business on hand. There is another
+rookery in the town, in the garden of Mrs. Cross, a friend of my
+mother's. Rooks always leave the town rookeries for the country as soon
+as their young ones are able to fly. Now Mrs. Cross noticed that her
+rooks, after they had gone to the fields, always came back each morning
+quite early to look after their nests. They stayed a little while to
+talk over matters; then they flew back again to the fields. One very
+stormy morning she noticed that instead of the whole flock coming and
+alighting, one solitary rook ventured through the wind and rain, flying
+round and round the trees without settling, and then flew back again to
+the others to give his report that all was right in the old home."
+
+"What clever birds they must be!" said Mary.
+
+"They are," said Tom. "There are lots of stories about rooks, but what I
+have told you happened under our very eyes.--I have a sparrow-hawk's egg
+here, white, spotted with brown. It was given to my father by a man for
+me. There are not many of these birds about here."
+
+"Oh," said Jack, "I wish I could get a collection of birds' eggs!"
+
+"It is almost too late in the season now," said Tom. "Still, you might
+get some from late nests. I can spare you some from mine, to make a
+beginning. I know a young fellow, who lives about a half-mile off, who
+has a large collection of eggs. We'll go and see him one Saturday
+afternoon. He is sure to have some to give away, for he is always adding
+to his store, and he is very good-natured."
+
+
+
+
+IV.
+
+_JACK AND THE GARDENER._
+
+"Oh! fie upon you, little birds,
+  To eat up _all_ our cherries!
+Why don't you go into the woods
+  And dine upon the berries?"--C. H.
+
+
+A few days after Tom had shown his cousins his collection of birds'
+eggs, Jack, as he was coming away from a visit to Lion, passed by the
+end of the potting-shed. The gardener was in there, and he called out,
+"Master Jack, I've got something for you in here."
+
+Jack went into the shed, and the gardener fumbled about on a shelf till
+he found what he was looking for.
+
+"There," he said, "is a thrush's nest; I thought you'd like it. I took
+it out of one of the trees in the orchard. It has got four pretty eggs
+in it."
+
+[Illustration: JACK AND THE THRUSH'S NEST.
+_Page 36._]
+
+"Oh," said Jack, "how splendid! What a treasure! It does seem a shame,
+though, to take it from the birds."
+
+His delight soon got the better of his scruples, especially when he
+heard the gardener say,--
+
+"There are too many birds about here already. Missus does encourage them
+so, that they are as bold as possible. I can tell you, Master Jack, who
+gets most of the cherries. It is not us that does; it's them birds,
+especially the thrushes and blackbirds. I'm up early, and I see; and I
+hear 'em too before I'm up. There they are, at the fruit as soon as 'tis
+light. They have their breakfasts hours before you get yours. One
+wouldn't grudge them a few cherries now and again; but to clear the
+trees as they do is downright greediness, I say. And I wouldn't be hard
+on them for taking a few currants, for we have plenty of them; but they
+just go and strip off the largest and reddest of them, and leave the
+stalk hanging, and that's all that's left of a fine bunch. Then as to
+the pease--you like pease, don't you, Master Jack? your grandpa's
+uncommon fond of 'em--well, I have to sow the pease pretty thick, or,
+I'll warrant ye, we shouldn't have a tidy row come up at all. I have to
+dodge about with netting and scarecrows to keep what we do get; for I
+hate a patchy row, I do. Last winter was a very cold season. I don't
+know how you found it in London, Master Jack, but here there was a long
+hard frost for three weeks. We'd had a good deal of rain; then it turned
+to snow, and froze and snowed again till the snow lay pretty thick all
+over the ground. Then it cleared up, and the sun shone; but the sun
+hasn't much power at that time of the year, so it did not melt the snow.
+It was bitter cold by day, and worse at night. The birds that eat grubs
+and insects could not get any food at all. So your grandma had a big
+lump of fat put into a piece of coarse netting, and it was hung up in a
+likely place--the long branch of a tree--where the birds could get well
+at it. You should have seen the poor creatures pecking away! It was soon
+gone, and we had to put more lumps into the net before the frost went. I
+thought to myself it was almost a pity to try to save their lives; it
+was just a natural way of getting rid of a lot of them. They do say that
+dying by cold is an easy way--it's like going to sleep; so I'm not
+wishing any great harm to the little things. And now, Master Jack, how
+do you think these birds paid back your grandma for all her kindness?
+Why, as soon as ever the frost was gone, and the weather became warmer,
+and the yellow crocuses came into bloom, if these very birds, or some of
+them at least, did not slit the flowers all to pieces with their
+bills--that's what _they_ did. The ground was covered with bits of
+flowers.--Do you know Mrs. Jones who lives on the green, Master Jack?"
+
+"No," he said; "I don't."
+
+"Well, she's a great friend of your grandma's; but she is not
+over-strong, and doesn't get out in the winter. She likes to have the
+birds about her, and she fed them on her lawn with crumbs and pieces;
+and her fine bed of crocuses in front of her windows was just spoiled.
+It was mostly the yellow ones that they tore to shreds; and the
+primroses too--there was hardly one fit to pick. The starlings and the
+sparrows were the worst; they did a lot of mischief."
+
+"Oh," said Jack, "perhaps they were after insects, or something they
+wanted to eat. I don't believe they _meant_ to do any harm."
+
+"Perhaps not," said the gardener; "but the crocuses were spoiled all the
+same. You know, Master Jack, I'm about the place summer and winter, and
+I see a lot. Now, if there's one thing more than another that I hate
+about a garden, it's cats. They do trample down things and spoil the
+beds. As this house is lonesome rather, we don't get much of that pest,
+I'm glad to say; and then Smut is not a sociable cat. But I'll tell you
+of a curious thing that happened to him one day. There was a pair of
+thrushes who had built their nest in the laurel hedge at the bottom of
+the garden next to the field. You know, Master Jack, there's a broad
+gravel path along the garden side of the hedge. One day, just as the
+young birds were able to get out of the nest, the young cat at my
+cottage close by walked into this garden, where, of course, she'd no
+business; but there she was in that gravel path, and she saw one of the
+birds and caught it. I saw her with it. The thrushes scolded her, flew
+at her with a sharp, angry cry, and puss was soon off the premises. The
+next day, Mr. Smut was walking along this gravel path, enjoying the
+sunshine in a quiet way, never thinking of birds, for he's a deal too
+lazy to put himself out of the way to catch anything. I've tried him
+with a mouse, but he never put out a paw to touch it. He blinked at it
+in the most unconcerned way, and didn't show the least bit of interest
+in it. Well, as I said, Smut was walking along, when out flew the
+thrushes from the hedge, swooped down upon him, pounced on his back,
+pecked his head, and screeched at him, till poor Smut was quite dazed.
+They fairly chased him out of that part of the garden. You would have
+laughed to have seen sober old Smut take to his legs as fast as he could
+run. The robins, too, soon afterwards began the same game, and would
+stand and scold within two or three yards of the cat, if he was asleep
+in the garden. I have often seen them sit just over him, and scold him
+till he woke up and came indoors. As to the gravel path by the thrushes'
+nest, Smut never came into that path again all the summer through.
+Smut's a deal too particular," added the gardener; "but I have heard of
+another cat that was almost as bad. The house-maid told me that in one
+of her places there was a fine tabby cat, or rather a good-sized kitten,
+which would never eat anything in the kitchen, and was so particular in
+his ways that he was called 'Sir Thomas.' At dinner time he had a trick
+of jumping up as quick as lightning just when any one was going to put
+his food into his mouth with his fork. He would give the fork a knock
+with his paw, so that the meat tumbled off; which he ate before one
+could see what had happened! Such behaviour was not to be borne; so Sir
+Thomas was always turned out of the room at dinner time. He was a good
+mouser, and foraged well for himself out of doors. One day he ate some
+poisoned meat, at least it was supposed he did so. He became so thin,
+and his fur came off; so he had to be killed, and that was the end of
+Sir Thomas."
+
+"I hope poor Smut won't come to any harm," said Jack. "I should have
+liked to see the birds chasing him, though. I wonder the thrush wasn't
+afraid of getting on to a cat's back."
+
+"Why, the bird was safe enough; Smut couldn't reach it, and he was
+almost frightened out of his senses. You know animals, when they have
+their young to take care of or their lives to defend, can do things
+which seem contrary to their nature. Birds don't make their perches on
+cats' backs, except for very good reasons.
+
+"I heard of a dreadful thing that happened once," said the gardener,
+lowering his tone. "There was a cat--it was a half-wild one--and some
+boys had a dog that was very fond of worrying cats. They set this dog on
+to the poor cat, expecting to see a fight. But puss made a clean jump on
+to the dog's back, and fixed herself there. Lifting up first one front
+paw, then the other, she beat and scratched the dog's head terribly. The
+boys then wanted to get the dog away, but they durst not touch either of
+them--the cat would have flown at them; besides, they were cowards, as
+cruel people always are. Then a gentleman came up, and he got a
+pitchfork, and secured the poor beasts, and they were both killed. At
+least the dog was, for certain. Now that's a fact," said the gardener.
