LEAVES AND STEMS WE EAT 153 



and is glad that there is not one less, for among 

 the cultivated vegetables there is not another 

 tribe of more wholesome foods than these. 



The seed of the onion has, within its outer 

 coat, a mass of starch, enclosing the bent embryo, 

 shaped like a pencil. The tip pushes out of the 

 shell, after the moisture and warmth in the soil 

 start it to growing. From a certain point in the 

 tiny shoot the growth is made in opposite direc- 

 tions. Downward goes the root: upward goes 

 the stem. But this is the end attached to the 

 seed, and that is lodged in the warm earth. The 

 seed is not lifted out of the ground, as peas and 

 beans are. Instead, the growing stem of the 

 onion forms a loop which comes out of the soil 

 looking like a very white hairpin, sticking straight 

 up ! Out of the bend there comes a leaf that rises 

 from the place where the root struck off toward 

 China. By the time this leaf is ready to do its 

 duty, the seed has withered, and its connection 

 with the hump of the stem dwindles to a thread. 

 This attenuated whip-lash breaks, and the stem 

 straightens, and one by one, other leaves form. 



The peculiarity of onion leaves is that they are 

 narrowly tubular above ground, and fleshy and 

 spreading, colorless, and still tubular just below 

 ground, and above the bunch of fibrous roots. 



