My Ambition Grows 31 



bottom of the pots for drainage, and one bright Sunday morn- 

 ing at the dark of the moon (to obey the almanac) I began the 

 holy work of planting some of the seeds. Later I planted 

 others at intervals of a week apart, writing the name and date 

 of planting on each pot. Every sunny window and warm 

 corner in the house was laid under contribution to my pur- 

 poses. My forcing-house was a long mantle shelf over a wood 

 stove, which was kept at temperate heat day and night. When 

 the first seed leaves appeared, the pot containing the new-born 

 was placed in the sun in a contrivance made by fitting a shal- 

 low frame into the lower casing of a window, with cleats nailed 

 across the ends from six to nine inches apart, and narrow 

 shelves four inches wide were set on the cleats. When three 

 pairs of leaves appeared, each seedling was transplanted into 

 a separate pot and placed in the cool shade on the top of a low 

 bookcase which served as a cold frame. By the time the seed- 

 lings had recovered entirely they were ready for the fourth 

 stage, which was to take them into a sunny chamber upstairs 

 with a south exposure, but no fire, where an even temperature 

 of about 60 was maintained. As I had no appliances, I used 

 anything at hand; and when a large table became too full, I 

 took out the shallow drawers of an old-fashioned bureau and 

 filled them with my pots, resting one end of a drawer on the 

 window-sill, the other on the edge of the table, and in this way 

 increased my area of possible sunshine three or four times. 

 This last stage of hardening is imperative; 'for if seedlings are 

 kept long in a warm living-room they grow spindling and very 

 tender and are quite unprepared for the changeable weather 

 and high winds of our Northern spring. 



By May I had several hundred plants, and the chamber 

 had an attenuated smell of a real greenhouse. While this 

 method of propagation gave me a good start, I have never 

 tried it since. In the first place it is an enormous care, and 