+
+[Illustration: REYNARD HARD PUSHED.
+_Page 45._]
+
+"I can tell you another curious thing," added he; "it's about a fox this
+time. It didn't happen anywhere about here, but in a part of the
+country where there's a deal of hunting going on. This poor fox was
+being hunted, and away he went through woods, over ploughed land and
+meadows, the pack of hounds and the huntsmen in full cry after him, when
+they came to a small village. Up the street ran the fox, the dogs at his
+heels, when he saw the open door of a house and ran inside, up the
+stairs, and crouched under a cot where a little child lay fast asleep!
+The mistress of the house saw the fox rush in, and she instantly shut
+the front door, as she knew she would have the whole pack of hounds in
+her house. As it was, two dogs, a little in front of the others, rushed
+past her through the hall into the kitchen, then into the yard; so they
+at once shut the kitchen door, and the dogs just missed the fox. There
+was a sight all round the house; the dogs were just mad to get in, and
+trampled down the flower-beds--for there was no keeping them out of the
+front garden--making such a yelling and barking as you never heard. At
+last one of the huntsmen came into the house, caught the fox, and
+carried him away in a bag. The next day a gentleman sent his gardener to
+put the garden straight again, after the dogs; but the crocuses, which
+were just showing nicely for bloom, were quite spoiled. They sent the
+fox's brush--that's his tail, you know--to the mistress. I've been
+inside this very house, and seen where the fox went to hide himself.
+It's not the way of the creatures that live in the woods to come into
+houses, but the poor fox was hard drove; he was.
+
+"But now, Master Jack, I've finished my job in this shed, and I must
+go."
+
+
+
+
+V.
+
+_HIVING THE BEES._
+
+"Busy bee, busy bee, where do you go?"--
+"To meadows and gardens whose sweets I know;
+Filling my baskets with spoils from the flowers,
+Working hard for the hive in sunny hours."--C. H.
+
+
+In a sunny corner of the kitchen garden stood a row of bee-hives. Many a
+time did the children stand to watch the busy workers, flying out of the
+hive to gather honey from the flowers, either to feed the bees or to
+store it into cells for future use.
+
+They would watch them returning laden, not only with honey, but with
+pollen, the yellow dust found in the inside of flowers.
+
+Bees get covered with this powder while they are sucking the honey out
+of the flowers; and they carefully brush it off their bodies with their
+hairy legs, make it into lumps, and then place it in a curious kind of
+basket or pocket which every bee has in the middle of each of its hind
+legs. The children often saw the bees with these yellow lumps piled up
+so high that it seemed a wonder they did not fall off. And so they might
+have done, had it not been for the fringe of long hairs at the edge of
+the basket, which, by making a kind of lid, kept the precious load safe.
+They watched the bees fly into the hive, but they could not see what
+happened next and what became of their treasure.
+
+Shall I tell you?
+
+First of all, other bees come to help them to unload; then those that
+are hungry eat the honey; and what is not wanted is stored away in the
+cells which those that stay at home are making.
+
+But how do they get the wax for their cells? It does not grow in
+flowers.
+
+No; they make it out of honey which they retain instead of storing. It
+comes while the bees are quiet; and many bees hang together for a long
+time while the wax is forming. It then oozes out in thin flakes on their
+bodies; and this they knead till it is soft enough to build with.
+
+They bring home from the fields something besides pollen and honey; it
+is a gummy substance which they get from the buds of trees. They use it
+with the wax, partly as a varnish and partly to make it stronger. They
+mend up broken places with it, and it answers the purpose of cement.
+
+They use their cells for three things: to store honey, to store bee
+bread, and others are used to rear the young bees,--nurseries, in fact.
+
+Bees have a great deal to do besides getting honey and building their
+cells. They have their young ones to take care of. As soon as an egg is
+hatched they feed the grub with great care; and in about ten days it
+wants no more food, but spins a kind of web round itself, and lies quite
+still for about ten days more, when it comes out a bee, ready for work.
+
+Only one bee lays eggs. She is the queen and the mother of all the
+others. She is a good deal larger than they are, and they all obey her.
+
+One day about the end of May, just as the children's lessons for the
+morning were over, they heard the gardener come into the hall to tell
+their grandpapa that one of the hives had swarmed.
+
+"Oh! what is that?" they cried. "Do tell us; do let us go and see."
+
+"Wait a little, wait a little," said grandpapa. "It means that the hive
+won't hold all the bees any longer; there are too many of them in it,
+and the old queen bee has left it, with some thousands of her subjects,
+to a young queen that will now reign in her stead."
+
+"We must see about a new hive for her, gardener."
+
+"Yes, sir; we have it all ready. Bob is waiting with it in the garden
+now."
+
+Bob was the young man who milked the cow, and minded the pony and the
+pigs and fowls.
+
+"Oh, do let us go too," cried all the children.
+
+"I must hear what grandmamma says," said grandpapa. "It won't do for any
+of you to get stung, you know."
+
+Just then grandmamma came into the hall to see what all the commotion
+was about.
+
+The three children turned to her and said, "Do let us go to see the bees
+put into their new hive."
+
+"Where have they swarmed?" asked grandmamma.
+
+"On to a plum-tree, ma'am, quite close to the hives," said the
+gardener.--"I don't think the little ones will come to any harm if you
+will let them go," he added, when he saw their eager looks.
+
+"Well," said grandmamma, "there really is no danger, if you will all
+keep perfectly still. It is easy to hive them from a branch, but needs
+a great deal more care if they swarm upon the ground. If any bees should
+settle on you, you must let them stay till they fly off of their own
+accord. If you try to brush them off, they will be nearly sure to sting
+you."
+
+"I am almost afraid to let little Annie go, lest she should be
+frightened."
+
+"I will take care of Annie," said grandpapa.--"You won't be afraid in my
+arms, will you, my little pet, even if some bees do settle on you? Yes,
+yes, you shall come," he said; for he could not bear to have her
+disappointed.
+
+"If they cover me," said Jack, "I won't touch one of them!"
+
+So all but grandmamma started off for the garden; and sure enough there
+was hanging from one of the lower branches of the plum-tree a huge bunch
+of bees; it was wonderful how they managed to keep together.
+
+"They'll hive easy," said the gardener.
+
+Bob held the new hive directly under the cluster of bees, and the
+gardener gently shook the bough on which it was hanging, when the bees
+fell into it. Numbers, however, flew about hither and thither in a state
+of great commotion.
+
+"Don't be frightened, Annie dear," said grandpapa; "they won't hurt
+you--keep quite still."
+
+A few bees settled on Jack and Mary, many more on the gardener and Bob,
+but only two or three on grandpapa and Annie, for he was a little
+farther off than the others.
+
+By-and-by all the bees flew away into the hive after their queen, and no
+one was stung. The hive was then placed upon a board on the ground and
+left there.
+
+In the evening, when all was quiet, the gardener took up the hive and
+set it by the side of the other bees.
+
+After the children had gone back to the house, Mary asked grandmamma why
+she did not come to see the bees hived.
+
+"My dear, it is no new sight to me. Why, I hived the very first swarm we
+ever had myself."
+
+"_You_ hived them, grandmamma? Do tell us about it."
+
+"It was a year or two after we were married, and a friend had given us a
+hive of bees in the spring. They swarmed one sunny day when your
+grandpapa had gone to London, and the only man handy was the gardener.
+He had not been with us long, and he stayed but a very short time, as he
+did not suit us.
+
+"I saw the swarm myself hanging on to a red-currant bush, and I asked
+the gardener if he could hive the swarm. He said he didn't know anything
+about bees, and he didn't care to meddle with them.
+
+"I didn't care to ask for any help from him, so I went into the kitchen
+and said to one of the servants, 'Ann, would you be afraid to help me
+hive the bees, for they have swarmed?'
+
+"'Not at all, ma'am,' she said.
+
+"So I told her to draw a pair of stockings over her hands and arms, and
+to tie a thin shawl over her head and neck; then, when she was ready, we
+went into the garden."
+
+"What did you put on, grandma?"
+
+"Nothing special. I was vexed at the gardener's cowardice, and I really
+did not feel afraid, so I went just as I was. I well remember the dress:
+it was muslin, with large open sleeves, so that my arms were bare. I did
+not even wear a hat!
+
+"Ann held the hive, and I shook the bees into it. We were both of us
+covered with bees that settled on us, as they did on the gardener and
+Bob this morning. We let them take their own time to fly off from us,
+and neither of us was stung.
