3G4 AGRICULTURAL REPORT. 



years, as the dearest spot on earth, and one to which every lingering affection 

 will constantly turn. 



Our people do not yet fully appreciate the power of garden employments to 

 restore health, to bring back strength and equanimity to a distracted mind, and 

 to wean it from deep sorrows occasioned by bereavement. A lady wrote me 

 several years since, saying that in the autumn she met Avith a severe domestic 

 affliction. A long, dreary winter passed, and knowing, as she well did, that 

 occupation gives relief to a mind distressed, she resolved to commence the cul- 

 tivation of flowers. Her husband provided a suitable spot in the midst of a 

 rich vegetable garden, in which she placed a few varieties of pinks, some com- 

 mon roses, and a flowering almond. Everything she placed there grew and 

 throve finely, and the cultivation of this little spot became a source of real 

 comfort. The next autumn she set four tulip bulbs, and in a few years she 

 bad more than two thousand tulips in blossom in one season. There were 

 twenty-seven varieties ; and, besides those, she had all the bulbous roots that 

 are usually grown in our climate, more than twenty sorts of roses, and an 

 almost endless variety of annuals and perennials. She said the pleasure she 

 derived from tending the garden amply repaid her for all the labor bestowed 

 upon it. I give the closing part of the letter in her own words : 



"I am a fanner's wife, and not without an abundance of in-door employment ; but my 

 garden is my relaxation from labor. Money would not tempt me to part with it. From the 

 earliest crocuses and snowdrops to the late.<t autumn flowers, it is one continual pleasure. I 

 will add, that since I coumienced gardening- thcoe Lave sprang up about our duelling 

 trees bearing most delicious plums, cherries, and pea;s, vines iaden with the juicy grape and 

 strawberries and raspberries, too, have each the'.r place in some favorable spot. I would not 

 willingly exchange my home for what it was before we cultivated fruits and flowers, and 1 

 beheve any one owning even a small amoimt of land can, without being poorer for it, aii'orJ 

 a little spot for ornamental gardening." 



The care of flowers will soften the poignancy of grief, and heal soitows that 

 no medicaments of the apothecary can cure. God's sunlight and pure air, the 

 fragrance of unfolding flowers, the freshness of the soil, and free exercise 

 among growing plants in the garden, may give health and life when all other 

 means fail. 



Fe^ dw-ellings are so circumscribed, and few persons so involved in care, 

 but room and time may be found to set a few climbing plants that will soon 

 change the Avhole aspect of home. The scarlet trumpet honeysuckle, the yel- 

 low trumpet monthly, and the evergreen monthly honeysuckles, are hardy and 

 beautiful climbers for the pillars of piazzas, summer-houses, porches, and 

 trellises. The Chinese twining honeysuckle is another, growing remarkably 

 fast, flowering in June, and very fragrant. 



The purple or crimson Boursalt rose is quite a wonder of beauty in the latter 

 pai't of May, being then literally covered with blossoms, and it is so hardy that 

 scarcely a branch is ever injured by the cold of w-inter. The Queen of the 

 Prairies is a superb variety, and known by some as the Michigan rose. The 

 flowers are of a deep rose color, with a white stripe in the centre of each petal ; 

 it is the most luxuriant grower of its class, and is as hardy as an oak. It 

 blooms after the summer i-oses are gone. The Baltimore belle is another per- 

 fectly hardy rose; the flowers arc a pale, waxy blush, almost white, very 

 double, and in large clusters. 



The Virginia creeper, or American woodbine, is a hardy, rapid gi-ower, and 

 is exceedingly ornamental. It is a native of our own woods, and climbs rocks 

 and trees to a great height. The flower is of a reddish green color, and is not 

 showy, and is succeeded by clusters of dark blue berries, which are nearly 

 black when mature. At the same period the fruit-stalks and tendrils assume a 

 rich crimson or red color. The leaves are not evergreen like the ivy, yet in 

 the autumn they far surpass that plant in their rich and gorgeous tints. It is 

 the most ornamental plant of its genus. It flowers thi-ough July and August. 



