Little Plant People: Part I..
By Annie Chase, fl. 1900.
Dansville, N.Y.: F. A. Owen Publishing Company., c1903.

No. 1

Little Plant People

PART I

By Annie Chase

F. A. OWEN PUBLISHING COMPANY

Dansville, New York.

Copyright 1903 by F. A. Owen Publishing Company, Dansville, N.Y.

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Author's Preface.

Anna Botsford Comstock of the Bureau of Nature Study at Cornell University says: "Truly the child cares very little about the forms of things. He is more interested in what things do."

J. M. Coulter of Chicago University says: "They [plants] are as much alive as are animals, and so far as mere living is concerned they live in much the same way."

This little book has been prepared with a view to interesting the little people in the behavior of plants at home, the author believing that there the growing things teach their choicest and most broadening lessons.

A.C.

Illustration

WHERE DO THE LITTLE PLANT PEOPLE LIVE?

Plants! Plants! Plants!

Plants all over our big world!

Plants on the land!

Plants on the water!

Some of these dear little plant people love to live high, high up among the mountains.

There the wind is merry and often rough in his play.

There the sunbeams are bright and strong and go dancing up, up, up steep rocky slopes, or down,

Some other plant people – most of these are dwarfs – love to live up on the hillside and even up on the sides of the gray old rocks themselves.

Other plant people love the meadow lands.

There the winds have the jolliest of jolly times.

There the sunbeams sparkle so with fun they make the brook laugh

No wonder the plant people of the meadow love their home and will have no other.

Still other plant people love to live in the woods.

There the winds put on their gentlest manners.

There the sunbeams are soft and tender and the shadows, long and cool.

Some little plant people live in the ponds and ditches and streams and have the oddest balloons and sails to keep themselves afloat.

Other plant people – many of these are giants – love to live in damp, hot, sunny swamps. Others live in the deep, wide, salty sea.

WHAT ARE ALL THE PLANTS DOING?

Every plant on the mountain, in the lowlands, on the hills, in the meadows, in the woods, in the streams, in the damp swamp, and in the deep wide sea, has work to do.

Every plant must feed itself.

Every plant must see that when itself shall die a new plant just like it shall come to take its place on the earth.

Oh! What a task!

Yes; and you can never find a

PLANTS AT SCHOOL.

Do the plant folks go to school?

Oh yes; their school room is roofed with the blue, blue sky.

The breezes, the brooks, and the birds, do the singing in the plant school.

The sun does a great deal of the teaching.

Every plant, little or big, can stand or sit or lie down in school, just as he likes.

What do plant scholars study?

Cooking! They learn how to find, mix and cook their own food.

The big grown-up plants and the babies all study the same lessons, and if the lessons are not learned the plants die.

That frightens you! It does not frighten plant people; they find the lessons as easy as you do the eating of ice cream.

It is great fun for a little plant to mix together air and water and some

This they did till you would have laughed to see how round and roly poly they looked.

When they were swollen just enough, they learned – I cannot tell you how – that they needed something to eat.

That something was down in the soil.

"We must have a tool to dig in the soil with!" cried all the babies.

"Make your own tools," cried the sun. "Make your own tools; you can if you work hard and fast."

"All right, we can make them." said the plant children.

"Roots are good tools," cried they all; "lets make roots."

"We will," cried a plant inside an acorn shell, "and the soil will help us."

The soil did help the plant children and the plant children helped themselves till there was the acorn child with a fat white root backing out of the end of her shell.

There was a bean with a nice little root growing right out of her side.

Pumpkin Seed had a root growing out at the small end of her shell.

All these and a hundred other

"Bravo," cried the Sun Teacher, "Now for a new lesson."

"We must have light;" cried the Acorn child.

"Light! light! please give us light!" cried all the children.

"Work for it; earn it yourself;" said the Sun Teacher.

Then all the little plant children dug in the soil with their roots as hard and as fast as they could.

With their roots they found they could draw up food somewhat as you draw up lemonade through a quill.

This food made them grow larger.

"Light! light! Where is it? How are we to get to it? We feel it up above us."

"Light! give us light, so we can grow faster!" cried the plant children.

"See me," said the Bean child, "I have left my shell altogether; I wish to spread myself out in the light."

"Stems will push us up into the light," cried all the plant children.

How did they know this? "Stems will push us up, let us make stems."

Then all these first grade little folks made themselves stems from the food they drew up through their roots.

Now for a push and a pull cried these brave little folks.

They pushed, and the light up above helped them by pulling, till there were ever so many odd little loops made of their stems pushing up above the soil into the light.

The Sun Teacher kissed every one of these brave little pupils.

"We too must get our tops up in the light ," said Acorn.

"Yes," cried all the little plant folks, "now for another pull."

Then all of the little plants made their stems longer and longer, stronger and stronger, and how they did pull, till – hurrah! there they all were out of the soil, spreading their tops where the sun could smile on them.

"Light! light! hurrah! Here we are in the light!" cried all the pupils together.

Then all the older scholars – the trees and vines and shrubs – clapped their hands and the winds whispered all sorts of pretty and pleasant things to the baby class.

MORE LESSONS.

No sooner had the little plant folks learned these lessons than the Sun Teacher and the air began to teach them others.

"We need something more," cried the little plants. "What is it?"

"It is not enough that we draw up food from the soil," said the Acorn child. "We must mix other things with it and cook it in the Sun."

"How shall we do that?" said a pumpkin child.

"We must make something to

SOME SECRETS ABOUT THOSE LEAVES.

No wonder the plants were proud of their leaves.

They had made them very cunningly.

They had made them with little cells to hold food and water and with little openings in them to let air and moisture out and in.

Then they had covered the whole with a nice little waterproof covering, both to keep water in and to keep too

THE BEST LESSON OF ALL.

After the first leaves it was easy to make more and more and more, then more stems and branches.

Then these bright little pupils began to think of something else.

"We must take care that we leave some seeds so there will be new

Then the plants waved their gay blossom banners in the breeze till the bees afar off saw them and came hurrying up.

"Buzz! buzz! honey! There is always honey hidden under such pretty banners," said the. bees.

"Where is it? Where is it?"

"Oh! we smell it!"

Then the bees blundered about inside the blossoms till they shook the gold out of the pocket book and rubbed it right on the sticky knob on the stem at the center.

"Thank you! thank you!" said the plants as the bees buzzed off. "Thank

A FUR COVERED BUNDLE.

Lady's Slipper (wild tulip), that pretty pink flower you find growing in shady nooks under the trees, wears furs – or is it green velvet?

She comes up with a little velvet roll of green looking full of mystery.

What can be done up in that fuzzy bundle?

The bundle unrolls a little; it is a leaf with another precious furry bundle done up inside of it.

The second bundle unrolls a little!

Aha! there is a furry stem inside; on the end of the furry stem is a furry knob.

Up pushes the stem for the sun is warm and the spring winds are very soft and gentle.

The knob unrolls! a slipper! a slipper! a little pink slipper with pink fur at the ankle part to keep off the insects! Is it for some sweet little Cinderella of the green-wood?

PLANT FURS.

Many of the plants wear furs to keep out the cold. The furs keep in the moisture too, and keep insect robbers from coming into the honey store house to steal.

You would laugh to see an ant trying to climb a furry stem for honey.

He climbs up one step, he falls down three steps; he tries it again; he gets tangled in the fur; it brushes his eyes unpleasantly, till, at last down he tumbles and brave as he is, he has to give up that drop of honey,

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F. A. OWEN
PUBLISHING
COMPANY
DANSVILLE
N.Y.