Finally, there is the question of fruit. In the fig and mulberry the fruit is succulent, and depends for its dispersion upon birds and animals. In the nettle it takes the form of a tiny, seed-like, flattened nut. Why is this, again? One might as well ask, why are we not all Lord Chancellors or Presidents of the Royal Academy. Each plant and each animal makes the best of such talents as it has got, and gets on by their aid; but all have not the same talents. One survives by dint of its prickles; another by dint of its attractive flowers; a third by its sweet fruit; a fourth by its hard nut-shell. As regards stings, the nettle is one of the best protected plants; as regards flower and fruit, it is merely one of the ruck. Every plant can only take advantage of any stray chances it happens to possess; and the same advantageous tendencies do not show themselves in all alike. It is said that once a certain American, hearing of the sums which Canova got for his handicraft, took his son to the great man's studio, and inquired how much he would ask to make the boy a sculptor. But there is no evidence to show that that aspiring youth ever produced an Aphrodite or a Discobolus. WASHINGTON IRVING During the course of the revolution that changed the British colonies in America into the United States, there was born in the city of New York the first great writer of this new nation, Washington Irving. The parents of Irving had been in America but twenty years, the father being Scotch and the mother English, yet they sympathized so fully with the colonists that they spent much of their time and means in caring for the soldiers held as prisoners by the British. The mother was unusually warm-hearted and charitable, but the father, though a kind and conscientious man, was very strict, especially in dealing with his children. He seemed to feel that nearly every kind of amusement that young people delighted in was sinful, and he held up before his children such sober ways of living that Washington at least came to think that everything pleasant was wicked. No amount of sternness, however, could keep the five boys of the family and their three sisters wholly out of mischief, nor hinder them from having many a harmless good time. [Illustration: Washington Irving 1783-1859] After spending two years in a primary school, Washington was sent when six years old to a school kept by a soldier who had fought in the Revolution, a man who dealt most harshly with disorderly pupils. Though Washington was always breaking rules, he was so honest in admitting the wrong done that the teacher had a particular liking for him, and would call him by the envied title of "General." To bear this title, as well as the name of the foremost American of that time, and to have received a blessing from the great Washington himself, was honor enough for one boy.