"For my part," said Josephine, "I don't know at all what these words
mean."

Katharine got a dictionary and soon she and Eloise had these botanical
terms worked out as follows:

A perennial is a plant which lives year after year in the soil. It
usually blossoms its second season. Trees and shrubs are hardy
perennials.

A biennial is sown one year, blossoms the next and then dies. Biennials
should be covered lightly with straw or leaves through the winter.

An annual blossoms and dies its first season. But some annuals sow
themselves and so come up again the next season.

The girls worked out a table of planting by months which Ethel called
the plant time-table.

Besides the garden which the girls all had together each one did
something to improve things at home.

THE FLOWER TIME-TABLE
+--------------+-------------+--------------------+
| NAME | SOWING TIME | BLOSSOMING TIME |
+--------------+-------------+--------------------+
|Ageratum | May | June-October |
|Aster | May | Until frost |
|Balsam | May | June-September |