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POPULAR GARDENING. 



■^5 



foct, ami tlieic is a wealth of blossoms. Mi's. Vaii- 

 naiuan, rod rtud bronze: f^ullinfordii, ver.v dark 

 red; Priiiee of Oranjre, olirome .vellow and larjji': 

 AlKl-el-Kadi*e, very dark ivd with j-ellow eenter; 

 Tragiclie, a lieautifnl rose: Vim. Itobert.son, 

 onin^e and .vellow. attnu'ted speeial attention 

 nmoHK the niiinerous other beauties. Our huKC 

 nia.ss of riehl.v blended eolors was the ehief at- 

 traetion. ('hrysanthemums do well left In the 

 ground lieix*. We do not t(t take up the Dahliaji 

 or the (iladioluses if set reasonabl.v deep.— J7. A, 

 O., lirninanl Jn.'^lituti; S. r. 



The Sprinp Adonis. One of the most 

 attractive siibje^-ts amon^r hardy border 

 plants iu the spring is the Spriuj: Adonis 

 (>ldom> wniaUs) of whieh an engraving is 

 shown anue.xed. It is a low arrowing plant 

 of about one foot in heicrht in the form of 

 a dense tuft and having finely di\ ided leaves 

 in whorls along the stems. Early spring 

 is the season of bloom at whieh time the 

 plants are covered with numerous large, 

 brilliant .vellow Anemone-like tlowei*s three 

 inches in diameter, a single flower being 

 produced at the end of each stem. Reing 

 a dwarf jilant this Adonis should not b^ 

 crt)wded among strong, coarse growers, 

 but should occupy a place next to the 

 margin of the bed or be situated on rock 

 work. A sandy, moist loam, on which the 

 water never stands, suits it well for soil 

 the plants should not often be disturbed. 

 Increased by division or by saving seeds 

 soon after they ai'e ripe. The Adonis can 

 be had from leading growers of perennial plants. 



Muslin Covered Cold Frame. When we com- 

 nienced housekeeping we of course wanted a 

 garden, and having read so much of the desir- 

 ability of having a hot -bed. cold frames, etc., de- 

 termined to have them if possible. The first year 

 however, we could do no better than start some 

 plants in boxes at the kitchen windows. To be 

 sure that was better than nothing, but they re- 

 quired a great deal of care and attention in order 

 to do at all well. The next few years we had a 

 small hot-bed, but it was rather troublesome to 

 get the manure, make the hot-bed, and give it 

 the attention it needed in the way of ventilation, 

 etc., and we lost plants or had them in.iured by 

 chilling from over-ventilation, and burning from 

 lack of it, so at length I was forced to content 

 myself with a cold frame only. This required 

 much the same care, but for a shorter time. As 

 a substitute for glass I took a piece of unbleached 

 muslin, some boiled linseed oil, and a lump of 

 resin; then I got my husband to make a frame 

 of strips of pine boards to fit the top of the cold 

 frame, and tacked the muslin to it firmly, stretch- 

 ing as tightly as possible. I then melted the oil 

 and resin in a tin dish, and while hot applied it to 

 the cloth with a clean paint brush. A second 

 coat was given after the first had dried, and this 

 frame was used in place of sash. The frame re- 

 quired less attention than one covered with 

 sashes. I only ventilated it after the sun got 

 very high and warm; and on very chilly nights 

 early in the spring covered it with an old quilt, 

 and I never had such strong thrifty plants be- 

 fore. The care of it had been so little, that I got 

 the full benefit of the pleasure, whereas hereto- 

 fore the constant attention'required, added to my 

 other cares, made it a troublesome pleasure at 

 best. Hereafter I shall use that sort of covering 

 more e.xtensively, and would recommend it to 

 all other busy wives and mothers, who, while 

 they have little time to spare to "fuss" over early 

 things for the flower and vegetable garden, 

 would yet enjoy the growing and having of 

 them, if it did not involve much extra time and 

 trouble. Mine required practically nothing ex- 

 cept watering and w^eeding, from seed sowing 

 until transplanting. I would suggest that the 

 muslin used be of close even texture, that if the 

 frame to be covered is large that the cover be 

 made in sections, one dimension equal to the 

 width of the muslin used. A piece of resin the 

 size of an egg to half a pint of boiled linseed oil 

 will be about the right proportion.— EWcr's Wife. 



