2 THE BEGINNER'S GARDEN BOOK 



leaves, and each has the same purpose. This purpose is of 

 course unconscious; but it is nature's chief care that each 

 plant shall make seed. The seed is made by means of flowers. 

 If man did not interfere, the plants that are alive to-day 

 would go on, year after year, blossoming and making seed 



Fig. 1. — The Child and its Garden. 



A garden should be in proportion to the strength of the gardener. Note 

 the child's small patch. 



from which other plants would grow. This is true not only 

 of plants that sprout and die within a single summer, but 

 also of a tree that will live a thousand years. And although 

 nature has other ways to make plants, of which man takes 

 advantage, and although man interferes with the natural 

 growth of plants in the strangest ways, such as making a 

 plant grow from a leaf, it is still true that the most important 



