Page:Henry B. Fuller - Bertram Cope's Year, 1919.djvu/191

. Why the Sassafras has Three Kinds of Leaves."

Pearson stopped his buzzings, and Cope began. "The Wood-nymphs," he said slowly, "were a nice enough lot of girls, but they labored under one great disadvantage: they had no thumbs."

Hortense pricked up her ears. Did he mean to be personal? If so, he should find that one of the nymphs had a whole hand as surely as he himself had a cheek.

Cope paused. "Of course you've got to postulate something," he submitted apologetically.

"Of course," Medora agreed.

"So when they bought their gloves, or mittens, or whatever their handgear might be called, they usually patronized the hickory or the beech or some other tree with leaves that were——"

"Ovate!" cried Medora delightedly.

"Ovate, yes; or whatever just the right word may be. But a good many of them traded at the Sign of the Sassafras, where they found leaves that were similar, but rather more delicate."

"I believe he's going to do it," thought Foster.

"Yet the nymphs knew that they lacked thumbs and kept on wanting them. So, during the long, dull winter, they put their minds to it, and finally thumbs came."

"Will-power!" said Medora.

"And early in April they went to the Sassafras and said: 'We have thumbs! we have thumbs! So we need a different sort of mitten.'