A busy month is June in the Green Forest, on the Green Meadows, in the Old Pasture, everywhere. Of all the months of the year it is the busiest. By the middle of June most of the feathered folk have families, either just starting out in the Great World or almost ready to start out. Most of the little people who wear fur are teaching their children those lessons which they must learn before going out in the Great World for themselves. And in no month are there such hosts of flowers to keep the Butterflies, Bees and other insects busy from daylight to dark.

It was now well past the middle of June, yet Peter Rabbit's interest in the flowers was as great as when, in the early spring, he had first started out to get acquainted with them. In fact, it was even greater, for each new find was always in the nature of a surprise. Always it was different from any flower he had seen before and added to his wonder that Old Mother Nature could have created such a variety, each adapted perfectly to the conditions surrounding it. And with the finding of each he wondered what the next one would be.

Not a day passed that Peter did not find one or more flowers he had not seen before. On the day following his visit to Jumper the Hare in the Green Forest he went to a part of the Green Meadows where the ground was low and damp. Farmer Brown had dug a ditch down there to drain off the water. Beside this ditch were growing many plants and small bushes. Peter paid no attention to these for his mind was on something else. It was just chance that caused him to look up just as he was passing a straight little shrub about three feet high and somewhat branched near the top. He stopped abruptly. Above his head standing straight up was a long, pointed cluster of feathery flowers just faintly touched with pink.

"Hello!" exclaimed Peter. "This is a new one and I nearly passed it. I wonder what it can be. My, but it is pretty!"

"You ought to know what it is, Peter Rabbit!" cried a Merry Little Breeze. "You must have seen it here last year and the year before, for it has been growing here ever since this ditch was dug."

"I suppose I ought to know," replied Peter, just as there are many other things I ought to know. But, you see, I never was interested in flowers until this year, and so never took any notice of them. What did you say is the name of this one?"

"I didn't say," replied the Merry Little Breeze, rumpling up Peter's fur.

"Well, say it now," begged Peter. "There isn't any use in finding a flower and not being able to name it."

"True enough," replied the good-natured Merry Little Breeze. "True enough, Peter. Most people call this the Meadowsweet. Some call it Quaker Lady, though why I don't know. Others call it Queen-of-the-meadow, which, when you come to think of it, isn't such a bad name. But its most common name is Meadowsweet."

"Is that because it is sweet smelling?" inquired Peter. "Those flowers are so far above my head that I cannot smell of them."

"No," replied the Merry Little Breeze. "There is very little odor to them. I guess whoever chose that name did so because they look as if they ought to be fragrant."

Peter tipped his head back and studied those flowers as best he could. The tall, straight, woody stalk was smooth and of a reddish color. The leaves, which grew rather closely for almost its whole length, were oval in shape and the edges were cut into fine teeth. Above the last leaf the tiny flowers grew in little clusters on short stems springing out from all sides of the stalk, and these little clusters in turn formed a big pointed cluster.

The dainty little flowers, crowded close together, were not more than a fourth of an inch across and had five slightly curved and rounding petals. Each tiny flower had many long, rosy stamens and several pistils. It was the great number and length of the dainty stamens that gave the big flower cluster a feathery appearance just as was the case with the Foamflower Peter had found some weeks before.

Many Flies and insects were busy among these little flowers, for though they were not sweet smelling they contained plenty of sweet nectar for those who could get it.

The Merry Little Breeze, which simply couldn't keep still, had danced away, leaving Peter to find out what he could for himself. Just as Peter had made up his mind that he had learned all he could by just looking and was trying to decide where to go next the Merry Little Breeze came dancing back. "Have you seen the Milkweed yet?" cried the Merry Little Breeze.

Peter shook his head. "No," said he. "I don't believe it is in bloom yet."

"Yes, it is," cried the Merry Little Breeze. "I saw it only a few minutes ago."

"Tell me where that I may see it too," cried Peter, eagerly.

The Merry Little Breeze came close to Peter, and whispered in one of his long ears as if the matter were a secret, which of course it wasn't at all. "Follow your nose, Peter, straight along the side of this ditch, and use your eyes." Once more the Merry Little Breeze rumpled Peter's fur and then danced away across the Green Meadows.

Slowly Peter hopped along beside the ditch. He knew that he would recognize the Milkweed plant as soon as he saw it, even though the blossoms might not yet be open. Ever since he could remember Peter had known the Common Milkweed, for with its tall, rather stout-looking stalk, with long, rather thick, oval leaves, smooth and grayish-green above and downy and silvery beneath, growing out in pairs from opposite sides at regular distances apart, it is unlike any other plant. More than once had he found one of these plants broken, and always the hollow stalk was filled with a milky white, sticky juice. It is this milky looking juice which gives the plant its name.

Peter had gone only a little way when he saw just ahead of him one of these plants. Now of course the first thing he did was to look for flowers. He was not disappointed. Springing out from between the upper leaves were two or three large, loose bunches of small purplish-pink flowers. At least, that is the color they appeared to be at first glance. If Peter had looked closely enough he would have found that the base of each of the petal-like parts was greenish, above this white, and finally the purplish-pink which gave the general color to the mass.

Half a dozen Butterflies were fluttering around these clusters of flowers, and Peter knew by that that they contained plenty of nectar. Could he have looked at one of those little flowers very closely, he would have found that Old Mother Nature had formed it very wonderfully to make sure that the visitors to it should be unable to get any of that sweet nectar without paying for it by bringing to it pollen from the last blossom visited. The arrangements for this purpose are almost as wonderful as in the Orchids.

Peter had found the most common of all the Milkweeds, and that is why it is called the Common Milkweed. Later he would find other kinds, for there are very many. But most of them are much alike in general appearance. Late in the summer in place of these bunches of flowers would be big brown pods packed tightly with little seeds, each one attached to a tuft of silky white, fluffy hairs. When the seeds were fully ripe the pods would open, and the first Merry Little Breeze to come along would send those seeds sailing far across the Green Meadows just as the Dandelion seeds sail. It is in this way that the Milkweed spreads so fast.