"
"Where?" asked Mab.
"In a box in the house. You may bring me in a little dirt and I'll let it
dry out near the fire, for it is rather damp and cold yet in the garden."
The next day Hal and Mab brought in some dirt from the yard. It was wet
and sticky but when it had been spread out on a paper under the stove it
soon dried. That night Daddy Blake filled a big wooden box with the dirt,
which he worked with a trowel until it was made fine and smooth.
"The first thing to learn in making a garden," the children's father said,
"is to have your dirt made very fine, and to be sure that it is the right
kind for what you are going to raise. Beans will grow in almost any kind
of soil, but tomatoes and other vegetables must have soil which is called
richer--that is it has more fertilizer in it--something which is food to
the seeds and plants as bread, butter, meat and potatoes are food for us."
"Do plants eat?" asked Hal.
"Of course they do, just as I told you the trees did. Plants eat through
their roots in the earth. They drink water that way, too, and through
their leaves. And they breathe in the air and sunlight the same way.
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