like them as well as ours, Miss Harson?"

"No," was the reply, "I do not think we should; but if we had never
known any other kind, it would be quite a different matter, and the
traveler says that both smell and taste are agreeable. The sap, it
seems, is like curdled milk, and the natives say that they can tell,
from the thickness and color of the foliage, the trunks that yield the
most juice. This wonderful tree will be found growing on the side of a
barren rock, and its large, woody roots can scarcely penetrate into the
stone. For several months of the year not a single shower moistens its
foliage. Its branches then appear dead and dried; but when the trunk is
pierced, there flows from it a sweet and nourishing milk. It is at the
rising of the sun that this vegetable fountain is most abundant. The
negroes and natives are then seen hastening from all quarters, furnished
with large bowls to receive the milk, which grows yellow and thickens at
its surface. Some empty their bowls while under the tree itself; others
carry the juice home to their children."

"Isn't it funny," said Edith, laughing, "to go and get their breakfasts
from a _tree_? I wish we had some milk trees here."

"But you would not find it pleasant," replied their governess, "to have
some other things that are always found where the milk tree grows. The
intense heat and the swarms of mosquitoes and biting flies, the serpents
and jaguars and other disagreeable and dangerous creatures, make life in
that region anything but pleasant, and the curious vegetation and
delicious fruits are not worth the suffering inflicted by all these
torments."

On hearing of these drawbacks the children soon decided that their own
dear home was the best, and no longer envied the possessors even of
the cow tree.

CHAPTER XIV.

_HOME AND ABROAD: LINDEN, CAMPHOR, BEECH_.

"Now," said Miss Harson to her expectant flock, "it is to be hoped that
our foreign wanderings among such wonderful trees have not spoiled you
for home trees, as there are still a number of them which we have not
yet examined."

"No indeed!" they assured her; "they liked to hear about them all, and
they were going to try and remember everything she told them about
the trees."

Their governess said that would be too much to expect, and if they
remembered the most important things she would be quite satisfied,

"We will take the linden, lime, or basswood, tree--for it has all three
of these names--