every child, and certainly to every reader of the ROUND TABLE--the
pretty bluets, or Houstonia, whose galaxy of white or blue stars tints
whole spring meadows like a light snowfall. We have "known" it all our
lives. Perhaps we may have chanced to observe that the flowers are not
all constructed alike, but the chances are that we have _seen_ them _all
our lives_ without discovering this fact. If we pluck a few from this
dense cluster beside the path, we observe that the throat of each is
swollen larger than the tube beneath, and is almost closed by four tiny
yellow anthers (Fig. 1). The next and the next clump may show us similar
flowers; but after a little search we are sure of finding a cluster in
which a new form appears, as shown in Fig. 3, in which the anthers at
the opening are missing, and their place supplied with a little forked
stigma! The tube below is larger than the first flower for about
two-thirds its length, when it suddenly contracts, and if we cut it open
we find the four anthers secreted near the wide base of the tube. What
does it mean, this riddle of the bluets? For hundreds of years it
puzzled the early botanists, only finally to be solved by Darwin. This
is simply the little plan which the Houstonia has perfected to insure
its cross-fertilization by an insect, to compel an insect to carry its
pollen from one flower and deposit it upon the stigma of another. Once
realizing this as the secret, we can readily see how perfectly the
intention is fulfilled.
[Illustration: 1st Clump.--Flower enlarged. Insect's Tongue inserted.]
[Illustration: Pollen high on Insect's Tongue after withdrawal from
Blossom.]
[Illustration: 2d Clump.--Flower enlarged. Pollen thrust against high
Stigma at top and touching Pollen below.]
[Illustration: Pollen at Base of Insect's Tongue after withdrawal from
Blossom.]
[Illustration: 3d Clump.--Flower enlarged. Pollen thrust against low
Stigma.]
In order to make it clear I have drawn a progressive series of pictures
which hardly require description. The flowers are visited by small bees,
butterflies, and other insects. At the left is an insect just alighting
on a clump of the blossoms of the high-anther form indicated below it.
The black probe represents the insect's tongue, which, as it seeks the
nectar at the bottom of the tube, gets dusted at its thickened top with
the pollen from the anthers. We next see the insect flying away, the
probe beneath indicating the condition of its tongue. It next alights on
clump No. 2, in which the flowers happen to be of the high-stigma form,
as shown below. The tongue now being inserted, brings the pollen against
the high stigma, and fertilizes the flower, while at the same time its
tip comes in contact with the low anthers, and gets pollen from them. We
next see the insect flying to clump No. 3, the condition of its tongue
being shown below. Clump No. 3 happens to be of the first low-stigma
form of flowers, and as the tongue is inserted the pollen at its tip is
carried directly to the low stigma, and _this_ flower is fertilized from
the pollen from the anthers on the same level in the previous flower.
And thus the riddle is solved by the insect. From clump to clump he
flies, and through his help each one of the pale blue blooms is sure to
get its food, each flower fertilized by the pollen of another.
Another beautiful provision is seen in the difference in size of the
pollen grain of the two flowers, those of the high anthers being much
larger than those from the lower anthers. These larger grains are
intended for the high stigma, which they are sure of reaching, while
those of smaller size, on the top of the tongue, which should happen to
be wiped off on the high stigma, are too small to be effective for
fertilization.
HOW RUFUS TRAPPED THE BURGLARS.
BY WILLIAM HEMMINGWAY.
The squealing of dry snow under horses' hoofs awakened Rufus Walker. His
room was the nearest to the turnpike crossing. Perhaps that was why he
was the only sleeper in the railroad station at Winona to be aroused by
the approaching sleigh. It was a sleigh, that was certain; for now Rufus
could hear the smooth, easy, half-shuffling sound of the runners on the
well-packed snow. Who could it be travelling at that time of night? The
horses were going at a walk. Neither of them wore a bell. "Maybe some
one has come to wake up father and send a telegram," thought Rufus,
sleepily. But no, the sleigh bumped over the railroad tracks and passed
on. The boy heard the shrill crunching of the snow a few times more, and
then he fell asleep again. If he had only felt enough curiosity to get
up and look out of the window he would have seen something to make his
heart beat very fast indeed; but the cold air nipped the tip of his nose
and made it numb, and he buried his face in the blankets and slept.
