GARDEN AND VYILD FLOWERS. Ill 



and nothing more adorns a dwelling or ground. A Inimblo cottage, vine- 

 wreathed and nestled amid flDwers and shrubbery, gives to the passer-by a far 

 higher sense of home comfort than the most imposing mansion that lacks 

 these evidences of taste and reSuement. 



All the varieties of Convolvulus are handsome and desirable. Honeysuchles 

 in variety, beautiful and very fragrant; most of them hardy enough to bear 

 our winters. But of Creepers there are none that for gracefulness and beauty 

 of long continuance can compare with iha 3£aurandia. It retains its luxuri- 

 ance Jong after our hardiest indigenous vines are sere or dead. I copy from 

 my diary : " The supports of our low-roofed porch are wreathed and draped 

 with that prettiest of creepers, the graceful Maurandia, which even now, 

 November 29th, is green as in mid-summer, and is in all its summer luxuri- 

 ance, contrasting so beautifully with its snowy surroundings, for every object 

 about wears winter's spotless ermine. Where these vines are partially protected 

 by the over-hanging roof, they sway in the chilly air their festoons of leaves 

 and flower buds, which look as if ready to open with the first hour of suK"- 

 ghine." 



It may not be generally known that the rose and scarlet Geraniums, and 

 others of the hardier varieties, can be taken from the ground, tied in bundles 

 and hung roots up in a cellar free from frost, and be planted out, grow and 

 bloom finely the following summer. They can also be raised from seed planted 

 in the house in February, and will bloom the first season. A few of these 

 brilliant, perpetual bloomers are needed in every collection. The early flower- 

 ing Chrysanthemum will bloom here in the open air, but the later ones require 

 a longer season ; yet they are abundantly worthy of being taken up before the 

 buds are injured by the frost, and will make your windows gay and fragrant 

 until Christmas. Everybody should have Roses, and some should be perpetuals, 

 blooming until winter. So fragrant and beautiful — 



" Oh, there is music to the spirit's ear 

 In every si^b, 

 Heaved by the rose's bosom to the air 

 That winnows by." 



You will observe that I have confined myself principally to such plants as 

 can be raised without the aid of a hot-bed, for my object is to show that any 

 one who has a plot of ground can have flowers. Before closing allow me to 

 allude to our indigenous flowers, and express a hope that eS'orts will be made 

 to preserve them, as before the relentless plowshare and ruthless scythe of the 

 farmer they will disappear, and their beauty be lost to ns. Twenty-five years 

 ago it was an experience in the very perfection of landscape gardening, to ride 

 through our uncultivated oak openings, sometimes amid a wilderness of flow- 

 ers of rainbow hues, which loaded the air with fragrance ; again 'neath the 

 shade of delightful groves, where flourished the dainty blossoms that loved 

 such quiet, sheltered homes, while loveliest lakes gleamed in the distance or 

 sparkled and dimpled close at hand. One could sympathize with the untutored 

 red man in his belief that in all this wondrous beauty was foreshadowed the 

 "happy hunting grounds" of his prospective heaven, and they might well be 

 ready to mourn with him that all of it must give place to the inexorable advance 

 of the white man with his sweeping "march of improvement." (?) 



Any one so inclined, can gather around them a rich garden of native flowers, 

 by consulting a little their habits and the soil they love. I have plants that 

 for years have flourished in my garden, which were transplanted from marshes, 



