Wait a day or two more and dig up the third bean. The stem is putting out wee roots. The leaves have come out of the bean and are trying to get to the top of the earth. The two thick halves of your bean are held, by little thread-like stems, to the main stalk of the new plant. The skin that was on the bean is now a small dry husk. In a few days your fourth bean will be well above ground. You will notice that the two thick halves of the bean you planted are now turning green, and look like thick leaves. At first they lay side by side. The skin was like a little cap over the ends of the two. Perhaps in that state the bean made you think of a new chick just out of the shell, with a piece of the shell still on its head. Did you ever see that? Soon the bit of husk falls away. Then these two parts of the bean spread from each other. One is on one side the stem, one on the other. They look like leaves. We call them “the seed-leaves.” You will see that as the plant grows, these shrink up. That is because the young plant is feeding on them. The thick part of the bean is the plant’s first food. The bean which you put in the middle of the pot has gone through all these changes. Its two little wrinkled leaves become greener and larger. Now they show their deep green color, and are of a heart shape. They have long stems. Between these stems is a little bud, or growing-point. It shoots up and puts out more leaves. By this time the thick seed-leaves are quite shrunk up and dead. Dig up that fifth bean, the last one on the side of the pot. Can you tell why the seed-leaves are dead? The plant has eaten up all the food in them. And now it has a strong root of fibres, and can take its own food from the soil. If you look near the roots of trees in the wood or garden, you will, no doubt, find oaks, cherries, maples, other little trees, in all these stages of growth. Your last bean-plant grows fast. It is tall and slim. It needs a stick to climb on. Notice how the stem winds around the stick. See, the new leaves are pale and smooth. As they grow, they become darker and have hairs on them. Break off a bit of stem and leaf. There is juice in them. That is sap. It runs all through the plant in little pipes or tubes. It carries in it the mineral food the root-mouths suck from the earth. By and by you will see a new thing in among the leaves. It is a bud, but not a leaf-bud. It is shorter and thicker than the leaf-buds, and it is twisted. As it grows, its green cover opens, and you see a little white, red, or purple color. This is the flower-bud. Slowly the colored petals unroll. If you have several flowers on your vine, you can take one to pieces, to look at all the flower parts. The seed-bag at the bottom of the pistil will be so small that you will not notice it.