THISTLE-DOWN 



THE WAY OF A SEED 



EVEN the turn of the leaf does not more emphatically 

 impress on us the mood of autumn than the dispersal of seed. 

 It is true that the way of a seed in the air is not autumn work 

 only, for our year is spread wide. Many seeds, including 

 the barren seed of trees, are scattered in spring ; then again 

 we may find a real instance of the kinship of the two 

 equinoctial seasons. Seeds are scattered throughout the 

 summer ; but it may be said that the work of spring and 

 summer has been preparation for the scattering of seeds in 

 autumn. 



Almost all writers who have moralised at all on the vast 

 fertility of plants have regarded the colossal scale of seed 

 production as a waste. Some almost scold Nature for taking 

 this wasteful way. It is not rare for plants, even plants of 

 no great age or appearance, to produce ten thousand seeds. 

 Most people are familiar with the correction that Tennyson's 

 scientific friends imposed upon him in this reference. ' Of 

 fifty brings but one to birth ' became in the later edition ' Of 

 myriads.' But the seeds that do not come to birth or are 

 still born are not to be regarded as waste. There are birds 

 and beasts to be fed ; and the seeds are the chief of their 

 diet. The squirrels cut open the fir cones. The mice carry 

 loads of small seeds into old thrushes' nests for winter feed. ' 

 The thousand sycamore seeds that fall and sprout produce 



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