Part 20 (1/2)

Margery ran and brought the seed box, and found the package of corn

It looked like kernels of gold, when it was opened

”May I help?” Margery asked, when she sa pretty it was

”If you watch me sow one row, I think you can do the next,” said her father

So Margery watched Her father took a handful of kernels, and, stooping, walked slowly along the line, letting the kernels fall, five or six at a tientle, throwing olden seeds trickled out like little showers, very exactly It was pretty to watch; it raph of a famous picture called ”The Sower” Perhaps you have seen it

Putting in the seed was not so easy to do as to watch; soh; but her father helped fix it, and soon she did better

They planted peas, beans, spinach, carrots, and parsnips And Margery's father made a row of holes, after that, for the tomato plants He said those had to be transplanted; they could not be sown from seed

When the seeds were in the trenches they had to be covered up, and Margery really helped at that It is fun to do it You stand beside the little trench and walk backward, and as you walk you hoe the loose earth back over the seeds; the saain Then you rake very gently over the surface, with the back of a rake, to even it all off Margery liked it, because now the garden began to look LIKE a garden

But best of all was the work next day, when her own little particular garden was begun Father Brown loved Margery and Margery's arden to be perfect, and that rass would begin to coreen” soil, and that it wouldto have any such thing for his two ”little girls,” as he called thearden very fine! This is what he did

After he had thrown out all the turf, he shoveled clean earth on to the garden,-- as rass was in that Then it was ready for raking and fertilizing, and for the lines The little footpaths were hed hen they saw it, for it looked like soardeners do it when he was a little boy, and he did it very nicely: he walked along the sides of the square, with one foot turned a little out, and the other straight, taking such tiny steps that his feet touched each other all the tih for a person to walk

The wider path was ht, of course, all the floould be put in as the vegetables were; but she found that it was not so For soer; for some, he made very shallow ditches; and sohtly over the top of the ground

Margery and herout how the floould look prettiest, that arden At the back were the sweet peas, which would grow tall, like a screen; on the two sides, for a kind of hedge, were yellow sunflowers; and along the front edge were the gay nasturtiuarden froetable patch by the tall flowers on the sides The two front corners had coreopsis in them Coreopsis is a tall, pretty, daisy-like flower, very dainty and bright And then, in little square patches all round the garden, were planted white sweet alyssuolds, tall larkspur, many-colored asters and zinnias All these lovely flowers used to grow in our grandardens, and if you don't knohat they look like, I hope you can find out next summer

Between the flowers and the arden; all the things Mrs Brown had na so cunning as the little round lettuce-seeds They looked like tiny beads; it did not seereen lettuce leaves could come from those But they surely would

Mother and father and Margery were all late to supper that evening

But they were all so happy that it did not ht of, as she went to sleep at night, was the dear, sarden, with its funny foot-path, and with the little sticks standing at the end of the rows, labeled ”lettuce,” ”beets,”

”helianthus,” and so on

”I have a garden! I have a garden!” thought Margery, and then she went off to dreamland

THE LITTLE COTYLEDONS

This is another story about Margery's garden

The next ery was up and out at six o'clock She could not wait to look at her garden To be sure, she knew that the seeds could not sprout in a single night, but she had a feeling that SOMETHING arden was just as sht before, and no little seeds were in sight

But a very few ery went out, there was a funny little crack opening up through the earth, the whole length of the patch Quickly she knelt down in the footpath, to see Yes! Tiny green leaves, a whole row of theery knehat she had put there: it was the radish-row; these must be radish leaves She exaht know a radish next tier nail, grew in twos,--two on each tiny steery flew back to her mother, to say that the first seeds were up

And her ery, came to look at the little crack