House Plants and Health. The Massachusetts 

 Horticultural Societ.v has for some time taken 

 special pains to encourage window gardening as 

 a sanitary measure. It is held to be of great 

 average advantage to the health of the people to 

 cultivate a few of the simpler plants during 

 winter in their houses. The moral effect is also 

 held to be very marked and positive. The society 

 now is engaged in the free distribution of pam- 

 phlets to teach the best methods of culture; and 

 especially' to enable children to care for a few 

 floral pots. Sanitation is the sum of all science 



for the people at large. It is getting to be un- 

 derstood that nearly all disease is preventable. 

 Probably a good deal of guess work is indulged 

 in in matters sanitar.v, but a very general opin- 

 ion is expressed by scientists that the perfume of 

 tlowei-s is t)f \'alue in civating ozone, and minis- 

 tering to health. Professor Meehan ami l)r 

 Augers of Philadelphia have written ranch to 

 this point, and now a Frenchman, M. Ungerer, is 

 convinced that, not only flowers, but the per- 

 fumes distilled from them have a salutary in- 

 fluence on the constitution and are of high thera- 



THE SPRING ADONIS. Adonia Vernalia. 



peutic value. He tells us that in towns where 

 perfumes are made all forms of phthisis are rare. 

 This is probably a general truth; but it niust not 

 be overlooked that each i.>erson has special rela- 

 tions to the vegetable world through his olfac- 

 tory organs, as well as through his organs of 

 taste. Some perfumes are injurious to some per- 

 sons that benefit others. In selecting our house 

 plats we shall not go amiss in taking by preference 

 Heliotropes, Mignonette, the old fashioned rose 

 and apple scented Geraniums; and for bulbs the 

 Freesia and Lilies. The relation of sanitation to 

 animals is quite as close as the scientists find it to 

 be to plants. I do not like to disturb the serenity 

 of the domestic cat, but a medical journal as- 

 sures us that an outbreak of scarlet fever in 

 Chicago was certainly caused by the spread of 

 contagion by means of a cat. Other disgusting 

 diseases are frequently spread about by dogs, 

 notably, the itch. We have traced trichinosis to 

 the hog, and it is more than probable that the 

 cow is the origin of some of our worst diseases. 

 Cats are very subject to diptheria; and rapidly 

 spread the malignant poison to those who pet 

 them. Barnyard fowls are also said to be sub- 

 ject to the same disease. The lesson is, keep ani- 

 ma.ls as clean as nature demands, and kill diseased 

 pets at once. A dog or cat that is spared may 

 cost a family dearly, if not a whole neighbor- 

 hood. The moral? Pet plants in preference to 

 domestic animals. 



Notes on Floral Usages in New York. 



A center-piece for a dinner, last week, was made 

 of only one kind of flower, the Lady Eramsi Car- 

 nation, which had its own foliage freely inter- 

 persed among the blooms. Around the clump of 

 these was a heavy line of the golden Lycopodium 

 foliage. Altogether the eflrect was most brilliant. 



For a child's funeral last Wednesday, a Sixth 

 Avenue florist turned out some very elegant 

 floral pieces. There was a pall of Hoses, Lilies, 

 and Hyacinths, which was thrown over the 

 casket. Besides this there was a broken link 

 made of white blossoms studded with Roses, and 

 a plaque of Faust Pansies. upon which reclined 

 an anchor of Forget>me-not flowers, with a chair 

 of Lily of the Valley sprays, all most exquisitely 

 made up. 



The catalogues of the seedsmen and florists 

 which come out this month are usually much 

 more than mere price lists. Some of them show 

 the bestowal of much thought and labor by able 

 men, in making them valuable as guides for 

 growing different flowers advertised in their 

 pages and in general garden management. As a 

 rule, the instructions given are safe to be follow- 

 ed, for no seedsman would be likely to advise a 

 course of treating his seeds that would result in 

 failure to the purchaser. 