+
+"Bees are very curious creatures; they seem to have their likes and
+dislikes as well as other beings.
+
+"My grandfather kept bees; but he was obliged to get rid of them, for
+they would sting my grandmother whenever she went into the part of the
+garden where they were kept. No one ever knew the reason of this."
+
+Bees keep the inside of their hives very clean. If a bee dies, they turn
+it out; or if anything like a snail, for instance, crawled in, which
+would be too large for them to push out, they would completely cover it
+over with wax.
+
+Here grandpapa came into the room and said, "That was a strong swarm of
+bees that we have just hived; first swarms generally are."
+
+"How many bees do you think there were, grandpapa?" asked Jack.
+
+"I should say about five thousand. A well-stocked hive will hold from
+fifteen to twenty thousand bees. We may expect another swarm from that
+same hive in a week or ten days; but it won't be worth so much as this
+one."
+
+"Did you ever hear the old rhyme, children?
+
+"A swarm of bees in May
+Is worth a load of hay;
+A swarm of bees in June
+Is worth a silver spoon;
+But a swarm in July
+Is not worth a fly."
+
+"Why not?" asked Annie.
+
+"Because it is smaller and weaker, and it is later in the year, so they
+have not such a long time to get honey to keep them through the winter.
+They will generally die off, if they are not fed."
+
+"Suppose the queen dies, what do the bees do then, grandpapa?"
+
+"They are greatly concerned; they run about the hive touching every bee
+they meet with their little horns or feelers. Then, when all the bees
+know of their loss, they set to work to feed one of the grubs in the
+royal cells with a particular kind of food, and a young queen after due
+time makes her appearance. They take great care of her, and obey her as
+they did the old queen."
+
+
+
+
+VI.
+
+_WASPS AND THEIR WAYS._
+
+"An elegant shape is yours, Sir Wasp,
+  And delicate is your wing;
+Your armour is brave, in black and gold;
+  But we do not like your sting."--C. H.
+
+
+The next morning Jack went to see how the new hive had settled, and he
+found everything going on as usual. The bees were very busy, flying in
+and out, and working hard to build the cells of their new home.
+
+The gardener was working near, and he said, "Master Jack, did you ever
+see a wasp's nest?"
+
+Jack shook his head.
+
+"Well, now, if you come into my cottage, I'll show you one this evening.
+It's not a very good one, for it got broken digging it out of the ground
+in one of the garden paths. We'd been terribly plagued with wasps for
+weeks, and it was some time before we could find the nest. We watched
+them go into a hole in the ground; so one evening when they'd all gone
+to bed we got some pitch and brimstone, and laid them with some lighted
+sticks on the top of the hole. The wasps woke up, and came out to see
+what was going on; but they were smothered by the brimstone smoke, and
+were soon done for. The next day we dug out the nest.
+
+"Wasps are great pests, Master Jack, I can tell you. They are very fond
+of honey, and they go into the bee-hives to steal it, especially when
+the mornings and evenings get cool, and the bees are not watching at the
+holes of their hives, because they've gone inside to keep themselves
+warm.
+
+"The wasps spoil a lot of fruit. If there's one peach finer than
+another, they know it; and as for the plums, green-gages in particular,
+why, they are as mad after them as the birds are for the cherries. What
+with the caterpillars and slugs being after the vegetables, and the
+birds and the wasps making such havoc with the fruit, I wonder sometimes
+how we ever get any for ourselves."
+
+"There always seems plenty of fruit and vegetables, though," said Jack.
+
+"Well, yes," said the gardener, "maybe. The birds do help us with
+caterpillars and slugs, I'm bound to own; and then we are always on the
+look-out to destroy wasps: and as to the birds, I dodge them with
+netting; and sometimes we take the nests out of the fruit-trees, as much
+as to tell them to go elsewhere."
+
+That evening Jack went into the gardener's cottage and saw the wasp's
+nest. It looked like the cells of bees made in whity-brown paper.
+
+"What is it made of?" asked Jack; "it isn't wax."
+
+"Well, I've heard that the wasp, which has very strong jaws, bites bits
+of wood off posts and rails, and moistens them by chewing them into a
+kind of paper, and then makes a comb of it like what you see here."
+
+"I wish I had seen this wasp's nest taken."
+
+"No, Master Jack; why, you'd be in bed at that time: besides, I don't
+suppose your grandmamma would have let you go, even if you had been
+here, for you might have been stung. It's rather a touchy job, is taking
+a wasp's nest,--very different from hiving bees; we give them a home,
+but we take one from the wasps.
+
+"If the queen bee falls into the new hive, the bees are right
+enough--they are sure to go where she is; but the wasps are naturally
+angered and frightened at being suffocated out of their home. So, I say,
+keep clear of wasps' nests; those jobs are best done on the quiet."
+
+"Was anybody stung when this nest was taken?"
+
+"Yes, your grandma was. She's naturally curious about such things, and
+came with your grandpa to see the sight. One half-stupified wasp
+settled on her hair, and she didn't know it; but after she got back to
+the house it revived a bit and moved, and she, not knowing what it was,
+touched it, and it stung her badly on the top of her head. I don't think
+wasps will sting unless they are touched; but they are such creepy
+things that you don't always know where they are, and you are apt to
+touch them without meaning to do so."
+
+The next morning at breakfast Jack was talking about the wasp's nest
+that he had seen on the evening before at the gardener's cottage.
+Grandma remarked, "There is a kind of wasp called the mason wasp, which
+bores holes several inches deep in sand-banks. The inside of this long
+narrow passage is covered with a gummy paste which the wasp makes with
+her mouth. Here she lays her eggs, and then brings some green
+caterpillars into the holes, ready for the young wasps to eat when they
+come out of the egg. Then she closes the holes by a ball of sand, so
+that nothing can get in to eat the young grub. Sometimes these wasps
+choose a brick wall instead of a sand-bank for their eggs.
+
+"A friend of mine watched one of these wasps in a wall in her garden.
+She saw the wasp go into a small round hole in the mortar between the
+bricks. After a few minutes she walked out of the hole, turned round,
+and went in again backwards. There she stayed, her little horns and
+bright eyes being all that could be seen of the wasp. My friend tried to
+make the wasp come out of the hole, but nothing could move her; so then
+she had to go away, but not before she had put a mark by the spot.
+
+"The next morning she went back to the wall and found the wasp had gone,
+and had carefully and cleverly covered up her hole with what looked like
+mortar.
+
+"The lady then took a pen-knife and scraped away this door to the hole.
+She then put in a fine crochet-hook, and out tumbled no fewer than
+fifteen small green living caterpillars. At last, quite at the back of
+the hole, she found a small oval thing, something like an ant's egg,
+only more transparent. That was the wasp's egg; and the caterpillars
+were for its food when it was hatched, which would be in about three
+weeks."
+
+"Don't wasps make honey?" asked Annie.
+
+"No; the common wasp feeds her very young grubs upon the sweet juice of
+ripe fruit; in fact they like fruit over-ripe, and that is why they
+choose plums and pears and peaches that have fallen down to the ground.
+It is dangerous to eat any ripe fruit that has fallen, without first
+looking to see if there is a wasp inside it.
+
+"But the young wasps soon want green caterpillars and flies to eat, and
+many a blue-bottle fly is killed by wasps."
+
+"If wasps don't store up honey for the winter, what do they live upon
+when there are no insects about?" asked Mary.
+
+"When the fruit is all gone, and the nights get cold, about the
+beginning of October, then some instinct tells them what to do, for only
+a few of them live through the winter.
+
+"The wasps cease to bring in any more food for the young. They tear open
+the cells and expose the young grubs to the weather, when they die, or
+the birds eat them. Generally they pinch them to death, for they will
+not let them live to die of starvation; and while they are in this state
+they do not feel pain. So what looks like cruelty is really kindness.
+
+"The full-grown wasps soon become sleepy with cold and die off, all but
+the few which live to be the mothers of the wasps next year."
+
+
+
+
+VII.
+
+_CHARLEY FOSTER'S PETS._
+
+"Sweet is the love which Nature brings."--WORDSWORTH.
+
+
+On the following Saturday afternoon the children went to see their
+cousins.
+
+As soon as they arrived, Tom said to Jack, "I saw Charley Foster
+yesterday, and told him we would go to see him this afternoon. I asked
+him that, if he had any birds' eggs to spare, would he give them to you,
+that you might take them back with you to London. He said he should be
+most happy to do so; and that we had better stop till after tea, and go
+home in the cool of the evening. So," continued Tom, "as soon as you're
+ready we'll be off."
+
+"I'm ready now," said Jack; so the boys started for Charley Foster's
+house, which was about half a mile off, along the upper edge of the
+wood, so the walk was a pleasant one.