Rufus Walker's father was the station agent and telegraph operator at
Winona, in the heart of a vast wheat-raising section of Dakota. For
miles the country stretched away in gentle undulations. In the spring
you looked out on a sea of waving, tossing green, crinkled and fretted
by every passing breeze. In the fall the green sea had turned to gold,
and those noisy ships, the mowing-machines, went clattering through it.
Now the vast expanse lay white and still under its frosty blanket. The
wheat harvest had been gathered into the barns, and for weeks little
Rufus had heard the farmers talking about "number one hard," and "number
one," and all the other varieties of the grain. Right opposite the
station and across the railroad track stood a grain elevator. Its
gigantic shape rose over the little station like a castle towering above
a tiny cottage. The farmers for miles around would begin to haul wheat
to the elevator to-morrow, for Mr. Price, Pillsbury's elevator
superintendent, had arrived that day. He had brought a satchel full of
packages of new crisp bank-notes, and fat little rolls of gold eagles
and double-eagles. He always paid cash for the wheat as he bought it.
That is the custom all through the wheat country.
The thick black bag of alligator-skin that held more than five thousand
dollars was locked in the safe that stood in the office of the grain
elevator. The money was the attraction that had brought the three men,
who silently got out of the sleigh in the shadow of the tall building.
They tied their horses to a ring near the office door, then stealthily
crept through the snow to the railroad station.
Little Rufus Walker woke up with a start. A big man with a handkerchief
tied across the lower part of his face was shaking him by the shoulder.
"How old are you, sonny?" asked the stranger.
"Ten years last August," Rufus answered, huskily.
"Well, you're old enough to have sense," said the man. "All you've got
to do is to keep still. We're just goin' to relieve Mr. Price of that
bag o' money. You keep still, d'ye hear?"
The big man strode out of Rufus's room and joined his two companions at
the further end of the hallway. They had gathered Mr. Price, Rufus's
father, Mrs. Walker, and big Tom Walker in one of the rooms. Evidently
the strangers had awakened Rufus last of all. He sat up, shivering, with
the blankets wrapped around him. His hair was standing up so straight
that it seemed to bend backward. His teeth chattered.
"Where's the boy?" he heard a strange voice ask.
"Oh, I left him in his bed!" replied the voice of the big man. "He's no
bigger than your thumb, and he--"
"Better bring him in here with the rest," said the strange voice.
"No; let him stay in his bed," said the big man's voice. "He ain't
sizable enough to make trouble. He couldn't live to go two miles to the
nearest house for help."
"All right," said the strange voice. "Now, Mr. Price, we don't aim to
bust your safe. If you was a polite gentleman you'd just skip over and
open her for us. However, we've got the little implements here, and
we'll have her open in less than an hour fair an' easy. Bill, you keep
these folks quiet till we whistle for you."
Rufus heard two men go down stairs. Then he heard them stamping through
the snow toward the grain-elevator. There was silence for five minutes
or so, and then he heard the "bink! bink! bink!" of hammers falling on
steel wedges. Rufus suddenly wondered if he couldn't call help in a way
the robbers hadn't thought of. He stealthily got out of bed and put on
his coat, trousers, and thick woollen stockings. His heart fluttered and
jumped so hard that he was afraid he'd lose it as he crept inch by inch
to the stairs that led down to the ticket and telegraph office. How glad
he was when at last he stole in there as silently as a ghost! How glad
he was that his father had encouraged him to learn how to telegraph! He
wasn't a fine operator yet, but he thought he could manage to telegraph
something useful. Very slowly he pulled out the plug in the switchboard
that cut in the instrument on the telegraph line. He threw over a little
brass lever so that the noisy "sounder" was cut off from the "relay"
instrument. He screwed the points of the relay down so fine that the
instrument ticked no louder than a watch. He tightened up the key, too.
From upstairs he could hear the gruff voice of the big robber as he made
jokes at the expense of his victims. Rufus knew that the night
train-despatcher at Springfield was always at the wire, so he
telegraphed,
"Sg--Sg--Wn!"
That meant, "Springfield, Winona is calling you!"
In a moment the relay ticked out, "Ay--ay--Sg." That meant that the
despatcher heard the call. Then Rufus, his fingers stiff from the cold
and clumsy with fright, bravely ticked this message:
"3 robrs hv held us up. 2 are brkg opn safe in elevator, and 1 is
guardg our ppl. Pls send help qk. Do you 13?"
