It was curious to me, having hitherto barely observed the cone-flowers
along my fences, save as a colour of beauty, how simply we fell to
talking of them as though in truth they were people like ourselves,
having our desires and possessed of our capabilities. It gave me then,
for the first time, the feeling which has since meant such varied
enjoyment, of the peopling of the woods.

"See here," he said, "how different the character of these individuals.
They are all of the same species. They all grow along this fence within
two or three rods; but observe the difference not only in size but in
colouring, in the shape of the petals, in the proportions of the cone.
What does it all mean? Why, nature trying one of her endless
experiments. She sows here broadly, trying to produce better
cone-flowers. A few she plants on the edge of the field in the hope that
they may escape the plow. If they grow, better food and more sunshine
produce more and larger flowers."

So we talked, or rather he talked, finding in me an eager listener. And
what he called botany seemed to me to be life. Of birth, of growth, of
reproduction, of death, he spoke, and his flowers became sentient
creatures under my eyes.

And thus the sun went down and the purple mists crept silently along the
distant low spots, and all the great, great mysteries came and stood
before me beckoning and questioning. They came and they stood, and out
of the cone-flower, as the old professor spoke, I seemed to catch a
glimmer of the true light. I reflected how truly everything is in
anything. If one could really understand a cone-flower he could
understand this Earth. Botany was only one road toward the Explanation.