+
+Presently they saw two men come out of the wood with large,
+square-looking packages, covered over with black linen.
+
+"What are those men doing?" asked Jack; "and what have they got in those
+packages?"
+
+"They are bird-catchers, and those are the traps and cages for the
+birds. It's a downright shame to keep a thing with wings in a cage. I
+can't see what pleasure it can be to listen to their song when they are
+shut up like that. I like plenty of room myself, and so do birds," said
+Tom.
+
+"What birds have those men been catching?"
+
+"Linnets and goldfinches chiefly. They get nightingales, too, out of
+these woods: they are very easy birds to trap, as they are not shy; but
+it is now rather too late to catch them. The bird-catchers are after
+them about the middle of April, when they first come back to England."
+
+"Do nightingales sing only at night, Tom?"
+
+"No; they sing pretty nearly all day long, only you don't notice them
+because other birds are singing too. They begin their night song between
+ten and eleven o'clock, when other birds are quiet, and that's the time
+to hear them if you happen to be awake. There's Charley Foster's house,
+that low white house on the left hand side of the road. There's Charley,
+too, looking out for us."
+
+Charley was two or three years older than Tom, but having the same
+tastes they were often together.
+
+Charley took them at once to his "den," as he called it, a small room at
+one end of the straggling house, reached by a long passage.
+
+"Here," said Charley, "I can do what I like, and make my litters without
+disturbing anybody."
+
+Not but that the room was orderly, otherwise Charley would never have
+been able to find his things when he wanted them.
+
+He told Jack that he had already put up a box of birds' eggs for him,
+with a list and description of the eggs in it.
+
+[Illustration: CHARLEY FOSTER'S COLLECTION.
+_Page 68._]
+
+"I'm tremendously obliged to you, I'm sure," said Jack.
+
+"Not at all," said Charley; "I like to give to any one who really cares
+for such things: besides, I've not been very generous, as I have only
+put in those eggs of which I have other specimens. There are some very
+good sorts, though, in your box; for, you see, I've been collecting for
+some time. Tom, I've got an owl's egg for you, that white one, and two
+jay's eggs--dull green, speckled with olive brown. Look here, too! I've
+got a jay itself, which a farmer who lives near here shot and gave to
+me. I'm going to try and stuff it."
+
+"What pretty blue and black wings it has!" said Jack.
+
+"Yes; it's a handsome but a very thievish bird. It's very clever, too,
+in imitating all kinds of sounds that it hears. It will bleat like a
+lamb, mew like a cat, neigh like a horse, and imitate the sawing of
+wood exactly."
+
+"How are the red starts getting on?" asked Tom.
+
+"All right," said Charley; "the young birds are hatched now."
+
+Charley turned to Jack, and explained that there was a pair of red
+starts that had a nest just outside of the window of the room,--"as you
+can see."
+
+Jack went to the window and saw in a hole of the low roof a little
+bluish-gray bird with a white crown sitting on a nest; and presently her
+mate came with his red tail wagging, bringing an insect in his beak.
+
+Now Jack could see several little red starts poking out their heads from
+under their mother's wings, all looking as if they wanted to be fed
+first.
+
+"This is the third year that these red starts have built their nest in
+that hole," said Charley. "Before that, it seemed as if a pair of
+sparrows had looked upon the hole as belonging to them, for when the
+red starts first came there were a good many fights between them and the
+sparrows.
+
+"One day when the hen red start was sitting, two sparrows made a dead
+set at her; and although she behaved in a very plucky manner, she was
+getting the worst of it. She then uttered a peculiar cry, and her mate
+came to her help directly; and between them they drove off the sparrows.
+
+"That seemed to be the final battle, for there were only a few trifling
+skirmishes after that, and the red starts have considered that hole
+their own private property ever since."
+
+Charley next showed Jack his collection of butterflies, moths, and
+beetles; and after the boys had finished looking at these beautiful and
+curious creatures, it was time for tea, so they went downstairs.
+
+When they had finished tea, Charley said, "We will go out of doors and
+see our old raven, Grip."
+
+There were all sorts of odd places outside of this rambling old house
+which Charley said "just suited him."
+
+In a little enclosure by the side of the kitchen garden was Grip's home.
+He was kept at night, for safety, in a large wooden cage with open bars,
+something like a hen-coop; but in the day he had his liberty--although
+he did not wander far away, for he was very tame.
+
+"He knows all the sounds of the poultry-yard," said Charley, "only I
+expect he won't show off when we want him to do so. One morning, he had
+not been let out of his cage, and he wanted his breakfast. He called
+'Cluck, cluck, cluck,' just as a hen calls her chickens. In fact some
+chickens really thought it was their mother calling them, and they ran
+to Grip! I am sorry to say he helped himself to one of them; the others
+were frightened and made their escape. Ever since then Grip has been in
+his present quarters; he was too near the poultry-yard before. Many a
+time has he cackled like a hen that has laid an egg, so that the maids
+have gone out to look for the egg. He will get up into that elm-tree
+there and crow so exactly like a cock that he will set off all the cocks
+in the poultry-yard; and, in fact, all the cocks in the neighborhood
+that are within hearing will start crowing."
+
+"He knows we are talking about him--Don't you, old Grip?"
+
+Grip gave a croak, as much as to say "Yes," and turned his wise-looking
+old head, first on one side then on the other, in a very knowing
+fashion.
+
+The boys were just going, when there was a long loud crow from Grip,
+exactly like a cock's, which made them all turn round.
+
+"Before we had Grip we had a jackdaw," said Charley. "He was a very
+clever bird. He used to go round to the kitchen window every day at a
+certain hour, for a potato that the cook used to give him. If it was not
+ready she would tell him so, and he would go away for a while, but he
+always came back for it.
+
+"One evening he was shut out of his roosting-place by accident, so he
+went to the glass doors of the dining-room, which lead into the garden,
+and tapped on them loudly with his beak till some one went to let him
+in. He hopped about the room, and looked as much as to say,--'I want to
+be shown to my bedroom.'
+
+"Poor Jacky! he was killed by an accident; and then we had Grip in his
+stead.
+
+"You know we have a pair of hedgehogs, Tom," said Charley. "Well,
+they've got some young ones; suppose we go and see them."
+
+The boys went into the kitchen garden, and in a thick hedge at the
+bottom they came to the nest which the hedgehogs had made on the ground.
+It had a sort of roof to keep the rain off, and inside it was lined with
+moss and leaves.
+
+"I never saw a hedgehog," said Jack.
+
+"Well, now, that is one there," said Tom.
+
+Jack saw a little creature rather more than nine inches long, with a
+thick body, a long snout, short legs, and no tail to speak of. It was
+covered with spines, and could make itself into a ball whenever it
+pleased or when it was frightened, and then no dog or beast could touch
+the little spiky ball.
+
+"The mother is inside the nest with her young ones," said Charley. "They
+are about a fortnight old. These hedgehogs are very tame and know me
+well. I'll try to get her to come out of the nest."
+
+Charley went to the cabbage bed and found some slugs, which he put on to
+a leaf, and called to the hedgehog. She soon made her appearance, and
+the little ones with her, so the boys had a good look at the funny
+little things.
+
+"I say, Charley, you won't want six hedgehogs," said Tom. "Can't you
+spare me a pair, when these little ones have grown bigger?"
+
+"I daresay I can," said Charley, "I suppose your mother wouldn't mind
+having them in the garden: they are apt to make little holes in the
+paths, but then they eat slugs and insects. They are quiet, too, in the
+day time, but get lively towards evening.
+
+"They are useful little creatures, and soon get tame. I have heard of
+their being kept in kitchens to eat up the crickets and beetles there,
+sleeping all day and awake at night when these creatures are about. They
+eat vegetables and soaked bread, and are easy little things to keep."
+
+"I wish I could see one roll itself into a ball," said Jack.
+
+"Oh, that's soon done," said Charley. He took a stick and gently poked
+the hedgehog they saw first. "There, see now! he is bending his head,
+and drawing his skin over it like a hood, and closing himself up. See
+how stiffly his spikes stick out all over the round ball that he is."
+
+"Well, that is funny," said Jack. "I wonder how he manages to do it?"
+
+"He knows the trick of it," said Tom; "for you can't possibly open him
+against his will."
+
+The boys left the hedgehog to uncurl himself when he pleased, and next
+went to a cucumber frame where Charley kept a pet toad.
+
+"Don't toads spit poison?" asked Jack.
+
+"No; that's all nonsense. Their skins secrete something unpleasant,
+which they can make come out of it when they are frightened or in
+danger. Dogs don't like catching hold of a toad with their mouths; but
+they are perfectly harmless, in fact they are very useful in a garden,
+as they eat slugs, beetles, caterpillars, and earwigs. See, this one
+will eat out of my hand; but I must find something for him first."
