the woods?"

"How much are they, and how large are the bunches?"

"Prices differ, and they are the right size to appear well. They had
better see for themselves."

The maid reached for the basket, but the Harvester drew back.

"I keep them in my possession," he said. "You may take a sample."

He lifted the leaves and drew forth a medium-sized bunch of long-stemmed
blue violets with their leaves. The flowers were fresh, crisp, and
strong odours of the woods arose from them.

"Oh!" cried the maid. "Oh, how lovely!"

She hurried away with them and returned carrying a purse.

"I want two more bunches," she said. "How much are they?"

"Are the girls who want them dark or fair?"

"What difference does that make?"

"I have blue violets for blondes, yellow for brunettes, and white for
the others."

"Well I never! One is fair, and two have brown hair and blue eyes."

"One blue and two whites," said the Harvester calmly, as if matching
women's hair and eyes with flowers were an inherited vocation. "They are
twenty cents a bunch."

"Aha!" he chortled to himself as he whistled to Betsy. "At last we have
it. There are no dark-eyed girls here. Now we are making headway."

Down the street he went, with varying fortune, but with patience and
persistence at every house he at last managed to learn whether there was
a dark-eyed girl. There did not seem to be many. Long before his store
of yellow violets was gone the last blue and white had disappeared. But
he calmly went on asking for dark-eyed girls, and explaining that all
the blue and white were taken, because fair women were most numerous.

At one house the owner, who reminded the Harvester of his mother,
came to the door. He uncovered and in his suavest tones inquired if
a brunette young woman lived there and if she would like a nosegay of
yellow violets.

"Well bless my soul!" cried she. "What is this world coming to? Do
you mean to tell me that there are now able-bodied men offering at our
doors, flowers to match our girls' complexions?"

"Yes madam?" said the Harvester gravely, "and also selling them as fast
as he can show them, at prices that make a profit very well worth while.
I had an equal number of blue and white, but I see the dark girls are
very much in the minority. The others were gone long ago, and I now have
flowers to offer brunettes only."

"Well forever more! And you don't call that fiddlin' business for a big,
healthy, young man?"

The Harv