This meant: "Three robbers have held us up. Two are breaking open the
safe in the elevator, and one is guarding our people. Please send help
quickly. Do you understand!"
The despatcher gave a quick "Ay, ay!" closed his key, and rushed out
into the railroad yard. Within two minutes a locomotive was running
westward toward Winona, eighteen miles away. Besides the engineer and
fireman, there were four freight brakemen in the cab. Each one had a
rifle. The engineer kept the throttle wide open until he was within a
mile of Winona. Then he shut off steam.
"Her headway'll carry her a long way," he remarked to his companions,
"and it's all down grade from here."
Within a quarter of a mile of Winona the fireman put all his strength on
the brake-wheel and brought the engine to a stop. The four brakemen
cautiously plodded up the track.
Little Rufus sat in the dark office, numb with cold and fear. Every
sense was on the alert. He thought the glare of the moonlight in the
snow would blind him as he gazed down the track, minute after minute,
through a knothole in the shutter. At last he saw a black dot away down
the track. The dot turned into four dots as it swung around the curve.
They came nearer, and he could make out the burly figure of Tim Ryan and
the other three brakemen, each with a gun resting across the hollow of
his left arm. The four figures silently passed by the office window,
and crossed over to the grain elevator. Rufus could still hear the
"bink! bink! bink!" of the hammers on the steel wedges. If he had dared
to follow, he would have enjoyed what happened. The door of the safe was
almost off when the robbers heard Tim Ryan's soft voice bidding them "Be
aisy, now, an' lift yere hands above yere heads!" The two thieves almost
fell over in their surprise.
The fourth brakeman easily captured the lone robber upstairs. Little
Rufus went up stairs as soon as the excited men stopped talking. When
the three thieves had been tied hand and foot, and Rufus had explained
to his father and mother how he had summoned help, everybody looked at
him in surprise.
"Weren't you scared?" asked his father.
"So scared I could hardly hold on to the key," said Rufus. "But I was
too scared to let go of it, too."
THE JOYS OF WINTER.
Hurrah for the joys of winter!
For the jolly sparkling weather,
For the lake like glass where the skaters pass,
For the flying flake and feather!
Hurrah for the fun of rushing
Down the long toboggan slide,
For the dash ahead of the winning sled
Round the curve of the steep hill-side!
Hurrah for the joys of winter!
Jack Frost and the boys are friends;
To the girl's bright face what a witching grace
The touch of his pencil lends!
Hurrah for the wild northwester,
And the crisp cold wintry night
When the rough wind blows and we toast our toes
In the glow of the hearth-fire's light!
THAT BIT OF LOOSE FLAGGING.
BY GEORGE GRANTHAM BAIN.
That piece of loose flagging should have been fixed long before. It was
one of those wicked, insidious suggesters of temptation which are quite
as bad in their moral effect as the temptation itself. Probably not a
man or woman stepped on that wobbling piece of stone but thought of the
possibilities that lay below it. Directly beneath were the vaults in
which were kept the millions on millions of silver and gold dollars
belonging to the government Treasury. The first thought that the loose
flagging suggested to the mind was always: Suppose it should turn over
and drop me into the vault where the gold is kept; and suppose it was as
easy to get out as to get in; and suppose--for I do not believe there
was any one wicked enough to want to steal the coin--suppose there was
no objection on the part of any one to carrying away as much gold as the
pockets would hold. What a jolly time one could have with it!
That is what Harry Holt thought every night when he left the Western
Union Telegraph Building and started home. He always crossed over to the
Treasury Department sidewalk and walked on the loose piece of stone.
There was no harm, he thought, in imagining all of the delightful things
that he could do with a pocketful of the gold. For he was quite sure
that even if the flagging was as loose as it seemed to the pressure of
his foot, and even if he could move it--and he was tempted often to
stoop and see--the top of the vault below was of heavy steel, and the
only thing he would get if the flagging gave way was a good bumping, if
not a broken leg. So the loose flagging was only a touchstone to a
little world in which Harry lived on his way home each night from his
telegraph desk--a world where all the hot summer days were made of trips
to Nova Scotia, and the winter of sunny sojourns in the everglades of
Florida.