+
+Charley soon found a fat little slug, which he brought to the toad; and
+he at once ate it from his hand.
+
+"I'll find you something else, old boy;" and Charley soon found a fly,
+which was snapped up by the toad in a twinkling.
+
+"What beautiful bright eyes he has!" said Jack.
+
+"Yes; and he makes good use of them, too. Didn't you notice how quickly
+he darted out his tongue after the fly?--I say, Mr. Toad, I believe you
+are growing out of your skin."
+
+"What do you mean, Charley?"
+
+"Don't you see he has grown so much lately that his skin is very tight,
+and it is looking dull. He'll soon cast it off. It will split down his
+back, and then he will draw his legs out of it.--And you'll have a nice
+new suit complete, won't you, old Toady?"
+
+"I think frogs are very interesting creatures too," said Tom.
+
+"So they are," said Charley. "I often stand by our pond down there and
+watch them. The pond is in a damp part of the garden; just what frogs
+like. In the spring there's a lot of that spotted, jelly-looking stuff,
+which is the frogs' spawn, or eggs, about the pond.
+
+"By-and-by, in about a month or so, a tadpole comes out of the egg.
+There are swarms of them wriggling about the water, with heads and
+bodies and tails, but no legs. In about six weeks more the legs begin to
+grow, and gradually the tadpole changes into a frog. See what a number
+of young frogs there are hopping about here on the edge of the pond!
+They are just out of their tadpole stage. They'll eat just what toads
+eat, so they do no harm in a garden."
+
+"I think I'll take some home with me and put them into the little pond
+in grandpapa's garden," said Jack; "for I shall like to watch them
+growing."
+
+So Jack caught a few carefully, and tied them loosely in his pocket
+handkerchief.
+
+"Well," said Tom, "I think we must say good-bye, Charley; it's about
+time for us to go home."
+
+"We must not forget the box of birds' eggs; and thank you," said Jack.
+
+"No," said Charley; "I'll fetch the box and go home part of the way with
+you. It's a very fine evening for a walk."
+
+
+
+
+VIII.
+
+_A TALK WITH AUNT LIZZIE._
+
+"I can show you the spot where the hyacinth wild
+  Hangs out her bell blossoms of blue,
+And tell where the celandine's bright-eyed child
+  Fills her chalice with honey-dew,--
+The purple-dyed violet, the hawthorn and sloe,
+  The creepers that trail in the lane,
+The dragon, the daisy, and clover-rose, too,
+  And buttercups gilding the plain."
+
+EDWARD CAPERN.
+
+
+After the boys had started for Charley Foster's, the little girls went
+upstairs into what was once the nursery, where Tom and Katey kept all
+their toys and books and learned their lessons; in fact it was still the
+children's room.
+
+Katey showed her cousins her various belongings, and said, "I'm afraid I
+have not anything so pretty to show you as Tom's birds' eggs. I thought
+I would make a collection of wild flowers and leaves, and press them
+and fasten them on to paper. So I began with the leaves of the forest
+trees, and here they are."
+
+The children looked through the sheets, on which were pressed the leaves
+of the oak, the elm, the birch, the willow, and many others besides, all
+so different in shape.
+
+"The _leaves_ are very well," said Katey, "but not the _flowers_. I soon
+left off pressing them, for the poor flowers looked so wretched, so
+unlike the living ones, that I did not care to go on."
+
+"I have felt just the same about some of the things in the museums in
+London," said Mary. "They may interest grown-up people, but not us. They
+are so dried and withered, that they don't give you much of an idea of
+what they were in life. Who would ever guess what a man was like by
+seeing a mummy? and some of the things are no better than mummies."
+
+"I am very fond of flowers," said Katey: "they look lovely in their own
+places where they grow, but just like mummies, as you say, dried up and
+stuck upon paper."
+
+"I'll tell you what: we are going to have tea on the lawn, and after tea
+we'll ask mother to show us some sketches she has made of wild flowers.
+Now they do give you a real notion of the flowers themselves."
+
+Katey went to the window, and said, "Oh! there is Sarah bringing out the
+table for tea already. Let us go downstairs into the garden."
+
+So they all went down to watch Sarah lay the cloth, and put the bread
+and butter and cake on the table, then the milk and sugar, and last of
+all she brought the teapot.
+
+"Here comes Aunt Lizzie," said Annie; and all the children joined in the
+request that when tea was over she would show them her paintings of
+flowers.
+
+"To be sure I will," she said; "and we will look at them out of doors as
+soon as the tea-table is cleared."
+
+"I _do_ like having tea out of doors," said Annie; "we can never have
+it in London, however hot it is."
+
+[Illustration: THE TEA ON THE LAWN.
+_Page 82._]
+
+"We cannot have it for very long in the country either," said Aunt
+Lizzie, "because our weather is so changeable. Sometimes we have cold
+winds with bright sunshine, or it rains, or the grass is damp. Still,
+during the long summer days we can frequently manage it; but it is not
+always summer even in the country."
+
+"Do the woods seem very dreary to you in the winter, aunt?"
+
+"No; I have known and loved them all my life, and they have a very
+different look in winter from what they have in summer."
+
+"But they look so bare when the leaves are gone," said Annie.
+
+"Yes; but you can see the shapes of the trunks and branches, down to the
+little twigs. You can tell the name of the tree from its skeleton, for
+each has its own form--the sturdy oak, the stiff poplar, the drooping
+willow, and the elegant silver birch. You should see them after a fall
+of snow. Each tree bears the weight of snow after a different
+fashion--like itself.
+
+"In fact the woods during a bright hard frost are as good as Fairyland.
+The brown dead oak leaves lying on the ground are fringed all round the
+edges with what looks like small diamonds sparkling in the sun. The
+frost takes every blade of grass, every twig and straw, and covers them
+with glittering crystal, and the whole air is clear and bright."
+
+"We have some very beautiful days in winter," said Katey.
+
+"Yes," said her mother; "calm, still, cloudless days--like midsummer,
+only of course colder. Not very often, it is true, but occasionally.
+
+"I was walking on one such day till I came to what had been the private
+road leading to a gentleman's house. The house itself was old and
+uninhabited, and the way to it was open. I walked along, and the trees
+on either side of it were bare, sparkling with frost and looking like
+other trees outside. Presently I came to a bend in the road, and saw
+that on both sides the space was planted with evergreen shrubs and
+trees, and some of the trees were very tall. There were evergreen oaks,
+and pines, and firs, and plenty of the large-leaved ivy. It seemed as if
+I had walked from midwinter into midsummer. The bright sun was shining,
+the air was still, the sky a cloudless blue, and all the trees were
+green! I stood still to enjoy the sight, then I walked on for a very
+short way, when another sharp turn of the road brought me back to the
+wintry landscape of bare trees and more open country. That sight can be
+seen any winter now."
+
+"I thought the country was dull in winter," said Mary.
+
+"We have dull days, rainy days, and dark days; but then, although Nature
+is so quiet, she is still alive, and there are always changes going on.
+
+"I knew a gentleman, who is dead now, but he lived to be very old. For a
+very great many years he always took one walk, at a certain hour every
+Sunday morning, all the year through. It was a very ordinary country
+walk--through the little town, up by the side of a fir plantation, along
+hedge-rows and scattered houses, over a stile into a long ploughed field
+generally planted with turnips for cattle, then over another stile,
+through winding lanes that led to farm-houses and at last came out into
+the public road.
+
+"It interested him to watch the changes week after week--the first
+appearing of buds in the spring time, their growth during the week, then
+the bursting of the leaves. Then there was the white blossom of the
+black-thorn, which comes before the leaves; then that of the white-thorn
+or 'May;' the silvery blossom of the willow tree; and the yellow catkins
+of the hazel, called by country children 'lamb-tails.' Then came the
+wild flowers of very early spring, till, as the weeks went on, their
+bloom was over with summer and autumn. Now the hedges were red with hips
+and haws. At last the leaves fell, and winter came once more.
+
+"Besides all these changes there were the birds to notice--when they
+first came back to England after their winter absence, when the cuckoo
+was first heard, and many other things as well.
+
+"You may take the same walk fifty-two times a year, year after year, as
+he did, and yet no two walks will be alike.
+
+"Now Sarah shall clear the table and I will fetch my portfolio of
+sketches."
+
+When Aunt Lizzie returned she said, "These are all wild flowers
+here.--You know that one?"
+
+"Why, yes, it is a primrose. We should know what a primrose was like
+better by this than by the dried ones. Why, aunt! you have painted a
+whole lot of them growing just as they do grow."
+
+"Yes; I like, if I can, to paint the flowers in their natural places,
+besides taking a single flower and painting it the size of life. Look
+at that wild rose-bush mixed with bramble in that piece of hedge;
+underneath it I have painted a small spray of roses and buds."
