MANAGEMENT OF HOUSE PLANTS 49 
is safest to “ harden them off ” first by leaving them 
a few nights with the windows wide open or ina 
sheltered place on the veranda. Those which re- 
quire partial shade may be kept on the veranda or 
under a tree. Most of them, however, will do best 
in the full sun and should, if wanted for use in 
the house a second season, be kept in their pots. 
The best way to handle them is to dig out a bed six 
or eight inches deep (the sod and earth taken out 
may be used in your dirt heap for next vear) and 
fill it with sifted coal ashes. In this, “ plunge,” that 
is, bury the pots up to their rims. If set on the sur- 
face of the soil it will be next to impossible to keep 
them sufficiently wet unless they are protected from 
the direct rays of the sun by an overhead screening 
of lath nailed close together, or “ protecting cloth ” 
waterproofed. Where many plants are grown 
for the house such a shed, open on all sides, is some- 
times made. 
Care must be taken not to let plants in “‘ plunged ” 
pots root through into the soil. This is prevented 
by lifting and partly turning the pots every week 
or so. They will not root through into the coal 
cinders as rapidly as into soil and better drainage 
is secured. Watch the soil in the pots, not that in 
which they are plunged, when deciding about water- 
ing. For most plants a thorough watering, tops 
and all, once every afternoon ordinarily will not be 
too much, 
