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17. 
THE ONION 
You must now try to find the ‘“/fuiry’s dancing 
skirt.” This is not easy. Take off a second tent 
and look inside of it. /¢ is lined with a most 
beautiful white gauze. With great care this can 
be pulled out entire, and you will see that you 
have a seamless skirt that would fit a fairy as tall 
as your finger. 
Hach ‘ tent” is lined with a “ fairy skirt.” 
Take the whole top of the onion apart and get out 
all the “skirts.” Are they the same size? 
Where are the larger ones? Where the smaller? 
Hold one of the skirts up to the light and examine 
it closely. 
Place the “tents” in a row, beginning with the 
smallest. Cover the smallest with the one next 
in size, this with the one next, and so on until 
you have built up the half again. You will 
now understand how the “tents” fitted over one 
another; or one inside the other. 
The same arrangement is true of the lower half. 
But to take the lower half apart you must first 
cut out the white mass or ‘cork’ at the bottom. 
If you do this, you will find that each tent is one 
half of a hollow ball; and that there are as many 
hollow balls as there are “ tents.” 