+
+"What is that pretty little flower?" asked Annie; "I don't remember ever
+having seen one like it."
+
+"It is the wood-sorrel; a very lovely little thing it is too. It is
+common in woods and shady places; but the flowers are almost over now."
+
+"We have some roots of it in the shrubbery, and I saw one flower in
+bloom there this morning," said Katey.
+
+"Well, you may all go and look at it, if you like." So the children
+scampered away to look at the small pale, drooping flower.
+
+"What pretty leaves it has!" said Mary. "I have brought one with me; it
+looks like a cluster of leaves in one."
+
+"Yes; the bright, transparent leaves and stems are very delicate. These
+leaves will frequently fold up, if knocked, like the leaves of a
+sensitive plant. You can look for a plant in the woods and try it. The
+leaves, too, have a very acid taste."
+
+"I see a violet root. I like violets because of their sweet smell," said
+Annie.
+
+"I like what are called dog-violets too," said her aunt. "They have no
+smell at all, but they grow all the summer through, in hedges and in
+grass, in such large quantities that the turf often looks like an
+embroidered carpet.
+
+"The flower is very similar to the scented violet, only it is of a pale
+grayish blue. I have painted two roots side by side, one of the scented,
+one of the dog-violet; also a specimen of the white violet, which is not
+so common as that of the dark kind, but its smell is quite as
+delicious."
+
+The children were delighted to recognize, among others, sketches of
+daisies, cowslips, buttercups, wood-anemones, wild hyacinths,
+forget-me-nots, eyebright, red and white clover, and many kinds of
+flowering grasses and graceful fern leaves.
+
+"What is that?" they said, as they saw something that looked curious but
+not pretty.
+
+"That is one of the sketches I took in Cornwall two or three miles from
+the Land's End. It is a poor, unhappy furze-bush, covered with dodder.
+The dodder is what is called a parasitical plant; that is, a plant that
+lives entirely on another. There are several kinds of dodders: some live
+entirely on flax, some on nettles, but those that stick to clover and
+furze-bushes are the most common in this country.
+
+"When the seed of a dodder dropped into the ground begins to grow, it
+feels about for the kind of plant it wants to live upon: if it cannot
+find it, it dies.
+
+"This furze dodder, you see, has found what it wanted, and, having done
+so, began at once to coil its pink thread-like stem on that of the
+furze. Now it had gained its footing, and threw out a great many more
+fine stems in all directions, after the fashion of strawberry runners,
+rooting as it grew. There are thousands of little dodder plants sucking
+the life out of the furze. I have seen many of the bushes quite
+smothered, and even killed, by this unpleasant and greedy plant.
+
+"When you are older, if you study the ways of plants, you will find them
+quite as interesting as those of animals. They have to get their living;
+and some, like the dodder, prefer to get it at the expense of another;
+and others resort to all kinds of plans to keep themselves and their
+kinds alive.
+
+"The acid of the pretty wood-sorrel is a poison, so nothing will eat it;
+and the buttercups growing in meadows are untouched by cattle, because
+of the poison in their leaves and stems.
+
+"I might tell you of many other plants that live in safety because they
+are defended by poison, or thorns, or prickles, or some peculiar shape.
+The leaves of the common holly are only prickly on the lower branches,
+where it needs protection from browsing cattle.
+
+"Then there are wonderful contrivances for keeping not only the single
+plant but its kind alive, which you will learn one day.
+
+"There are plants which bear seeds in very great numbers, like the
+field-poppy, so that some of them are sure to survive. The winds carry
+other seeds to great distances, because they have beautiful feathery
+down attached to them, which causes them to be easily blown about--such
+as thistle and dandelion seeds.
+
+"Birds, too, are great seed-sowers: they eat the wild fruits which
+contain the seed. These fruits are generally red or black, so as to
+attract birds to them. Among the red ones are hips, the fruit of the
+wild rose; and haws, which contain the seed of the white-thorn. Among
+the black are blackberries, the fruit of the bramble; and sloes, which
+are like a very small hard plum. The birds eat these, and drop the seed
+which is inside of the fruit on to the ground."
+
+Then Sarah came into the room to say that Jane had come from Woodside to
+take the children back.
+
+"We must wait for Jack," said Mary.
+
+"Yes," said Aunt Lizzie. "I daresay the boys will be home directly. Why,
+here they are.--How hot you look, Jack!"
+
+"It is so warm to night, aunt, and we have walked fast. We've had a
+splendid time of it at Charley Foster's, and we stayed till the last
+minute, so we hurried home at last." Where-upon Jack drew out his
+pocket-handkerchief to wipe his hot face, forgetting all about the
+little frogs. The loose knot slipped, and you may guess what happened.
+The frogs, delighted to get out of Jack's warm pocket, were soon hopping
+about the room.
+
+"What have you there, Jack? what does this mean?" asked Aunt Lizzie. But
+she could not help laughing, for she knew what odd things boys will do.
+
+Jack explained to her how he had caught the young frogs to put into the
+Woodside pond, that he might watch them there.
+
+"Well, you must catch them again," said his aunt, "and I will give you a
+paper bag to carry them in, only you need not suppose that there are no
+frogs in grandpapa's pond. Charley's pond is large and shaded, while the
+Woodside pond is small and open; and the weather has been very dry
+lately, so the frogs have kept in the soft mud at the bottom. You will
+see plenty of young frogs after the next shower of rain hopping about
+the edges of that pond."
+
+
+
+
+IX.
+
+_AFTER THE RAIN._
+
+"The very earth, the steamy air,
+  Are all with fragrance rife;
+And grace and beauty everywhere
+  Are bursting into life.
+Down, down they come, those fruitful stores,
+  Those earth-rejoicing drops;
+A momentary deluge pours,
+  Then thins, decreases, stops."
+
+ANON.
+
+
+"There seems likely to be a change in the weather," said grandpapa one
+morning at breakfast. "The wind has got round to the west, and there are
+clouds about."
+
+"I am so glad," said Mary.
+
+"So am I," added Annie. "It has been too hot for the last two or three
+weeks."
+
+"We shall all be glad to see a little rain," said grandpapa; "the garden
+wants it badly enough, and so do the newly-mown fields."
+
+Grandpapa was right, for sure enough during the day there were many
+cooling showers, which made everything out of doors look bright and
+fresh.
+
+In the evening grandmamma sat at work in the drawing-room by the open
+doors which led straight into the garden, and the children were with
+her.
+
+Jack was lying on the floor with his face to the garden, and supposed to
+be reading a book; while the little girls were busy with some easy
+fancy-work, making something to take home to their mother when they left
+Woodside.
+
+Jack seemed to be more interested in something out of doors than he was
+in his book. At last he exclaimed, "Grandmamma, do look; isn't that a
+beautiful white fleecy cloud?"
+
+"Yes, it is indeed, Jack. Clouds _are_ beautiful and well worth looking
+at."
+
+The girls put down their work and went to the doors to look out, or
+rather up, at the deep blue sky, covered with patches of downy white.
+
+"That cloud looks as if it were made of snow mountains and caves," said
+Mary. "See how it changes its shape: now there is another cloud coming
+to it: now they have melted into one."
+
+"The sky is one beautiful thing that you can watch anywhere, in town or
+country, in summer or winter," said grandmamma. "It is like a
+picture-book that is always open; and the pictures are always changing."
+
+The children stood and watched the clouds as they sailed about like
+majestic swans. Some moved faster than others, and came in front of
+them. They mingled and they parted, and took all sorts of shapes. The
+colour changed from pure white to delicate gray; and again a stormy
+cloud appeared, dark with rain that would fall somewhere before long.
+
+"O grandmamma, look!" they all exclaimed, as the evening sun shone from
+behind a cloud, gilding its edges with gold.
+
+At last, when they had been for some time feasting their eyes with the
+beauty of cloudland, something else struck Jack, and he said, "How
+sweet everything smells after the rain!"
+
+"Yes, it does, Jack. The very gravel paths and garden mould smell fresh;
+and as to the flowers, they are sweeter than ever."
+
+"I can smell mignonnette," said Mary.
+
+"I can smell the stocks," said Jack.
+
+"And I can smell the honeysuckle," said Annie.
+
+"Do, grandmamma, let us walk round the garden, to smell the flowers,"
+said all the children; "the gravel is almost dry."
+
+"Very well, you may go; but don't go on the grass--keep to the path."
+
+Jack was off at a bound, and his sisters were not much behind; and they
+visited flower after flower, sniffing their sweet perfumes. The tall
+white lilies gave out so strong a scent that, sweet as it was, they did
+not care to bend them down to their faces; but the roses, after the
+rain, were so delicious that they did not want to let them go. They
+found, however, that it was not the large showy roses which had the
+sweetest smell.
