DOMESTIC NOTICES. 



for the benefit of all our readers interested in 

 the matter. 



A fine lawn, as everyone knows, is the most 

 essential ground-work of all ornamental plea- 

 sure grounds. It is not so easy to get a fine 

 lawn here as in England, but quite as easy as on 

 most parts of the continent. What we have to 

 contend with, are our dry summers and hot 

 sun — which often parch up and turn brown a 

 lawn made in the ordinary way. This is not 

 to be guarded against, as some suppose, by 

 enriching the top-soil where the lawn is, but by 

 making it deep — so deep that the roots of the 

 grass, instead of depending on the top layer of 

 the soil, which always suffers by the heat of the 

 mid-summer sun, shall run down to the cool 

 under layer, eighteen inches or more deep — 

 Mhich preserves a more uniform moisture and 

 temperature. 



If you are preparing the ground for a new 

 lawn, let the first point, then, be to deepen the 

 soil. It ought to be -at least 18 inches, and is 

 better if two feet deep. If it is a small sur- 

 face you can prepare it by trenching — if large, 

 by using the sub-soil plough. It is well to mix 

 a good coat of manure with the sub-scfil while 

 this is going on — and it is just as needful (or 

 even more necessary) that the sandy soil should 

 be as deep as clayey — for unless tlie sub-soil is 

 well stirred the roots of the grass will not pene- 

 trate there. 



The soil being well prepared, and the surface 

 made quite even and smooth, sow it with a 

 mixture of blue grass and white clover at the 

 rate of three bushels to the acre.* There 

 should be about two quarts of white clover seed 

 to a bushel of blue grass — all mixed intimately 

 together before sowing it ; and if a quart or so 

 of sweet scented grass is mixed with the whole 

 before sowing, the lawn will give out a delicious 

 odor every time it is mown. The seed should 

 be sown in a still day (if just before rain so 

 much the better) very evenlj', by hand, and 

 the ground should be lightly raked, and if pos- 

 sible rolled afterwards. 



* We formerly recominendeil Red-top and While 

 Clover; but some careful experiments of different grasses 

 for a lawn have satisfied us that the Poa pratensis — known 

 in various parts of the country a? " bent-grass," " blue 

 grass," " green grass" — which grows by the road sides 



most parts of the country, is superior to the Red-top — 

 closer, and finer, and greener turf, and enduring 

 ih better than the Red-top. 



To keep a lawn in good order order it re 

 quires in our climate, to be mown about once 

 a fortnight — witli a sharp, broad-bladed lawn 

 scythe. In England, we found mowing ma- 

 chines in very general use for this purpose, and 

 when there is much lawn to be mown they 

 would be found of equal or even greater value 

 here. One of these machines is small, and is 

 managed by hand ; the other requires a man 

 and a horse, and will mow as much in a day 

 as six good mowers, — rolling the lawn as it 

 mows it — and mowing the grass as neatly and 

 evenly as if it was done with a pair of shears. 



Rural Hours. — "We have already spoken of 

 Miss Cooper's charming hand-book of nature 

 and the seasons, published last winter under 

 this title. But lest any of our readers, and 

 especially our fairreaders, who would study na- 

 ture, now in her freshest and most winning garb, 

 should not yet have made its acquaintance, we 

 must be allowed to allude to it again. The 

 w"ay to enjoy the " Rural Hours," is to take the 

 book in hand daily, and read it as the season 

 unfolds itself — for it is a diary of nature, telling 

 us of every bird, and flower, and rural incident 

 that makes part of the out-door life of country 

 people. Make its acquaintance, study it in 

 this way, and you will feel as if the author 

 were a personal friend, who knows nature's 

 sweetest secrets, and lets you into all her con- 

 fidences. 



To Propagatk the Scarlet Japan Quince.- 

 Being afflicted with deep horticultural propen- 

 sities, I have, as a matter of course, been led 

 to " try all things, and prove all things," in 

 the true horticultural sense of the quotation. 

 I was exceedingly desirous of obtaining a large 

 quantity of the Pijrus Juponica, for the pur- 

 pose of using it for a division hedge. I tried 

 various modes of propagation. Firstly, by 

 grafting on the stock and on the root ; by lay- 

 ers, which seldom took root ; by cuttings of the 

 roots, which method did pretty well. But not 

 being satisfied, I made another experiment, 

 which resulted in complete success. 



Having had occasion to move two large plants 

 of the scarlet variety, and one of the white, I 

 was obliged, very unwillingly, to take them up 

 after they had bloomed, and just before the 

 leaves were fully expanded. Severe pruning 

 was necessary in this case ; and when I beheld 



