DOMESTIC NOTICES 



479 



young gardeners and amateurs frequently lose 

 many of their floral favorites. They know that in 

 general circumstances their little pets dearly love 

 the sun's light, and they hasten to expose them to 

 his influence, displaying as much wisdom as pa- 

 rents who allow their young ones to place their 

 very cold toes and fingers as near as possible to 

 the blazing fire, and they wonder how it is possi- 

 ble that the y can be so crippled with chilblains! 

 Every good housewife knows that it would be 

 downright madness in her to place frozen butch- 

 er's meat, or frozen vegetables of any kind, in hot 

 or boiling water, well aware that she would only 

 disgust and injure her guests with a mass of insi- 

 pidity and decomposition. She places them first 

 in the coldest water she can procure, that the 

 frost may be discharged slowly and gradually, 

 but effectually, before she commences the cooking 

 process. Precisely the same principle must be 

 resorted to in the case of tender plants slightly 

 frozen, only, in the present case, as any addition 

 of moisture would be a future annoyance, we 

 must dispense with cold water, and allow them 

 to be thawed by the milder atmosphere gradually 

 reaching them. " Bu* then," says friend Still- 

 havc-a-doubt, " it seems so odd that you should be 

 always recommending as much light and air as 

 possible to growing plants, and yet here you wish 

 me to exclude for a time the influence of both." 

 In reply, there are few general rules without ex- 

 ceptions, and these exceptions, if not too nume- 

 rous, only give strength and validity to the rule. 

 But, in the present case, we desire no exception, 

 as the rule is unbroken. We advise that green- 

 house, window, and bedding-out plants, preserved 

 during the winter in places without artificial 

 heat, should be kept from growing as much as 

 possible, by keeping them cool and dry. We ad- 

 vise that they should have every possible exposure 

 to light, that the little growth which does take 

 place might prove an addition to the substance 

 of the plant, and not a mere extension of the 

 matter it previously contained, such as w r ould be 

 the case if the plants were in a dark sultry at- 

 mosphere. And we recommend abundance of air 



for keeping down all those fungous broods which 

 gardeners technically call damp, and which, if 

 allowed to accumulate in a close warm atmos- 

 phere, would soon make all your plants fit for the 

 rubbish heap. Hence it is that the covering up 

 of plants from light and air for any length of 

 time, when still in a growing slate, is attended 

 with such disastrous consequences. Very dif- 

 ferent is it in the case before us. The plants are 

 slightly frozen, and, therefore, growth is at a 

 standstill. The cold will prevent moisture rising 

 and being deposited, and, therefore, there will 

 be nothing to feed and support those fungous 

 damps which usually visit us. If the plants are 

 not frosted enough to be permanently injured, they 

 in iGfh t thus be shut up for months, without taking 

 more injury, provided the frost lasted as long. I 

 think it was Mr. Errington who some years ago, 

 in one of his admirable papers, recommended the 

 allowing young cauliflower-plants to be slightly 

 frosted before covering up. Upon the same prin- 

 ciple, the nearer your hardy green-house or win- 

 dow-plants are to the freezing point, the more 

 safely will they bear a lengthened covering up 

 from light and air. The difficulty we have chiefly 

 to contend with is, the rapidity of the changes of 

 temperature in this country, which render fre- 

 quent covering and uncovering necessary. For 

 instance, verbenas are yet quite green, after the 

 frost on the 28th, but a temperature of 50°, and 

 a heavy fall of rain, will keep them so growing 

 again that they will become easy victims to the 

 next severe frost. Were our winters confined to 

 a certain number of frosty weeks or months, we 

 might allow many of our bedding-out plants to be 

 slightly frozen, and then cover them up for the 

 winter, removing the covering only when the cold 

 season had passed away. This is the treatment 

 that the majority of Alpine plants receive, from 

 nature clothing them in winter with a mantle of 

 snow, and the care and attention requisite for 

 their cultivation in this country arises not from 

 their tenderness, but from the changes to heat 

 and cold, to which they are unavoidably subject- 

 ed. R. Fish. Cottage Gardener. 



DOMESTIC NOTICES. 



Frontispiece — Belmead, Va. — The mansion 

 house at Belmead is situated upon the James river, 

 Va., 40 miles above the city of Richmond , and is in 

 the pointed style of architecture of the English 

 Tudor acre. The <b si<_ r ns were furnished by Alex. 

 J. Davis, of New- York, in 1845. 



The plan is extensive, embracing out-buildin<_'s 

 serving many purposes; and few country residen- 

 ces in the United Slates have more ample aooomi 

 modation. The material is brick, covered with 

 an excellent stucco, laid off in courses, and co- 



loured with warm grey tints in fresco, to match 

 the trimmings, which are of well wrought granite 

 from a neighboring quarry. The details of the 

 architecture are full of character, and picturesque 

 in their effect. The south entrance carriage way 

 is 18 feet square, pointed, arched with a groined 

 ceiling, under a lofty gable. This leads to a plat- 

 form 13 by 18 feet, connecting with a terrace 

 upon one side, and an umbrage upon the other. 

 Part of the latter, seen in the engraving on the 

 left, aflords shelter to those witnessing arrivals or 



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