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Morning-Glory Stories (Morning-glory glowed)

The morning-glory glowed in the sunshine all day long, happy, no doubt, in the consciousness that the little seed-children had begun to grow. It was because of them the bees were made so welcome.

We can imagine the flower might feel like saying, "This is my seed-children's birthday party; come often, dear bees, and sip my nectar and take my pollen. But be like the good fairies and bring each a gift to my seedchildren." The bees buzzed and came and went and came and went.

Each time they took away nectar and pollen to their hives, and each time left something for the seed-children.

Do you suppose they left a cap of darkness, and a pair of seven-league boots, and a sword that always conquered, and a magic carpet that took people wherever they wanted to go, as the fairies used to do in the times when fairies were alive and came to the christenings of little children?

I do not think the bees brought any of these things to the birthday party of the seed-children.

The bees, not being real fairies, were obliged to bring what they could.

Now, the day that the pink morning-glory bloomed, a great many other morning-glories came out of their buds, and they all gave the bees a welcome.

They filled their cups with nectar and opened their boxes of snow-white pollen.

Such a feast as was spread for the bees!

Blue morning-glories, and pink and purple and white ones, on all sides they stood, fresh and smiling, and invited the bees to come.

And the bees came. They went from one to the other as fast as they could. They sucked up nectar from all, and took it home and made morning-glory honey of it. And they gathered snow-white pollen from all, and took it home and made morning-glory beebread of it.

But they did not carry home all the snow-white pollen. They bore some of it as gifts to the seedchildren.

The seed-children needed the pollen; they could not grow into seeds without it, and they needed the pollen from another flower, not that from their own. So the pollen the bees brought them was better far than caps or boots or carpets or any of those things the fairies used to bring to human children.

And this is why the morningglories made the bees so welcome. They could not take their pollen to each other, for they could not leave their stems; so they employed the bees to carry it for them. glories nodded to each garden. "I will send one said to another, and left a few friendly flower.

The morningother across the my bee to you," and the bee came grains of pollen from the In this way the morning-glories exchanged pollen all day that each had plenty of bors' pollen to give the The flowers lasted all sunset, and the nectar long, so fresh neighseed-children. day, from sunrise to lasted all day, and the snow-white pollen. But when night came the bees went home to sleep, and the morning-glories, too, slept. They rolled in the edges of their corollas so that the way to the nectar cups was closed.

Next day the morning-glories did not open again.

There was no more nectar in their cups and no more snow-white pollen in their anther cells. Other morning-glories came out of their buds and invited the bees, but these staid shut. Soon the corollas, faded now and no longer lovely to look at, fell off. Their work was done. They had been beautiful to show how happy they were and how lovely life was; by their beauty, too, they had brought the bees and gained the pollen they wanted to make other lovely flowers live. Now, their messages of love and happiness given, they fell off, and the pollen boxes, empty and withered, fell with them.

But they left behind life and hope, for each tiny seed had received its grain of life-assuring pollen. For only the corolla and the stamens fell. The seedchildren still clung to the stem; they lay in their cradles, nicely wrapped up by the green calyx leaves. And then the little stems that held the seed-babies ' cradles turned down and hid the little cradles under the leaves.

The seed-babies grew and grew. They would soon have outgrown their cradles, only the strange thing is, the cradles grew too! They grew as fast as the seeds and kept them snug and safe.

So all summer long, until the frost came and it was time for the morning-glories to take their long winter sleep, the buds opened in the morning. All summer long the bright morning-glories filled their cups with nectar and opened their boxes of snow-white pollen for the bees. And all summer long the seed-children received their pollen and grew and grew in their cradles that grew too. But after a while the green cradles turned brown. And after another while the brown cradles opened to let the seed-children look out, and as soon as this happened every little black seed-for they had grown quite black by this time fell out of its cradle!

It did not hurt it to fall out, for it tumbled and rolled down to the earth, where, at last, the wind came and covered it with leaves, as the robins covered up the babes in the woods. And the little black seed-babies lay there as snug as seed-babies could be. - Then the snow came and spread a blanket over them, and the leaves and the snow kept them as warm as they wanted to be until springtime came and the snow went away; and the seeds began to stretch themselves and think it was time to wake up and go out and see what was going on in the big world above.