March, 1900. 



Junior-Naturalist Monthly. 



Issued by the College of Agriculture and Experiment Station of Cornell University, 

 under Chapter 450 of the Laws of 1899, of the State of New York. 



Entered at the Post Office at Ithaca, N. Y., as second class matter. 



Vol. I. CORNELL UNIVERSITY, ITHACA, N. Y. No. 6 



THE COMING OF SPRING. 



While looking out of my window at the snow-covered fields and 

 frozen stream and listening to the roaring of the wind, I can scarcely 

 believe that spring is near. Spring enters onr world so slowly and 

 quietly that rarely are its first footsteps heard. Will our Junior 

 Naturalists listen for them this year. Will they know when the 

 hepatica first lifts its head, when the brook sings its first song, and 

 when the first green leaves unfold ? If so, spring will not take 

 them unawares — they will be waiting. 



Who in your club will find the first hepatica, I wonder ! Will it 

 be John or Tom or Henry or Nell ? Nell is a bright little girl and 

 unless the boys look out, she will find one some morning before 

 they are up. These small blue or purple blossoms, which many of 

 you call Mayflowers, sometimes appear before the snow has gone. 

 I was told once that anemones (the little wind flowers) are the first 

 to blossom. I hardly think this possible. They always stand so 

 erect on their slender stalks, that it seems to me they woiild be 

 injured by the cold more than the lowly hepaticas lying close to the 

 earth. However, I am not sure which is the earlier, and will ask 

 you to find out for me. For your dues, describe the first wild 

 flower vou find, and tell us where vou found it. 



A little plant is a wonderful thing. It takes its place in the world 

 in such a modest way that we usually treat it with indifference, but 

 the commonest flower or plainest weed has a most interesting life 

 story if we only knew it. Begin with the tiny seed, which dropped 

 to the ground last fall. Already the little plant inside the seed was 



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