Buttonball's pajamas he cared to expose to us the next spring!

[Illustration: Button-balls--fruit of the sycamore]

The leaves of the sycamore are good to look at, and efficient against
the sun. The color above is not as clear and sharp as that of the maple;
underneath the leaves are whitish, and soft, or "pubescent," as the
botanical term goes. Quite rakishly pointed are the tips, and the whole
effect, in connection with the balls,--which are first crowded clusters
of flowers, and then just as crowded clusters of seeds--is that of a
gentleman of the old school, dignified in his knee-breeches and cocked
hat, fully aware that he is of comfortable importance!

Those little button-balls that give name to this good American tree
follow the flower clusters without much change of form--they _were_
flowers, they _are_ seeds--and they stay by the tree persistently all
winter, blowing about in the sharp winds. After a while one is banged
often enough to open its structure, and then the carrying wind takes on
its wings the neat little cone-shaped seeds, each possessed of its own
silky hairs to help float it gently toward the ground--and thus is
another of nature's curious rounds of distribution completed.

A tree is never without interest to those whose eyes have been opened to
some of the wonders and perfections of nature. Nevertheless, there is a
time in the year's round when each tree makes its special appeal. It may
be in the winter, when every twig is outlined sharply against the cold
sky, and the snow reflects light into the innermost crevices of its
structure, that the elm is most admirable. When the dogwood has on its
white robe in May and June, it then sings its song of the year. The
laden apple tree has a pure glory of the blossoms, and another warmer,
riper glory of the burden of fruit, but we think most kindly of its
flowering time. Some trees maintain such a continuous show of interest
and beauty that it is difficult to say on any day, "_Now_ is this tulip
or this oak at its very finest!" Again, the spring redness of the swamp
maple is hardly less vivid than its mature coloring of the fall.

But as to the liquidambar, or sweet-gum, there can be no question.
Interesting and elegant the year round, its autumn covering of polished
deep crimson starry leaves is so startlingly beautiful and distinct as
to almost take it out of comparison with any other tree. Others have
nearly the richness of color, others again show