lants, the roots of which were afterward to be covered with the brown
earth.

"Why not?" Hal asked.

"Because you must only drop ONE plant in a place. You are letting two and
three fall at once. You mustn't make a bouquet of them," and his father
laughed. "Only one cabbage plant in a spot."

"Am I doing it right?" asked Mab, who was on the other side of the cabbage
plot.

"Well, not exactly. Hal dropped his too close together and yours are too
far apart. The cabbage plants ought to be about two and a half feet
apart, in rows and the rows should be separate one from the other by about
twenty inches. Here, I'll cut you each a little stick for a measure. You
don't need to worry about the rows, as Uncle Pennywait marked them just
the right distance apart as he made them."

So after that Hal and Mab measured, with sticks Daddy Blake gave them to
get one cabbage plant just as far from the one next to it in the row as
Daddy Blake wanted. Then, with a hoe, the children's father covered the
roots with dirt and the cabbages were planted, or "set out," as the
gardener calls it.

"Now let me take a look at your corn and beans," said Mr. Blake to the two
children, when the cabbages had been left to grow. "I want to see who has
the best chance of winning that ten dollar gold prize."

"Hal's corn is very nice," said Mab.

"And so are her beans," added Mab's brother kindly. "I guess maybe she'll
get the prize."

"Well, it will be quite a little while before we can tell," spoke Daddy
Blake. "Corn and beans will not be gathered until Fall, though we may eat
some of Hal's corn earlier, for he has some rows of the sweet variety
which can be boiled and gnawed off the ears."

Daddy Blake found a few places in Mab's bean patch where the useless weeds
needed hoeing away, so they would not steal from the brown earth the food
which the good plants needed.

"And one or two of your corn hills could be made a little higher, Hal,"
said his father. "If you look at the corn stalks you will see, down near
where they are in the ground, some little extra roots coming out above the
earth. In order that these roots may reach the soil, and take hold, the
dirt must be hoed up to them."

Mr. Blake showed the children what he meant, and Mab cried:

"Those roots are just like the ropes we had on our tent when we went
camping."

"That's it," said Daddy Blake. "These roots keep the tall corn stalks from
blowing over just as the ropes keep the te