Gardening at Seaside Watering Places 



461 



ful and instructive pastime, but, forming as 

 they do the most beautiful as well as intricate 

 and interesting specimens furnished by the 

 vegetable kingdom, their after inspection, 

 as well as exhibition to friends, would be- 

 come pleasing occupations in leisure hours. 

 Ladies, when at sea-side residences, might 

 find an agreeable change from sewing, knit- 

 ting, crochet, and other light work by imi- 

 tating those of antient Tyre, in dying fine 



linen and like articles of dress with the in- 

 imitable purple of the very common white 

 whelk (Purpura lapellus), in destroying which 

 they would be contributing to the removal of 

 the worst enemies of that highly useful of 

 shell fish, the common mussel ; and the beau- 

 tiful floral or other fancy designs which might 

 be produced in this manner would certainly 

 not be out of place when exhibited at a sea- 

 side flower show. 



OUT-DOOR PRESERVATION OF TE.\WER PLANTS E¥ WINTER. 



AT the present period of the year, wlien 

 flower-beds are still gaily decorated 

 with tender and half-hardy bedded-out plants, 

 many cottagers, villa residents, and others 

 who have not greenhouse accommodation at 

 their command, find their floricultural enjoy- 

 ments much marred by the consideration that 

 some frosty morning will soon deprive their 

 most cherished favourites of their loveliness, 

 and that all must shortly perish under the 

 biting frosts and chilling blasts of winter, 

 leaving the ground to be refilled next season 

 with young plants of whatever kinds can be 

 culled from the over-abounding stores of more 

 fortunate friends, or purchased from plant 

 dealers. No great hardship this last, some 

 may be disposed to argue, as, for the require- 

 ments of small establishments, bedding plants 

 can generally be purchased in spring cheaper 

 than they can be wintered ; but those who 

 argue in this manner do not take into con- 

 sideration, or make allowance for, the pleasing 

 occasional recreations associated with in-door 

 plant management in winter. At present, 

 however, we have only to do with those to 

 whom such recreations are denied, and who 

 may yet wish to preserve some of their 

 cherished favourites, and to grow them to 

 greater sizes than they can attain to in a 

 single season. 



From among tender plants, to which out- 

 door protection may, in general, be success- 

 fully applied in our climate, we may exclude 

 geraniums, verbenas, heliotropes, petunias. 



and a few others of less note ; to which such 

 protection is only applicable in mild winters, 

 approximating in temperature to the last, 

 when, in many places, some of the hardier 

 varieties of all these stood out without any 

 protection whatever. But even after these 

 are discarded, there remains many which 

 may be eff"ectually protected, with but little 

 trouble and expense, and which, when so 

 preserved, will amply recompense any care 

 which may have been thus bestowed, by their 

 increased size, and the consequent highly 

 augmented display of their flowers. We do 

 not mean to insinuate or deny that the out- 

 door protection of tender plants in winter is 

 either altogether neglected or not pretty well 

 understood ; but there is good ground for 

 believing that it is not sufficiently practised, 

 and that it is too frequently applied in such 

 a slovenly and unsightly manner as to be 

 simply obnoxious, if not disgusting, to winter 

 residents who have the least pretensions to 

 gardening taste. " Protect the roots by 

 litter, and the tops by straw, mats, or ever- 

 green branches," is the stereotyped Gar- 

 dener's Kalendar instructions for preserving 

 tenderish plants out of doors ; and the littery 

 mess employed, while objectionably un- 

 sightly in itself, is generally rendered more 

 than doubly so in consequence of being 

 scattered abroad by birds, winds, or other- 

 wise, while the top appliances of straw or 

 mats, however tightly and tidily tied, invari- 

 ably offend the eye, which experiences but 



