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hours they must burst open. And you know that each 
new day may bring with it some happy surprise, —a 
bird, a leaf, or a flower that you have not seen for many 
a long month. 
So when you find the willow branches set thick with 
silken pussies, you know that a happy time has begun, 
at least for you country children. | 
And even the city children learn to love these soft 
pussies when they are placed in tall vases on the teach- 
er’s desk. i 
If you look carefully at the different branches, you 
see that they bear different kinds of pussies; and 
your teacher will tell you, or perhaps you will dis- 
cover yourselves, that these different branches were 
broken from different trees. 
Do you know what each “pussy,’’ or tassel, is 
made up of? 
Each tassel is made up of many tiny flowers. 
Sheds But willow flowers are built on quite a different 
plan from cherry flowers. If you pick apart one of 
these tassels, and examine a single blossom, you will 
find it hard to believe that it is a flower at all. 
On-one branch the tassels are all golden yellow. 
The flowers that make up these yellow tassels have 
neither flower leaves nor pistils. Each blossom has 
two stamens which are fastened to a little fringed leaf, 
and nothing more. Such a flower, much magnified, is 
given in the picture (Fig. 197). The golden color comes 
from the yellow pollen which has been shaken from the: 
dust boxes. 08 tients Soe 
The other branch is covered -with silvery green 
