15. "If these resources fail to yield anything, I have learned to look between the leaves of the suckers which spring thickly from some horizontal limb, for now and then one lodges there, or in the very midst of an alder clump, where they are covered by leaves, safe from cows which may have smelled them out. If I am sharp-set, for I do not refuse the blue-pearmain, I fill my pockets on each side; and as I retrace my steps, in the frosty eve, being perhaps four or five miles from home, I eat one first from this side, and then from that, to keep my balance."

JOHN BORROUGHS.

26.

- APPLES IN THE CELLAR.

THAT is a barrel of russets;

But we can hardly discuss its

Spheres of frost and flint,

Till, smitten by thoughts of spring,
And the old tree blossoming,
Their bronze takes a yellower tint,
And the pulp grows mellower in 't.

But oh when they 're sick with the savors
Of sweets that they dream of,

Sure, all the toothsomest flavors
They hold the cream of!

You will be begging in May

Leave them alone, I can find
Better apples for you.

Those are the Rhode Island greenings,
Excellent apples for pies;
There are no mystical meanings

In fruit of that color and size :
They are too coarse and too juiceful;
They are too large and too useful.

There are the Baldwins and Flyers,
Wrapped in their beautiful fires;
Color forks up from their stems,
As if painted by Flora,

Or as out from the pole stream the flames
Of the northern aurora.

Here shall our quest have a close:
Fill up your basket with those ⚫

Bite through their vesture of flame,
And then you will gather

All that is meant by the name,
"Seek-no-farther."

1. How many of us, when we partake of bread, ever give ourselves a thought about what kind of plant we are

eating. We know that bread is made of flour, and that wheat is grown by the farmer; but how many of us know that the wheat plant is a grass, and that the wheat itself is the fruit of that grass? If not to all mankind, certainly to the Caucasian race, bread is the most important article of food.

2. The most numerous and respectable members of the great grass family are those which bear the name of wheat. There are an immense number of different sorts, and we know them best as summer and winter wheats. To what part of the earth these valuable grasses are indigenous will probably never be known. There is reason to believe, however, that Tartary and Persia are the native countries of wheat, oats, and rye. Winter cold does not affect the wheat, for that sown in spring escapes it, and that sown in autumn is protected by a covering of snow. Wheat keeps a respectful distance of twenty degrees from the equator; but on the elevations in warm climates it is successfully grown, as on the elevations near Quito, almost directly under the equator. And on the north side of the Himalaya mountains wheat and barley flourish at an altitude of thirteen thousand feet.

3. The rye branch of the grass family is very much like wheat in appearance and in habit, and is extensively cultivated in temperate and cold countries. In Russia, Germany, and parts of France, rye is in great request; and one-third of the population of Europe look to its help for daily bread. In this country rye is also largely cultivated and consumed.

4. Oats, a grass whose fruit is not closely set in dense spikes, as are wheat and rye, but in loose and open panicles, flourishes as far north as Norway and Sweden. In some

countries it forms an important article of diet. Scotch bone and muscle are largely indebted to oatmeal porridge and milk, almost the only food of the sturdy Scotch peasantry.

5. Barley is extensively cultivated in Scotland, and in the Orkney, Shetland, and Faroe islands. In Western Lapland barley may be found as far as Cape North, the most northern point of the continent of Europe. It is grown in Russia, on the shores of the White Sea, beyond Archangel. But over a great part of Northern Siberia no barley will live; and as the potato has found its way into such barren districts only here and there, the country which is too far north for barley is too far north for agriculture. There lichens, roots, bark, and a few scanty fruits, offer almost the only plant-food to the nomadic population. Barley grows rapidly, and soon matures, is impatient of a baking sun, and is thus well adapted to the short summers. of extreme northern latitudes.

6. But what shall be said of rice? If regard be had to the number of people it sustains, it is a more important grass than even wheat. All India and all China subsist upon it. Large quantities of rice also are grown in Italy and Spain, as well as in South Carolina, whose rice is perhaps the best in the world.

7. Maize, or Indian-corn, yields us, perhaps, the largest fruit of all the grasses. A roasting ear is certainly a very large fruit for a grass. The whole plant is the largest grass that grows in this country, at least in the North. In the South are very tall and large grasses, growing by marshes and river banks, forming the well-known canebrakes, from which are obtained the long, fine fishing-rods, of almost perfect straightness, elegantly tapering to a point, and possessed of marvelous strength and elasticity.

8. Sugar-cane, about the size of Indian-corn, and looking very much like it, also belongs to the Southern States. Its fruit, however, is nothing but little seeds, with long, white, silky hairs. In the cultivation of the sugar-cane the plants are not allowed to come to flower and fruit, but are cut down just as they begin to blossom, because then the stalk is full of sugar. In many localities the proper time for cutting is indicated by the first gnawing of the destructive rats, who know very well when the cane has reached its highest degree of sweetness. The stalks are carried to the mill, where they are passed between rollers that press out the sweet sap, which is then boiled and left to stand to form sugar and syrup. In countries where the sugar-cane grows, it is universally eaten. Everybody sucks the juicy cane, even the baby comes in for his share.

9. Nearly all grasses have three stamens to each little flower. There is hardly anything prettier to look at than the graceful forms of the light, bending grass, as it waves its trembling little heads of flowers in the breeze, when the threadlike stamens with their golden knobs peep out from the rows of flowers and dangle in the sunlight. Sometimes the little knobs are a delicate purple color; sometimes they are a golden yellow, which they usually are when the pollen is ripe and ready to be carried away. Then tap the grass-stem lightly, and you will see the fine dust floating off like a little cloud.

10. You can always know a grass from any other plant: it has split sheaths. These sheaths are thin, leafy tubes, inside of which is the stem. The leaves grow out of the top of the sheaths, and are always narrow, ribbon-like, running to a point. The stem goes up through the sheaths.