224 



THE FLOEAL WOELD AND GAEDEN GUIDE. 



have been published. An hour's 

 consultation of the papers by Mr. 

 Howlett, and other contributors, 

 may result in saving many pounds 

 to some of our friends, and per- 

 haps make all the difference be- 

 tween success and failure in some in- 

 stances. 



Small pits and mere keeping 

 places, from which it is desired to 

 exclude frost and nothing more, can 

 have no better heating apparatus than 

 a common furnace and flue, such as 

 any bricklayer can construct. By the 

 aid of this, the atmosphere of the pit 

 may be quickly warmed, and by bank- 

 ing up the fire it may be made to last 

 a long time without further attention. 

 The custom of placing the flue against 

 the back wall of the pit is a bad one. 

 It is preferable to carry it as low 

 down as possible along the front and 

 ends, or one end at least, because the 

 back wall is the part of the pit best 

 able to resist the cold, being a larger 

 bulk of material, and as heat always 

 rises, the flue in the front will com- 

 municate much of its warmth to the 

 back wall, and the whole contents of 

 the pit will be more equably heated 

 than if the flue were at the back. A 

 flue should always rise towards the 

 extreme end, or the draught at first 

 will be sluggish, and mischief may 

 occur to the plants during the delay 

 in getting up a fire. The bottom of 

 the furnace should always be at least 

 two feet below the level of the bottom 

 of the flue. If there is any objection 

 to a well-made brick flue, glazed drain 

 tiles of six inches diameter answer 

 perfectly, the junctions to be stopped 

 with Portland cement, but there 

 should always be a short length of 

 brick flue next the fire, as if the pipes 

 are subjected to too fierce a heat they 

 crack. Four inch glazed pipes make 

 an excellent chimney outside, and it 

 is easy to stay them with a couple of 

 iron rods. Defects in the draught 

 may generally be cured by increasing 

 the height of the outside chimney. 

 Always try that plan before attempt- 

 ing any alteration of the furnace, 

 etc. 



Houses required to be neat in ap- 

 pearance, and in -which it is desirable 

 to have a few flowering plants in 



winter, should be heated with hot 

 water. There are almost numberless 

 ways of accomplishing this, but they 

 differ but little in principle and they 

 are all simple in the extreme ; indeed, 

 they must be simple, or they will not 

 succeed. Usually, the best plan is to 

 have a boiler in an adjoining shed, to 

 cover this shed with some sort of 

 glass roof, and make it available for 

 keeping a few plants (many cultiva- 

 tors preserve their whole stock of 

 geraniums in the boiler shed), and by 

 means of a course of pipes carried 

 round the house to keep the tempe- 

 rature at the requisite standard. Up- 

 right and saddle boilers are the best 

 for small houses. The boiler must 

 always be placed at a lower level 

 than the lowest part of the house to 

 be heated, to insure a quick circula- 

 tion of water in the pipes. So many 

 curious cases occur, that no general 

 remarks can be made to apply univer- 

 sally. But it may be worth naming, 

 that we have recently got through a 

 difficulty in heating which may be in- 

 structive to some of our readers. A 

 range of houses were to be heated 

 from one point; that point was, of 

 course, the lowest level of the range. 

 But the house situated at that lowest 

 level stood beside a well, which all 

 winter long is full and sometimes 

 overflowing. The boiler could not be 

 sunk low enough to heat this house 

 by a flow in the ordinary way : and 

 we hit upon the following plan, which 

 answered admirably. A small pipe 

 was taken from the top of the boiler, 

 along the front of the house near 

 the glass, and a large return pipe was 

 brought back on the level of the bor- 

 der on which the plants stood. It 

 was therefore heated by the return 

 pipe ; and some of our friends pro- 

 nounce it an ingenious affair. A very 

 useful modification of the pipe system 

 is to have a tank placed at the end of 

 the house most remote from the 

 boiler, to carry the hot water by a 

 small pipe to this tank, and then by 

 a return round the house back to the 

 boiler again. Upright boilers, that 

 require no brick setting, may be had 

 for these purposes of Messrs. Jones, 

 Lynch "White, and other makers. It 

 must be remembered, however, that a 



