"'Which I wish to remark and my language is plain,'" Helen quoted, "that in spite of Dicky's picking all the blossoms we have so many flowers now that we ought to do--give them away.
"Ethel Blue and I have been taking some regularly every week to the old ladies at the Home," returned Ethel Brown.
"I was wondering if there were enough to send some to the hospital at Glen Point," suggested Margaret. "The Glen Point people are pretty good about sending flowers, but the hospital is an old story with them and sometimes they don't remember when they might."
"I should think we might send some there and some to the Orphanage," said Dorothy, from whose large garden the greater part of the supply would have to come. "Have the orphans any gardens to work in?"
"They have beds like your school garden here in Rosemont, but they have to give the vegetables to the house and I suppose it isn't much fun to raise vegetables and then have them taken away from you."
"But they don't know Willy's tomato from Johnny's. If Willy and Johnny were allowed to sell their crops they'd be willing to pay out of the profit for the seed they use and they'd take a lot of interest in it. The housekeeper would buy all they'd raise, and they'd feel that their gardens were self-supporting. Now they feel that the seed is given to them out of charity, and that it's a stingy sort of charity after all because they are forced to pay for the seed by giving up their vegetables whether they want to or not."
"I should say not! James and I said the other day that they were the most forlorn looking gardeners we ever laid our eyes on."
"Just a few in a border around the edge of their vegetable gardens and some in front of the main building where they'll be seen from the street."
The girls looked at each other and wrinkled their noses.
"Let's send some there every week and have the children understand that young people raised them and thought it was fun to do it."
"And can't you ask to have the flowers put in the dining-room and the room where the children are in the evening and not in the reception room where only guests will see them?"
"I will," promised Margaret. "James and I have a scheme to try to have the children work their gardens on the same plan that the children do here," she went on. "We're going to get Father to put it before the Board of Management, if we can."