"No, Prue, I don't think so. I think all the world of nature is harmony, like sweet music, and the flowers with their beauty and sweetness are part of it, but I think that just as we may attract friends and good servants by kindness and offering something in return, so the flowers attract the bees and butterflies, and even a little girl and boy to keep the weeds away. The more a flower depends on an insect to carry its pollen, the gayer or sweeter that flower always is. The orchids, which are almost the finest flowers in the world, seem to be made especially for the insects, and they could not do without them, any more than the insects could do without the flowers." "And is that what makes some flowers such funny shapes, too?" "I think it is. The foxglove, and the horse mint, and many others, have curious shapes and forms, just to fit their little helpers, and the milkweed has a funny little saddle-bag which it hangs to the bee's feet, so that he can carry it to another plant. There is another kind of a milkweed which is very cruel, for it attracts small insects by its odor, and when they come they are caught by a sticky substance and held until the weed sucks them down and really eats them, much as we eat our food. So, you see, plants are a good deal like people, just as I told you the other day." "You said they could sleep, too." "Yes, your rose-moss closes up every night, shuts its eyes just as you do, and rests. Many flowers close at night, and some even droop their heads quite low, like the bird, which sleeps with its head beneath its wing." III A FLOWER MAY REALLY REASON HOW beautiful was the September garden! The wild sunflowers were all in bloom like a wall of gold. A bunch of black-eyed Susans at the corner of the house seemed trying to imitate its large cousins, and was just as bright and yellow, too, in a small way. The little Susans had not been planted, but had strayed in out of the field somewhere, perhaps longing to be with people. A row of bright red cockscombs made a crimson line of plumes down one side of a garden-path, and just beyond them Davy's third planting of beans was in full bearing. Prue's pinks and sweet-pease bloomed on and on, and her alyssums and the other sweets became sweeter every day. "Do you think all these things like to be together?" Prue asked, one afternoon, as they sat looking at them from the shade of the peach-tree. "I think those that grow well do," said Davy. "They seem to, anyway."