"Now, one day in early spring, the sun, who makes the plants grow and
gives the colors to the flowers, heard the honeysuckle, which was
putting out green leaves on its strong vines, laughing at the bean and
morning-glory, that were just peeping from the earth.
"And the sun said, 'This is too bad. It is not fair for one who has so
much to make fun of those who have so little. I must give them more.'
"So, lo and behold, when the morning-glory vine began to bloom, instead
of having pale little flowers, they were a beautiful white and blue
and purple and rose color, and when the bean blossomed, it had a fine
scarlet flower, and both were more beautiful than the honeysuckle,
though the honeysuckle still had its sweet perfume, and its honey for
the humming-birds."
"But what about the twining?" asked Davy. "That is what you started to
tell."
"Why, yes, of course. I forgot that. Well, when the sun came to look
at them he said, first to the honeysuckle, 'Because you have been so
proud, you must follow me,' and to the bean and morning-glory, 'Because
you have been meek, you shall turn always to meet me,' and since that
day, the honeysuckle has turned always to the left, following the sun,
while the bean and the morning-glory have twined always to the right,
to meet it on every turn."
The Chief Gardener paused, seeing that Davy was making circles in the
air with his finger--first circles to the right, then more circles to
the left. Then the circles got slower and slower, showing that he was
thinking very hard.
"That's right," he said at last. "If they turned to the right, they
would meet the sun every time around, and if they turned to the left
they would be following it."
The Chief Gardener was glad he had told his story right.
"And then, by and by," he said, "I suppose people must have given them
their names--the honeysuckle's because of the humming-birds that came
to suckle the flowers, and the morning-glory's because it made each
morning bright with its beautiful flowers, while the bean they called
the scarlet runner, and when they found that its pods held good food,
they planted it both for its flowers and its usefulness, and valued it
very highly, indeed. Just where all this happened I do not know. The
honeysuckle and morning-glory now grow wild, both in Europe and the
United States, and the scarlet runner is said to have been found wild
in these countries, too, though I have never seen it except in gardens."
"Papa," asked little Prue, "haven't my morning-glories any useful
relations, like my sweet-pease?"
"Why, yes, of course, let me see. The sweet potato belongs to that
family. It is really about a first cousin, and useful drugs are made
from the juice and root of a wild morning-glory. There are hardly any
families that do not have both useful and ornamental members, and most
of them, I am sorry to say, have troublesome ones, too, which we call
weeds. But I must run away now, and all that will have to wait until
another time."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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