STATU POMOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 97 



If you should g^o to school some day and see a new boy among the 

 scholars would you walk right past him, with scarcely a glance, 

 and pay no attention to him ? No, indeed ! You would notice 

 that he had blue eyes, a freckled nose, a hole in his jacket, etc. 

 And you would ask someone what the boy's name was, also his 

 father's name, Where does he live ? Is he going to stay ? What 

 does he do for a living? Has he relatives? And after learning 

 all you could about that boy you would play with him and call at 

 his home and invite him to yours. Someone might tell you he 

 belonged to the Davenport family, and his name was Jonathan. 

 You would call him Johnny or John, for short. Well, now, that 

 is just the way to get acquainted with the flowers. When you 

 are passing through the woods and fields and see a new flower, 

 pick it carefully, root, leaf and all, when possible. Take it home 

 or to school, find out its name, family, habits, etc., just as you did 

 Johnnie's. You will find it belongs to some family as John did 

 to the Davenports. Probably the flower, too, will have some 

 long, hard name, and some short handy English name. You can 

 learn the "nickname" when you are little and gradually as you 

 grow older, you will learn the Latin names too. 



Just as you invite Johnny to your home, bring the wild flowers, 

 too. They are shy and bashful often times and not used to the 

 food you may give them but if you will study their tastes you 

 can have a wild flower garden and little spots all about the 

 premises where they can live quite happily and so you may get 

 better acquainted. You scholars often give each other photo- 

 graphs of yourselves, but you may have something even better 

 than those of your flower friends. That is, an herbarium, or a 

 collection of pressed flowers. Begin now, while young, then you 

 will keep adding to it with renewed interest and knowledge as 

 the years go by. And while performing the labor of pressing 

 and mounting them you will fix their names and facts about them 

 in your memory. I have brought you, here, a few sheets of 

 mounted specimens of our earliest flowers, so that you may see 

 just how it is done. 



Gather them carefully taking the whole plant, root, stalk, leaf, 

 flower, and seed when possible. Spread them out between sheets 

 of unglazed paper, newspaper will do, although it is better to 

 have something unprinted ; then put boards and heavy weights 

 upon them and press them a week or more, until they are perfectly 



