26 How to Make a Flower Garden 



We often seem to lose sight of the importance of such knowledge. It is 

 knowledge that it is troublesome not to hstxe. 



Fourteen months before these things were planted the land had been 

 only roughly graded. New soil had to be carted on, the final grading and 

 levelling done, and the sod established. The home-maker, with good soil 

 and estabhshed lawn, should be able to do at least as weh. 



It is well to plan in the fall for the spring planting. Things always 

 go slower than we expect. Spring will soon be here. If the ground is not 

 yet frozen the earth can be spaded or plowed. Let it lie loose and open: 

 the frost will pulverise it. Weathering is sometimes an efficient means 

 of tilling. Unless the land is already rich, and contains much vegetable 

 matter or humus, it is well to turn under manure when you prepare the land 

 this winter. This manure may be very useful in preventing hard clay soils 

 from cementing by the action of frost and rain as well as in affording plant- 

 food. Even in some of the northern States hardy bushes may be planted 

 in December, but it is usuaUy better to wait until spring. Large specimens 

 are often moved in the dead of winter because heavy balls of earth can be 

 taken with them. Read the catalogues, and be ready to order your plants 

 before the spring begins. 



II. How TO ]\Iake a Border 

 By F. W. Barclay 



Plant thickly enough to form eventually a mass of foliage sufficiently 

 dense to completely hide the ground. Scattered plants about a newly raked 

 bed may look neat, but so would perfect rows of painted stakes. 

 Neatness can be more perfectly attained by the close grouping of plants 

 of similar foliage. Too great a mixture of leaf -forms and colours often 

 gives a tangled and untidy effect. The aim is the happy medium between 

 the sameness of a too large group of one species and the careless mixture 

 of many species. Make the groups decided enough to be called groups in 

 comparison with the area of the planting, but let them be irregular and blend 

 into the surrounding groupings with pleas ng contrasts. 



A very effective way of planting, especially where the border is long, 

 is to use a large quantity of a few kinds of plants which follow each other in 

 bloom through the season, and to plant the whole border in small groups, 



