The Cucumbers
During the summer and the winter following many friends visited with Lady Hollyhock and her family.
From Cucumber Hill came a most dignified Englishman. At a glance one knew him to be English for he wore a single eyeglass. A large brass headed furniture tack occupied the place of one eye while the other was filled by a small black carpet tack. Though a trifle stiff in his manners, this gentleman always wore an agreeable smile.
The lady who came with him could not be called beautiful. Her neck was too thick for that, but she smiled so pleasantly and wore such a becoming gown that one hardly noticed her neck. This gown was a loose flowing one of white. With her rather sallow, bumpy, green skin she could not have worn colors.
And the children from Cucumber Hill were much like their elders—a little stiff and awkward but so cheerful that they were always welcome.
After their visit, the members of this happy family were usually caught and devoured by Florence, Tom and Bunnie who played “Bear” sometimes to please Tom.
Like little Russians the children ate their cucumbers with the skins on, just as they would eat apples.
Radishes and Corn
The beautiful red radishes from the garden made the most charming of babies, with their leaves turned down for clothes and tied around with blades of grass. These and the corn babies were Florence’s favorites.
When the tender roasting ears were brought in from the garden the children all agreed that they were such dainty babies, just as they were, that it would spoil them to change them in any way.
All they needed to do was just to open the green husk a little and there lay the most beautiful creamy white Corn Baby wrapped in the daintiest of silken garments.
Florence hugged the Corn Baby close in her arms and as she rocked it to sleep sang to it a soft crooning little lullaby which she and the others had made up. Charlotte—and Mamma, too, had helped them a little with both the tune and words. As Florence sang to the baby in her arms the others joined her, singing softly always, and letting the song fade away almost to a whisper at the end that the baby might not miss the music when it was heard no more.
Then the Corn Baby was tenderly laid in a cradle Tom had made by gluing two semi-circles of wood for rockers to a pasteboard spool box. The wooden circle which he had cut in two had once had a bolt of ribbon wrapped around it in a store.
The Radish Baby’s Song
(Tune: “The Corn Lullaby”)
Dear little red faced
Baby in green,
You are the brightest child
That ever was seen,
Though ’tis for your brightness
That others may greet you,
’Tis for your goodness
That Mother will eat you.
Radish Babies
SOMETIMES Radish Babies too were put to sleep in spool box cradles, but more often they were eaten by their fond mothers, for Radish Babies were not only good to look at, and good to play with, but good to eat, as well.
The Corn Lullaby
Rock-a-by hush-a-by. Corn baby mine.
Wrapp’d in your garments of silk, soft and fine.
Rock-a-by, hush-a-by, little one, dear.
No one can harm you while mother is near.
When you have closed your eye-lids in sleep.
Angels will over you tender watch keep.
They will bring dreams to you, little one, dear.
Now they are coming, now they are here.
Pansies
“I am thinking of you” is what pansies say
When they come to you from a friend;
And “I am thinking of you” is what they say
When you the blossoms send.
No need of words when pansies are near
To carry the message for you—
Just send a bunch of the blossoms fair,
They’ll speak plainly as you could do.
All over the world in their simple way,
No matter where they go,
“I am thinking of you” is what they say,
And all people their language know.
Pansy Ladies
Pansy dolls were made in several ways—and pansy verses with them. Of these dolls the easiest to make were the paper ones, folded and cut as all children cut rows of doll dresses. Then a small hole was cut in the top of each dress, and the pansy stem put into it. Without further work there stood a pansy lady with a paper body and blossom head.
Other pansy dolls were made by covering tiny pill bottles with grass blades, or leaves, putting one end of each leaf in the bottle, turning them all down, and tying them in place with a grass blade sash. When the bottle was filled with water and a pansy put into it, the children had a pansy lady who would live a day or two.
“Rich purple hued velvets the pansy maids wear,
While cunning caps rest on their long yellow hair,”
quoted Mamma when she was invited out to see a row of these visitors of Lady Hollyhock’s.
Poppy Maids
GREAT beds of poppies grew at the end of the cottage at Hollyhock Place. To make poppy blossoms into dolls is the easiest thing in the world. All you have to do is to turn down the soft, silky petals, tie a blade of grass round them, and there you have a poppy maid, all finished and growing on a stem—a real flower fairy. There is a small green seed pod inside, you know, and that is the poppy maid’s head.
After making a number of these without breaking their stems the children often laid a cucumber, or radish baby in the poppy bed and sang to it a soothing lullaby—one they had made up themselves. Perhaps they had a little help—I cannot say as to that.
Poppies are the flowers that bring sleep you know.
Before long, the poppy maids would fade away and others would take their places. The dead ones were quietly buried near their friends, and soon after, at sunset, their colors were seen in the sky, as were those of many dead and gone, hollyhock and morning-glory ladies. None of these ever lived to be very old.
Poppy Lullaby
Dainty Poppy maidens,
From Dreamland far away,
Gather round baby’s cradle
In your garments gay.
Gentle Poppy maidens,
Call the Sandman near,
With his dreams from Dreamland
For our baby dear.
Gentle Poppy maidens,
Whisper what you would
Baby will heed your message
Bidding her be good.
Acorn and Burdock Eskimos
ALONG the orchard fence grew great broad leaved burdocks crowned with purplish pink tipped burs, which early in the season were made into all sorts of useful and beautiful objects—baskets, hanging baskets, cradles, sofas, chairs, tables and many other things.
In autumn, when the large acorns with fringed cups began to fall, the children gathered them and made them into Eskimos. One acorn was used for the body, and one for the head, with the point on the end for a nose. Twigs of the oak served for arms and legs.
The warmest of fur overcoats was made of the ripened burdock burs, while the furry fringed cup of the acorn made a cap that would have delighted the heart of any Eskimo.
Then Eskimo huts or igloos were made of the burs or “furs” as the children called them. Of course every one knows that real igloos are made of blocks of ice or snow, not of fur, but ice was not to be had at that season of the year and would not have been comfortable to work with anyway.
As the bur Eskimo was in immediate need of a home the little Wests made him the very best one they could of the materials at hand. A very neat round hut was made of burs and that it might appear more real, both it and the ground were covered with cotton snow, making a real arctic landscape.