"My wire's clear at both ends; I think I'll go home," said Harry to the
chief operator one hot night. It was five minutes before his time for
leaving the operating-room, and Western Union orders are strict. The
chief operator shook his head and went on. Harry turned sulkily back to
his desk and picked up a fan. On a night like this, when every one in
the room was steaming with the heat of the overcrowded room, the click
of the instrument before him and the hum of the other instruments all
about jarred on his nerves. He wanted to get to his little room uptown,
where at least he could take a plunge in the bath-tub if his blood was
overheated. He hated the slavery of the operating-room, and the set
rules that made him only a part of the machine to earn dividends for a
lot of New York people in whom he had no interest. Harry was not a
philosopher, or he would have said to himself that the surest way of
heating his blood still more, and increasing his discomfort on this
trying night, was to worry about something, to fret, to be discontented.
Well, five minutes is not a very long time. Harry took his coat on his
arm and his hat in his hand; for it was long past the hour when every
one but a few night-workers and an occasional policeman had gone to bed.
The electric lights sputtered and spit as he came out of the building,
and the hot white light dazzled him a little. Then the steam from the
overheated asphalt came up into his face as he cut across diagonally
toward the Treasury building. It looked cool and comfortable in its
dress of white marble, and Harry thought how pleasant the air must be
down in the sub-basement, far below the heat of the street. Then he
stepped on the loose flagging, his steps turning to it as naturally as
though there had been no other path, and the flagging gave way. It was
so sudden that he had no chance to struggle or to try to regain the
solid ground. Before he could even spread his arms to catch the edges of
the stones about the opening, he had fallen below the surface of the
sidewalk.
He had an awful consciousness that he was doing something wrong--as
though his dreams about that loose flagging had exercised some weird
influence on it, and so far loosened it as to make it give way under the
weight of his body. And he suddenly remembered that he had read
somewhere of a little army of watchmen who guarded the treasure vaults
with weapons in hand, and who had been known to shoot first and make
inquiries afterward. That would be very awkward, thought Harry; and all
of this passed through his mind in the little space of time which it
took for a fall of--well, he thought it was one hundred yards, but every
one knows that the Treasury vaults have ceilings no higher than the
ceiling of your room.
"Hello!" said a voice at his elbow. Harry had alighted somewhere. Just
how he had managed to do it after that tremendous fall without breaking
a leg he could not understand; but here he was on his feet, with no
evidence of any damage done, and opposite him was a pleasant-faced old
gentleman with a white beard, wearing a pair of steel-bowed spectacles
which gave his face a benevolent aspect. Just behind the old gentleman
was a stack of wooden boxes as high as the ceiling--and Harry saw now
that the ceiling was not so very high after all--and lying around the
room were white canvas bags with figures stencilled on them. There was a
table not far away, with a delightful-looking cold luncheon spread on
it, and there was a bowl of lemonade or something that looked like
lemonade with a big square piece of ice floating on its surface. Harry's
tongue had been parched all evening in the hot operating-room. He longed
for a little of that lemonade, but he hesitated to ask the stranger for
it.
"You came by the balloon route," said the old gentleman, not
inquiringly, but as though he stated a recognized fact.
"I really don't know how I came, sir," said Harry, finding his tongue.
"I didn't know I was coming."
"I fancied you came in a hurry. I see you haven't had time to put on
your coat," said the old gentleman.
Harry felt very much ashamed of his shirt sleeves, and he tried very
hard to put his coat on. But, curiously enough, whether it was from
embarrassment or some other reason which he could not understand, he
could not get his arms into the sleeves. Moreover, the more he tried,
the more the sleeves of his shirt showed a disposition to come off his
arms and leave him in a more embarrassing condition. In fact, all of his
clothing felt loose and unstable, and Harry was much worried for fear
that he would find himself in the presence of this critical old
gentleman without a stitch of clothing on. The old gentleman came to his
rescue.
"Never mind," he said; "we must make some allowance for the Czar's
messenger. I suppose it is hot in America for one so recently in
Russia."
Harry thought that the best way to do with his strange new acquaintance
was to agree with him. He seemed kindly disposed, if he was a little
eccentric. So Harry ventured to stammer out: "It is a little colder in
St. Petersburg."
"Of course it is," said the old gentleman, sitting down on a pile of the
canvas bags and rubbing his hands together. "The last messenger was
actually sunstruck. But he came in his fur-lined robes of office. You
were sensible to leave yours behind."
