1.We all love flowers.We love them as we love the sunshine or as we love bright colours,because we admire their beauty,and because their presence makes us happier.
2.But have you ever thought that they are living things just as much as you are?They need food,and drink,and fresh air:they live and grow just as you do.Of course,they do these things in a very different way;but yet it may be interesting for you to think of flowers and plants as living creatures,and as relations of your own.
3.We speak of breathing as a mark of our life.But plants breathe too.Animals breathe air into their lungs ,and the lungs take from it the life-giving oxygen that the animal needs.But there is a closer likeness yet between us and plants;for we breathe not only by means of the lungs,but by means of the skin which covers our bodies,Plants breathe with the whole surface of their bodies,and take from the air what they require just as the animal does.By the help of the micro-scope,we can see on the under side of their leaves the little openings through which plants breathe,as you see them in this little picture.
4.And plants eat,-not such gross food as we eat,but things too fine and dainty for us even to taste.Down in the ground the fine hair-like roots creep about among the rocks and the soil,and drink in the moisture and the gases and minerals which they find there.But the roots do not supply all the food.The leaves help also;they take in nourishment from the air all over their surface,wherever air and light touch them.
5.Then this rich juice is sucked up through the stem.As it passes along through the stem and the leaves and the flowers,each part takes from it the food which it needs,and thus the whole plant is nourished and grows.
6.Movement is one of the surest signs of life.Perhaps you do not know that plants can move.Of course you do not see them running about,but yet some of them move a good deal.If you watch the geraniums and other plants you have growing at home,you will see that they always turn towards the light.
7.Many flowers close up at night,or in cold weather,and open wide when the sun is shining.There are other plants that shrink when you touch them,and fold up their leaves almost as quickly as a snail draws in his horns.Climbing plants move their tendrils about in a very curious way,as if they were feeling for something to lay hold of.
8.Then some plants have leaves that actually seize hold of any insect that may settle on them,and do not open again until they have sucked in the softer parts of the insect for their own food.There are many other interesting facts that you may learn about the life of plants some day,but this may be enough to make you think of them as really living creatures.
