“The columbine has been ‘burbanked.’  There’s a pink one among the cultivated kinds.  They’re larger than the wild ones and very lovely.”

“Mother has some.  Hers are called the ‘Rose Queen,’” said Margaret.  “There are yellow and blue ones, too.”

“Your grandmother can give you some pink Canterbury bells that will blossom this year.  They’re biennials, you know.”

“Does that mean they blossom every two years?”

“Not exactly.  It means that the ones you planted in your flats will only make wood and leaves this year and won’t put out any flowers until next year.  That’s all these pink ones of your grandmother’s did last season; this summer they’re ready to go into your bed and be useful.”

“Our seedlings are blue, anyway,” Ethel Blue reminded the others.  “They must be set in the blue bed.”

“How about sweet williams?” asked Mr. Emerson.  “Don’t I remember some in your yard?”

“Mother planted some last year,” answered Roger, “but they didn’t blossom.”

“They will this year.  They’re perennials, but it takes them one season to make up their minds to set to work.  There’s an annual that you might sow now that will be blossoming in a few weeks.  It won’t last over, though.”

“Annuals die down at the end of the first season.  I’m getting these terms straightened in my so-called mind,” laughed Dorothy.

“You said you had a bleeding heart—­”

“A fine old perennial,” exclaimed Ethel Brown, airing her new information.

“—­and pink candy-tuft for the border and foxgloves for the back; are those old plants or seedlings?”

“Both.”

“Then you’re ready for anything!  How about snapdragons?”

“I thought snapdragons were just common weeds,” commented James.

“They’ve been improved, too, and now they are large and very handsome and of various heights.  If you have room enough you can have a lovely bed of tall ones at the back, with the half dwarf kind before it and the dwarf in front of all.  It gives a sloping mass of bloom that is lovely, and if you nip off the top blossoms when the buds appear you can make them branch sidewise and become thick.”

“We certainly haven’t space for that bank arrangement in our garden,” decided Roger, “but it will be worth trying in Dorothy’s new garden,” and he put down a “D” beside the note he had made.

“The snapdragon sows itself so you’re likely to have it return of its own accord another year, so you must be sure to place it just where you’d like to have it always,” warned Mr. Emerson.

“The petunia sows itself, too,” Margaret contributed to the general stock of knowledge.  “You can get pretty, pale, pink petunias now, and they blossom at a great rate all summer.”

“I know a plant we ought to try,” offered James.  “It’s the plant they make Persian Insect Powder out of.”

“The Persian daisy,” guessed Mr. Emerson.  “It would be fun to try that.”