Whenever you look at a flower, I want you to remember that its bright flower leaves will soon fade and fall, and that its stamens will lose their pollen and wither away, but that the pistil or pistils will remain, turning at last into the ripened fruit,—the fruit which is the end, the aim, the object, of the plant’s life. [Illustration: Decoration] THE FIRST ARRIVAL [Illustration: Flowers] I should like to ask each of you children to tell me what flower you believe to be first to come in the spring. Some of you have never stopped to think about this. But there are sure to be a few among you who will name one special flower as the earliest of the year. Perhaps even in March you may have ventured into the woods to look for the lovely, fragrant, waxlike blossoms of the trailing arbutus. You know the sheltered hollow where the snow first melts; and there the delicate pink flowers make you glad with their beauty, and with the thought of the good time coming. To some of us this first hunt for the arbutus is one of the great events of the year. It means the beginning of long, delicious hours in the fresh air, with birds and trees and butterflies and wild flowers as our chosen companions. But not all of you will agree that this trailing arbutus is the first spring flower. Many think the violet can lay claim to this honor. The yellow violet especially may be found in the woods before the trees have put forth their leaves. And some say that the little blue liverwort (sometimes this is pink or white) is the earliest of all; and others vote for the spring beauty, or for the yellow adder’s tongue, or for the Dutchman’s breeches, or for the anemone. And still others say that the marsh marigold, the shining flower that in April gilds the wet meadows, leads the procession. But you are wrong, every one of you. The earliest blossom of the year makes its appearance long before any of these flowers you have mentioned. The first plant to blossom knows better than to proclaim the change of season by anything so fragile as a violet, an anemone, a spring beauty. It sends out its rather coarse little flowers under the protection of a tough waterproof hood, which shields them from the rude winds and nipping cold. This plant bears the ugly name of skunk cabbage (Fig. 196). Its broken stem and leaves give out an odor which at once persuades you that its title is deserved. [Illustration: FIG. 196] In the swamps the skunk cabbages send up by the dozen the curious purple hoods which curl about the thick clusters of little flowers. When you come across a colony of these queer-looking objects, no wonder it never occurs to you that the first flower of spring is at hand. The great shiny hoods look more like snails than like flowers; and indeed usually the flowers are not in sight at all, so well are they shielded by these hood-like leaves.