224 THROUGH LIBRARY WINDOWS 



we loved them and thought them soldiers, and 

 in heart we do so still. I wonder does a boy 

 ever get quite over his boyish likes and loves ; do 

 they not all crop out sooner or later? I confess 

 mine do, and I am heartily glad of it; it helps 

 the proof of identity in spite of the seven-year 

 rule. But those mulleins, artists and poets love 

 them and celebrate them; and really they are 

 always picturesque. I have seen them in Ger- 

 many, in their gardens labelled "American Vel- 

 vet Plant," and have been asked to note its vel- 

 vety leaves and so they are here in this pasture. 

 How solemn they look on patrol duty, the squad 

 is small, but they hold me by those invisible 

 memory chords and I enjoy them; and so will 

 you if you study leaf and structure and take 

 home the flowering stalk and put it in water 

 and let it flower and for a week cheer you with 

 its fairy blossoms. 



On this side-hill were Milk-weeds, also 

 friends, for what boy or girl has not played with 

 its silken blossoms, gathering them for pillows 

 or dolls' beds or letting loose the fluffy down and 

 chasing to catch it again, or rubbed its milky 

 juice on pesky warts. I thought I knew the 

 milk-weed; yes, I did know it as a savory spring 

 relish under mother's cooking; I knew it as 

 something relished by the ugly striped caterpil- 



