WHY TOMMY FELT ASHAMED 61 



This Bellwort has besides a near relative which 

 he hopes to find in the woods. The way he will 

 know it from the one he already has is because 

 its leaves will clasp the stem even more closely — 

 so closely that they will look as though they were 

 pierced by the stem. The little bells then will 

 hang out above these leaves, and as Tommy says 

 they are fragrant, I think perhaps I shall care 

 more for this relative called Perfoliate Bellwort 

 than for the one which we have just seen. 



There was a reason, Tommy said, that he sel- 

 dom went to the woods where he had found the 

 Bellwort, although once his favorite bunks were 

 there. He meant the woods the other side of 

 Uncle Hiram's, which belong to Miss Amelia, his 

 mother's friend. It wasn't because he didn't want 

 to go, he said, but because he once did something 

 there that made him ashamed. 



Grandmother asked him how that could be, and 

 then he told us this story: 



" Before last year," he began, " I had never 

 seen a flower called Lousewort, or Wood Betony. 

 I had read about it, and seen pictures of it, and 

 I knew besides that it was a curious wild flower. 

 But I had never found it, although I had hunted 

 for it much more than I have this year for Wake- 

 robins. 



" It's a flower that can't be mistaken. It's just 

 one of the few that has a look something like an 

 animal. You may think it very strange, but each 



