SECRETARY'S PORTFOLIO. 3G? 



pensa'blc in tlioir place ; but the greenhouse species — Vinca rosea. The variety 

 with dull, purplish-rose colored ilowers is altogether inferior to the pure white, 

 or white with a pink eye. If the seed were sown early in a hot-bed or 

 greenhouse the plants should be making a brave sliow before August. They 

 begin to bloom much earlier, but do not fill the bed completely until 

 midsummer. This vinca is a sturdy grower, with a stout stem, and no 

 tendency to lop down and trail. The ilowers are borne on the end of every 

 branch, and rest in a whirl of leaves which are of the deepest and glossiest 

 green. At this season a bed of well-grown vincas will be a mass of dark, 

 luxuriant foliage, thickly starred with flowers of dazzling white, and it will 

 nourish in undiminished beautv until frost. — JV. Y. Trihine. 



CULTIVATION OF FLOWERS. 



Few people are aware with how little trouble and expense they can have a 

 flower garden. To be sure there are some flowers that require a great deal of 

 care, but there are others equally beautiful which may be cultivated with less 

 care. For instance, the petunia, also the Phlox Drummondii, both of which 

 require very little culture, and bloom continually from the last of June until 

 the frosts come. They make the best display when grown in masses on a grass 

 plat, or a bed by themselves. Each bed should contain only one kind of flow- 

 ers, unless it have for a center piece something tall, as a geranium, a bunch of 

 sweet peas, or, better still, a young evergreen, which will grow all the better 

 for this cultivation around its roots. 



When the plants have made their appearance they will need weeding two or 

 three times, but no further care, unless they should get too dry during July or 

 August, then suds left from your washing will be a great help to them. AVhen 

 they are once sown they are sown forever, unless an improvement is sought for 

 by saving and sowing seed from the finest blooms, for the ground will be full 

 of seeds. 



I have written at some length on the culture of these two flowers because 

 they really yield such a variety and profusion of bloom, for so little care, that 

 no woman who has a piece of ground need miss them for the lack of time and 

 strength. 



Then there is the aster, larkspur, marigold and balsam (or as some call it 

 lady slipper), and many others that give their blooms to those who love them. 

 But some may call them common flowers, but in one sense of the word there 

 is no such thing as a common flower. Tlie dandelion we so carelessly tread 

 upon, or the thistle we whip off so ruthlessly will disclose beneath the close 

 scrutiny of the microscope sufiicient beauty to thrill the heart with the differ- 

 ence between human mechanism and divine creation. Did you ever stop and 

 look at some beautiful flowers, and if so, did you not wonder in amazement, 

 and ever say to yourself, ** What a pretty flower that is ! how lovely the color ! 

 how various the colors! how beautiful! truly, God is good!" Such is mv 

 admiration that I think it would be a sin not to love flowers. — Stella M. llul)- 

 hard in Grange Vintor. 



Saf/i?iaw, August 2od. 



