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 defied the frost. I had a curiosity to know what kind of a judge of the weather a person would make who couldn't tell a plant from a weed, I am going to hand your name to the society on natural science for a diploma as an eminent naturalist."

"Now stop, Walter," closing his mouth with her hands, "just because I happened to pull up the rest of it, thinking it was a weed which it exactly resembles."

"As much as a lemon does an orange," said he with as much distinctness as she would let him. "I am proud of such a distinguished sister, for the important acquisition she will make to the science of Botany."

"Well, I don't care if you have covered it up, it looks so smiling when every thing around it is killed. Here it is the middle of November, and a plant in bloom out of doors, but it does not look half as interesting to me now, as when I thought it resisted the cold of its own strength. I had watched it with a great deal of interest."

"I knew that would spoil it for you, you are such a philosopher, but I love it all the more, it looks so grateful for my care," and he petted it as if it had been a conscious thing.

"There's no knowing but it might have been just so if you had not covered it."

"Then for the sake of testing it, and letting you have a chance to carry out your point, we'll let it run the risk of the next cold snap."

"It amuses me to hear you talk about the cold