Harry accepted the tribute with a vague smile. He was a little puzzled,
but even in his uncertain mental condition he felt reasonably sure that
he had never owned any fur-lined robes. Still he was certain that any
one who left fur-lined robes behind on a day like this, whether they
were his own robes or those of some one else, was a very sensible person
and deserving of commendation.
"I suppose you have come after the fifteen millions for the Grand Duke!"
said the old gentleman.
"Not at all," said Harry, for he was seized with a fear that the old
gentleman might deliver to him some other man's property, and then have
him arrested for theft when the mistake was discovered.
"That's all right," said the old gentleman, reclining on the canvas
bags, and nodding his head encouragingly. "You can trust me."
"But I have not come from the Grand Duke," said Harry.
"What's that?" said the old gentleman, jumping up and speaking very
fiercely. Then he sat down again. "Of course you have," he said, calmly.
"Otherwise how would you be here, and how would you be able to carry it
away?" And Harry thought it best not to contradict him again.
"There is the lot over there," said the old gentleman, indicating
another pile of canvas bags just beyond, and to Harry's left. "It isn't
much of a load when you know how to carry it."
"Am I to carry all that?" asked Harry; for the bags looked as though
they might weigh a ton.
"And a very light load," said the old gentleman, nodding and smiling.
"Sit down." He pointed at the bags.
Harry was glad of the invitation, though an invitation to supper or to a
drop of that cooling lemonade would have pleased him more. The old
gentleman seemed to divine his thoughts, for he pointed at the lemonade
bowl, and said, with a smack of his lips, "A little later." Then he
motioned again to the pile of coin-bags. Harry threw himself down on
them. Then a dreadful feeling went through him. He felt as though he
were afire. The bags were hot--as hot as boiling water--so hot that he
sprang from them with a scream.
[Illustration: "YOU ARE AN IMPOSTOR. YOU ARE A THIEF."]
"What's that?" said the old gentleman, springing up. "Then you're not
the Czar's messenger. You haven't the key. You are an impostor. You are
a thief."
He caught up one of the canvas bags on which he had been sitting. It
burst, and the yellow gold pieces flew out in a shower on Harry's head.
Each of them seemed to burn a hole where it struck. Harry fell to the
floor. The old gentleman caught up another bag and poured its contents
over Harry. His face had the expression of a fiend now. More and more
gold he poured on Harry's prostrate form, until all but his head was
quite hidden from view. Each gold piece burned, and burned, and burned.
The heat was intolerable. Harry screamed with the pain of it.
"What's the matter with you, Holt?" said a voice in his ear. The
chinking of the gold pieces as they fell seemed like some old familiar
sound. Some one took hold of his shoulder, and the voice said again,
"Here, what's the matter with you!" The chinking now was like the
clicking of the telegraph instruments in the operating-room. Harry
opened his eyes and looked about him. The old gentleman was gone; the
bags of gold were gone. The old desk was under his arm, and the chief
operator was bending over him.
"Your time's up, Harry," he said. "I thought you were in a hurry to get
home. This isn't a very good place to sleep on a hot night, anyhow."
The clock on the wall opposite said half past two; it was twenty-five
minutes past when Harry had told the chief operator that he wanted to
go. He had been asleep perhaps three minutes, and every garment on him
was wet with perspiration. His hat and coat were not in his hands. He
looked for them, and then he remembered. They were still in the closet.
He got them, and walked slowly down the four flights of stairs. When he
came out on Fifteenth Street his footsteps turned instinctively in the
direction of the Treasury building. But Harry resolutely turned them the
other way.
"I don't want any more dreamland riches," he said, as he thought of the
old gentleman and his red-hot coin.
[Illustration: INTERSCHOLASTIC SPORT]
In the lull following upon the activity of football, and preceding track
athletics and baseball, I shall devote as much space as possible in this
Department to comment on seasonable sports, and on the methods for
training and preparation for spring work. So many letters come each week
asking for suggestions about training, especially for the running
events, and requesting information on the various outdoor sports for ice
and snow, that it seems advisable to award to these subjects the
preference, for the next few weeks at least. Concerning training for
field sports, I shall endeavor to treat of putting the shot in an early
number of the ROUND TABLE, and soon afterward we shall have hints and
advice on training for the sprints and the middle distances. This week I
want to devote almost all available space to the prime winter sport of
curling, about which I have been asked for a description by a number of
correspondents in the Northern and Western States and Canada.
[Illustration: A CURLING-MATCH.]