+
+They went to the arch along which the honeysuckle was growing, and then
+they smelled the rich carnations and the fragrant mignonnette.
+
+Grandmamma called to them not to stay out too long; but they said, "May
+we pick you a little nosegay first? the flowers are just lovely."
+
+"Very well," grandmamma said; "but don't let it be too large."
+
+It really was difficult to know what to leave out when all was so sweet;
+but they thought mignonnette, a half-blown moss rose, some sweet-peas, a
+piece of honeysuckle and of white jasmine, some pinks, and a little
+stock, could not fail to be agreeable. They thought more of what would
+smell sweet than of bright colour; and grandmamma was well pleased with
+her nosegay.
+
+"Grandmamma," said Jack, "there is a poor-looking flower like a small
+stock in the garden; it smells so sweet."
+
+"It is a stock--the night-flowering stock. The flower is dull-coloured
+and insignificant; but it has a powerful odour. You must not suppose
+that the sweet scent of flowers is for our pleasure alone. The perfumes
+are of great use to the plants themselves, and to the insects that live
+on honey."
+
+"Of what use can they be to the plants?" asked Mary.
+
+"The perfume is chiefly due to a kind of oil found in the blossoms of
+plants, and sometimes in the leaves as well. Lavender, rosemary, thyme,
+and herbs used in cooking, are examples of plants whose leaves as well
+as flowers possess this ethereal oil, as it is called. Caterpillars do
+not like the taste of these oils, and leave these highly-scented plants
+alone. It is, however, generally the flowers only that smell; and now
+you can guess why they are protected by their fragrance. What is the
+most important part of the flower?"
+
+"Its seed," replied Mary.
+
+"Yes; and as the cattle will not eat the flowers, the seed is safe from
+them."
+
+"But they eat flowers in hay," said Jack.
+
+"True; but by the time the grass is cut many seeds have ripened and have
+dropped out of their husks; and when flowers are dry, as they are in
+hay, they lose their particular scent and the oil with it. But the very
+perfume which keeps away the enemies of the flower attracts its friends
+the insects, whose sense of smell is very keen."
+
+"Why do flowers want insects?" asked Annie.
+
+"Because they want their yellow dust taken from one flower to another,
+to ripen their seeds, or to fertilize them, as it is called. The seeds
+are far better if they are ripened by the pollen or dust of another
+blossom than by the pollen of their own flower. The bees, as you know,
+get covered with this dust as they visit one flower after another; some
+of it sticks to the bees, but a great deal of it drops off as they rub
+against the flowers."
+
+"It's give and take," said Jack. "The flowers give the honey for the
+insects to eat, and the insects carry their pollen away for them."
+
+"Yes, that's something like it," said grandmamma. "And now you can see
+why flowers which bloom at night need to have a strong odour. There are
+some plants which
+
+    'Keep their odours to themselves all day'
+
+but towards evening they
+
+    'Let the delicious secret out;'
+
+and it is that moths and insects that fly about at night may know
+whereabouts the flowers are. The bees are busy in the day-time; but
+there are a great many kinds of moths, in fact there are more moths than
+there are butterflies, and they only fly about at night, and the honey
+of flowers is their sole food. So you see the scent of flowers has a
+great use."
+
+"I never thought of that before," said Mary.
+
+"If the flowers which keep open late in the evening have not a very
+strong perfume, they are generally white or pale yellow, so as to be
+seen easily. There is one of these plants called the evening
+primrose--not that it is like a primrose except in colour--at the bottom
+of the garden walk."
+
+"Do let us go and see if there is a moth on it, grandmamma."
+
+Grandmamma smiled and said, "Jack might go and look, and then he could
+tell his sisters what he saw."
+
+Jack scampered away, and after a minute or two he was back with the
+report that he had counted seven winged flies and moths all busy feeding
+upon the honey of the different blossoms of the plant!
+
+"Insects can smell things at a far greater distance than we can," said
+grandmamma. "The sense of smell seems to be their strongest sense."
+
+"Do you think it is a good thing to be able to smell so very much,
+grandmamma?"
+
+"Certainly I do. I know a keen sense of smell is sometimes disagreeable
+for its owner; but as a rule, when a smell is unpleasant it is
+unwholesome, and the nose is like a sentinel that gives warning of
+danger, so that we may either get out of the way or remove the cause.
+Some people really seem to have no noses, considering what they will
+endure in the way of bad smells, and how careless they are about keeping
+windows shut that ought to be opened to let in the fresh air and
+sunshine.
+
+"You must remember, children, that your five senses are but doors which
+the mind must keep open. It is the mind that perceives. We say, 'I
+perceive this apple is sour;' 'I perceive this cloth is rough;' 'I
+perceive a smell of roses;' 'I perceive this flower is white;' 'I
+perceive the birds are singing.' So the word 'perceive' will do for
+tasting, feeling, smelling, seeing, and hearing."
+
+
+
+
+X.
+
+_THE SIX CLOSED DOORS._
+
+"Say what is it, Eyes, ye see?
+Shade and sunshine, flower and tree;
+Running waters swift and clear,
+And the harvests of the year.--
+Tell me, Ears, what ye have heard?
+Many and many a singing bird;
+Winds within the tree-tops going,
+Rapid rivers strongly flowing;
+Awful thunder, ocean strong,
+And the kindly human tongue.--
+These and more an entrance find
+To the chambers of the mind."
+
+ANON.
+
+
+The end of the visit had come at last. Tom and Katey were at Woodside
+spending the last day with their cousins. It was evening: the long
+shadows were falling over the lawn, and the summer air was still.
+
+Grandmamma was sitting under a tree on the lawn knitting, when the
+children clustered around with the old request, "Please, grandmamma,
+tell us a story."
+
+Grandmamma looked a little gravely upon the dear, eager faces, and
+began:--
+
+"A little boy found himself one day, he could not tell how, in a cell,
+or rather a small room, which was very comfortable. He could not
+remember anything that had happened before he came there, nor did he
+feel frightened although he was quite alone.
+
+"For some time he was content to pass the time without taking any
+particular notice of anything. At last he saw that there were several
+doors--five--in the walls of his room. He noticed that two were high and
+wide, the rest seemed smaller; and he thought, 'I will open one of these
+first. Doors must be meant to lead somewhere, and I am rather tired of
+this little room, although it is comfortable.'
+
+"He opened the door very easily, and he found himself in a large room.
+In the middle of it was a table covered with things that seemed good to
+eat.
+
+"He did not see any one, but he heard a voice say, 'Come in and
+_taste_.'
+
+"So he took up one nice thing after another, according to his will; and
+after awhile he heard the voice say, 'This is enough for once; you may
+come again.'
+
+"He turned to go back to his room, but the door was gone. The way to his
+cell was open, and this beautiful room was added to his smaller one.
+
+"Now he had plenty of amusement. He learned how different were the
+tastes of the objects before him;--some sweet, some sour; others were
+bitter, or salt, or spicy; some with flavours that cannot be put into
+words, they were so delicate and varied. As soon as he had had enough he
+could taste no longer; so he always knew when to leave off.
+
+"He was satisfied for a long time with this room, for fresh objects were
+daily added. At last he looked longingly at the door by the side of the
+opening where the late door was.
+
+"He opened it and walked out, not into a room, but into a lovely
+garden. The walls were high, but the garden was very broad and long.
+
+"There were the fruits whose delicious flavour he knew: now he found
+that some of them at least had a fragrant _smell_. However, he scarcely
+noticed them; for a strange, sweet odour of flowers greeted his
+newly-found sense. After awhile he felt almost overpowered by this fresh
+pleasure, and turned to go back for awhile into his little room, when he
+found that this door had also vanished. He was glad of this, for the
+delicate perfume of the garden freely came into his cell.
+
+"What a growing pleasure was this garden! Every flower had its own
+special odour--the rich rose, the tall, queenly lily, and the lowly
+violet--each in its way the sweetest.
+
+"At first he thought that only the flowers had perfume, but he soon
+found this was a mistake. By taking more careful notice he perceived
+that leaves as well as flowers were sometimes scented, as in the musk
+plant, the geranium, and even those of black-currant bushes.
+
+"As he walked down an avenue of lime trees, he noticed a most delicious
+scent, which he found came from the small blossoms of the trees high
+above his head. He turned into a shrubbery, and was greeted by the fresh
+fragrance of the pine trees, and found that even the resinous buds of
+other trees had a pleasant scent. The very earth too, after a shower of
+rain, had a refreshing smell.
+
+"By-and-by he looked at the high walls of the garden, for there seemed
+to float over them a blended sweetness of something, he knew not what;
+but in after days he knew it as that of new-mown hay.
+
+"Again, the wind would bring him a smell of something that certainly did
+not belong to flowers or fruit. It seemed to make him strong, and long
+to know what was over the wall. It was the sea-breeze that came to him
+from the vast ocean, and made him feel that his lovely garden was, after
+all, too bounded.
