its store, can find but few other berries, those of the mountain ash, the bramble, 

 and the thorn being by that time utterly gone or nearly so. The plant that feeds 

 so many useful and entertaining creatures contributes in no small degree towards 

 the happiness of mankind. Nor must we forget that the owl, the best hunter of 

 mice and such small deer, prefers to nest in an ivy -tower for the warmth and 

 dryness and darkness, and perhaps also for proximity to the prey its attentions, 

 when hunger calls, are chiefly devoted to. 



The garden uses of the ivy are but little understood. It is common, indeed, 

 to meet with grand banks and verges of Irish ivy in gardens, but it is extremely 

 rare for an amateur to take to the plant in earnest, and collect the varieties and 

 put them to the several uses they are adapted for. All the climbing sorts are suited 

 for the covering of walls, trellises, and arbours ; and it is an especial recom- 

 mendation of them that they grow more luxuriantly, and acquire finer colours, on 

 a damp wall facing north than in any other situation or aspect. They need but 

 little training on a rough surface ; for there they train themselves, and it is 



scarcely needful to 



" Direct the clasping ivy where to climb," 



as Milton prudently directs. Where a luxuriant growth is required, the green- 

 leaved varieties are, as a rule, \o be preferred, although a few of the variegated 

 varieties grow rapidly and soon produce a grand effect. The more delicate- habited 

 varieties with variegated leaves, snch as the "marginata" series, are best adapted 

 for dwarf walls of six to eight feet high, but these will in time cover a ten or 

 fifteen feet wall. Patientid vinces. 



The partiality of the plant for a moist atmosphere and a subdued light renders 

 it peculiarly well adapted for glass cases, whether of an ornamental kind, adapted 

 to adorn an entrance-hall, or for a mere window screen to plant out an unpleasant 

 prospect in a town dwelling. There used to be a good example of this use of the 

 ivy in the windows of the house inhabited by the late Dr. Conquest, in Finsbury 

 Square, London. These windows were fitted with cases projecting outwards, and 

 forming a narrow glass box, with a trough at the bottom in which the ivies were 

 planted, and a few copper wires served for training them over the outermost sheet 

 of glass. The result was a cheerful, leafy screen, agreeable in appearance as seen 

 from without, but decidedly beautiful as seen from within against the light, every 

 leaf then showing its elegant veining, sharp and clear, upon a semi-transparent 

 ground of the richest green. For a large fern case, especially for a vase with a 

 tall glass lantern-like structure fitted to it, the plant is well adapted ; and many 

 \\lio have failed to grow ferns in cases (say through planting them in bad stuff, 



f 





