80 WORCESTER COUNTY HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. [1878. 



a well-grown Geranium, finely bloomed. The Pink is also a great favor- 

 ite with this class. Feverfew is invaluable, and well repays the small 

 cultivator. Verbenas are not to be surpassed for a small mound or bed. 

 We make a great mistake, however, in waiting to set out our verbenas 

 and pinks till it is warm enough for very tender green-house plants. 

 The frost that will kill Salvia and Heliotrope these plants do not mind. 

 Even if the leaves do turn a little from cold, after they are sdt, it will 

 not injure them. No garden, however small, can do without Heliotrope. 

 It must, however, be in a warm, sunny place, or it will be all leaves. 

 Salvia Splendens, our scarlet variety, which everybody grows, needs 

 nothing more than a good, sunny place, and a good bunch of Mignonnette 

 is desirable. Fuchsias, strictly speaking, are not bedding plants. They 

 are too easily broken by the^w'ind, but I have seen beautiful specimens 

 in the ground. Care must be taken to have the place a little shaded from 

 the noonday sun and in as sheltered place as possible. The better way, 

 perhaps, where you cannot choose the location, is to keep them in good 

 sized pots, and in heavy winds and storms take them indoors. The Co- 

 leus and Amaranthus are excellent bedders, and Centaurea contrasts 

 finely with them. Some Begonias have proved good for bedding pur- • 

 poses, especially Weltoniensis and some of the tuberous rooted varieties. 

 All or part of these combined with a few annuals that require no special 

 care, except to sow and thin out, like Sweet Alyssum and Candytuft, will 

 make home a much more attractive place with but little labor. Nor 

 should the laboring man think it beneath him to work a little each day 

 in cultivating such a plot of ground. It is a rest, coming from the dusty 

 shop, to work awhile among the flowers. 



And now a word on a subject near my heart. Do not forget to give 

 the children a place to work. A very small place will do. Remember 

 you are giving an education that will be life long, and when one of the 

 children asks you a question about a plant or flower, ansvver it in as sim- 

 ple a manner as possible and let the child understand what you are 

 telling it. Let us take as much pains to teach about the flowers as we do 

 about cabbages and beets, their habits and the best soil and location to 

 grow them in, and 3'ou will have more flowers in this hall in the summer 

 time than we are wont to see here now. It is not enough for the farmer 

 to say to his boys, " sow these seeds," but he tells them minutely where, 

 and how, to do it. Now we all know boys in the city do not have as 

 much to do out of school as boj'S in the country. Consequently, as there 

 is nothing for them to do, they lounge on the streets, thrown in contact 

 with idle and dissolute men, and learn in due time how to fill prisons and 

 jails acceptably. I do not say all will do this, but enough to make it 

 worth the while to do the best we can to keep them agreeably employed. 

 Boys do not care to go into the woods (except for nuts) simply because 