+
+"He turned the handle of another door. It was that of _touch_, and he
+found himself in a passage. He walked along a little way, and saw an
+open archway on his right, through which he went, and there he was in
+the room of taste. He took up a cherry, and it felt smooth; a peach, and
+it felt soft and downy; a pine-apple, and it was rough. He looked toward
+the archway through which he had come, when, behold! the whole passage
+wall had vanished, making the old room larger.
+
+"He went into his garden: the gravel path felt hard and firm, the lawn
+felt soft and springy under his tread. He touched a rose-stalk and he
+felt its prickles, while the leaves of the flowers were soft. Some
+flower-stalks felt sticky, others smooth, and the bark of the oak tree
+was rough.
+
+"The bright sunshine felt warm to his cheek, and the marble of the
+fountain felt cold.
+
+"There were now two large doors left, and he resolved to open that of
+_hearing_.
+
+"All was dark as he stepped into a room or passage, he knew not which.
+He walked on a little way, then he stopped, for he faintly heard the
+sound of music. The sweet strains grew longer and louder, drawing him
+along till he came to a large hall where an organ was being played by a
+master. Here he stayed to listen and to wonder, spell-bound by the
+strange high music;--now swelling to a triumph, now sinking to a soft
+echo; now it told of gladness, and again of sorrow. Then it changed to a
+solemn, stately march; then there was a sound of rippling sweetness,
+ending in a lullaby so soothing that he fell fast asleep.
+
+"When he awoke he was in his cell; the door was gone and the mystic hall
+had vanished. He went into his garden, and heard for the first time the
+sweet song of birds, the hum of insects, and the soft sound of flowing
+water from the marble fountain. He heard the swaying of the wind among
+the leaves and branches of the trees, and the sound of his own footsteps
+on the path.
+
+"'Now for the last door,' he said, as he opened it, and was dazzled by a
+flood of light which nearly blinded him. _Sight_, which had been before
+but faint and dim, now became clear and open. He found himself in his
+old room of taste; but instead of the walls were crystal windows, and
+his table of fruits and food looked small in the midst of the vast
+space. He turned into his garden: what a change was there! He saw that
+the roses were a deep, deep red, and pink, and yellow, and white; that
+the flowers were of every hue and shade of colour, and the trees of
+varying green.
+
+"Now he saw the birds whose sweet songs he had often heard, some in
+bright plumage, and others of graver colours.
+
+"He saw the insects flying about with whose soft hum he was familiar;
+some too of whose existence he knew nothing before--the noiseless
+butterflies of brown and gold, of deep orange or pale yellow, of azure
+blue or cream and brown and crimson.
+
+"He saw the darting dragon-fly, shining in black and blue, with gauzy
+wings of pearly tints; and other insects brilliant with many colours,
+shining or dusky, flitting by or crawling along the ground.
+
+"Tired out at last with all these wonders, he went back to his cell and
+slept.
+
+"He awoke thinking, 'There are now no new doors to open;' but when he
+turned to the wall on the opposite side, he saw a door that he had not
+noticed before.
+
+"He went up to it, but it was bolted and barred from without, and the
+key was in the lock on the outside. 'That door is not meant for me to
+open,' he said; and he went once more into his garden. The high walls
+were gone, the room with the crystal windows had vanished, but the
+senses of taste, of smell, of touch, of hearing, and of sight remained.
+
+"He could now go where he liked. He saw the meadows whose sweet smell of
+newly-mown grass had delighted him in his garden; and he wandered down
+to the shore, where he felt again the strength of the sea-breeze. He
+heard with awe the sound of many waters as myriad waves dashed against
+the rocky coast--those same waves which farther along, as the shore
+became sandy, rippled out in the lowest murmurs. In the caves, too, he
+saw new forms of life--the many-coloured sea-anemones, sea-weeds,
+shells; and in the sea itself fishes shining like mother-of pearl.
+
+"There were some mountains in the distance, and he went towards them.
+While climbing up their sides, the sky, which had been bright blue, now
+became overcast. Black, thick clouds quickly gathered, till day seemed
+turned into night. Then there shot through the darkness a swift, bright
+flash, lighting everything up for a moment, then leaving all darker than
+before. He had not recovered from his astonishment when he heard a
+sudden crash, as if the mountain were splitting into pieces, followed by
+a long deep roll of boundless sound. Again and again he saw the
+lightning's flash and heard the thunder's roar. Then the raging ceased,
+the blue sky began to re-appear, the sun shone through the rain-drops,
+and on the departing clouds he saw an arch of many colours, beautiful in
+form and brilliancy--the lovely rainbow. He gazed at it with strange new
+feelings till it all melted away.
+
+"At night he always returned to his cell. This night, however, he was so
+full of the wondrous scene he had witnessed on the mountain that he
+stayed out of doors, walking up and down his familiar garden path with
+downcast eyes. He was deep in thought, when at last he raised his eyes,
+and instead of a clear sky he saw tiny points of light shining through
+the gray twilight. As the darkness deepened he saw myriads and myriads
+of these bright points--the stars. He wondered at the mystery.
+
+"He now began to meet with beings like himself, at first one or two,
+then many more. He found the difference in human beings was very great
+indeed. Some of them kindly came to him, and told him many things about
+the world in which he now daily lived. They taught him how to read books
+in which was written the wisdom of men who had lived long ago. Here was
+a new, wide opening, as he looked back into the past, into the times so
+very far away. But the books were not all old; some were written by
+living men, into which they had put their choicest thoughts, and they
+gave him an insight into the best part of a man--his soul and mind.
+Others told him of the wonderful discoveries made by clever men. They
+brought him a telescope, to look through to the stars at night; which
+stars, they told him, were other worlds, and that this little world
+where he lived was but a speck compared with the rest of creation. In
+looking through the telescope he saw into great depths--stars beyond
+stars, in number far exceeding his powers of thought. They showed him a
+microscope; and in looking through it he saw undreamt-of beauty in
+familiar flowers and insects, and in all natural objects. They told him
+of the useful and beautiful things that men had found under the
+ground--coal, metals, and precious stones. Some of these they showed him
+when polished;--the diamond, which seemed to have taken the rainbow to
+itself and given it back in a flash, now of pure, now of many-coloured
+light; the delicate opal, which looked like a rainbow vanishing; the red
+ruby, the green emerald, the violet amethyst, the clear crystal, and
+many more besides. They showed him lovely forms, that men had sculptured
+in white marble; and paintings representing many things--now a stormy
+sea with waves lashed into fury against the rocks--again a summer
+evening landscape whose calm soothed his spirit. Scenes from the old
+books were made to live again; and then, again, were painted familiar
+objects. Wherever he looked, he saw more to see; whenever he listened,
+he found there was more to hear. What surprised him most of all was,
+that there were some men who did not care to find out and learn more
+about the wonders in them and around them; and then he noticed that
+those who would not use their eyes, and ears, and other senses, became
+dim of sight and hard of hearing, gradually shrinking back into the
+state they were before they had opened the doors of their cells.
+
+"He thought of the barred door, and sometimes through its chinks he felt
+something steal as once the sea-breeze stole over his garden wall. The
+thought of that something followed him more and more.
+
+"By this time he knew that all sights were not fair to look upon, nor
+all sounds delightful; and whenever he saw and heard the sad and wrong,
+he seemed to be most conscious of the something beyond his cell. He felt
+that he was in the world not alone to learn its wonders, but also to
+teach the ignorant, to help the weak, to be kind, and true, and brave,
+and patient to all.
+
+"Knowledge was a good thing, but goodness was better. The longer he
+lived, he felt the less he knew; and the reason was, that he saw more
+and more clearly the vast extent of creation.
+
+"Then some one came to him and spoke of an old Book which told of the
+great Creator of the world, and that all its wonderful beauty was the
+work of His hand; that the sorrow and the wrong which he had seen around
+him were but for a time, for the Creator was also the Father of the
+universe, and had sent His Son into the world as its Saviour, and to die
+for its deliverance.
+
+"Afterwards he read in this Book the story of the life and death of this
+Son of God, who was also the Son of man; and he learned that a fuller
+and truer life lay beyond the things that are now seen. So with reverent
+feeling he waited, thinking much of the closed door.
+
+"At last, the bars were undone, the key was turned in the lock, the door
+was opened, the walls of his cell fell down, and he stood young and
+strong on the outside! Then he saw and heard things I cannot tell you
+about, so like the old, and yet so different. But he felt no fear; for
+he knew he was under the same wise, kind, righteous laws, under the
+Ruler of the universe, and that the kingdoms of the seen and the unseen
+are but one."
+
+THE END.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Woodside, by Caroline Hadley
+
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