The weddings and receptions of the past week 

 made a considerable demand of cut flowers. In 

 no case were the displays of these very extensive, 

 but to an unusual degree choiceness of kind 

 marked the selections, and some high prices 

 were paid for individual baskets, A rarity for 



this season of the year was made use of in snvera 

 Instances, in forced Lilac flowers. Jacqueminot 

 Uoses also lent their charms to the different dis- 

 plays, a quality which has been missed for 

 months from floral events. 



It is diflieult to decide during this mid-winter 

 season which is the choicest of flowers cut in 

 such profusion in the villages of glass near New 

 York. Hybrid Roses, with their strength of stem 

 elegance of foliage, remarkable size, ami magni- 

 ficence of color; the "new" Roses that every 

 week astonish by beauty, freshly unfold- 

 ing as they become acclimated, or accus- 

 tomed to conditions: the winning wild flow- 

 ers, which have been forced to shake out 

 their fragile bells; such blossoms as Snow- 

 drops and Anemones; Orchids, with their 

 amazing shapes, splendid pencillings, and 

 fitful fragrance that comes and goes, 

 changing from "faint Lemon odors" to 

 ueavy permeating perfumes; or the great 

 spring flower crop that now, in vine, in 

 mish, and in blossoming bulbs, opens with 

 such a wealth of loveliness. 



The bloom of Lilacs, both of French im- 

 portation and domestic varieties, is hardly 

 excelled, in grace, color, or fragrance, by 

 that of any other flowers. It is now several 

 years that Lilacs have been produced in 

 mid-winter. Dwarf plants of the variety 

 Charles X. are imported from France and 

 grafted on common or Chinese Privet, when 

 they generally thro w up one long shoot. 

 In the fall these plants are taken up and 

 potted and the shoot is cut back to five or six 

 eyes. The shoots from these eyes become the 

 flowering ones the following season; that is, they 

 are potted in the fall and grown a twelvemonth 

 by which time they are covered with flower-buds 

 and ready for forcing. 



Forcing is then accomplished by placing the 

 plants in a greenhouse of uniform temperature 

 of eighty-five degrees, the plant being syringed 

 at least twice a day with tepid water. If plants 

 are put in the forcing house in November, they 

 require from three to four weeks to come into 

 bloom; but after New Year's, with a lower tem- 

 perature, say from seventy-flve to eighty 

 degrees, they will blossom in three weeks. 



A cause of dissatisfaction with these early 

 forced pot-Lilacs is, that they bloom so abundant- 

 ly that they produce scarcely any leaf, and 

 besides, their stems are very short. They are 

 unprofitable except for selling as pot plants 

 There is another beautiful French Lilac that 

 can be successfully forced in winter— the pure 

 white "Virginal"; this expands large trusses of 

 perfect flowers, far finer than the common, 

 white ones. It may here be stated that the 

 Charles X. and all LiLacsmaybe made pure white 

 by growing them in a perfectly dark house. 



A new Kochelle grower has blue-glass Lilac 

 houses; all the shades from pure white to deep 

 purple are brought out in Lilacs by management. 

 The domestic or common Lilac of the garden 

 is themost profitable to the florist of all the Lilacs 

 forced. If he can procure large overgrown 

 bushes that have remained undisturbed for 

 eight or ten years, these will serve him gener- 

 ously, yielding very readily to the forcing treat- 

 ment, giving long stems and usually plenty of 

 foliage and flowers. The French cultivate a 

 I variety in their summer gardens that they claim 

 I grows more freely than the common Syringa 

 I nd{iari.% our own spring-blooming shrub. They 

 call it Syringa dc Marley. It certainly flowers 

 much younger and more profusely than do the 

 aged bushes of the common sort with us. 



Nothing can be more ornamental and delight- 

 fully-fragrant than the pots of growing Lilacs 

 now sent from the greenhouses for decorating 

 dwellings, which sell for from $2 to f2..50 each. 

 The tassels will hang for some time if the condi- 

 tions of the atmosphere are right, and although 

 expensive, these plants give great pleasure and 

 satisfaction. 



A very elegant design in Lilacs was made for a 

 reception on Tuesday in East Twenty-fifth street. 

 A mound of shaded Lilacs three feet high was 

 formed in one corner of the drawing-room which 

 looked like a pyramid of foam. Upon the tassels 

 were perched white .Tava sparrows There were 

 groups of Palms and screens of foliage and rich 

 festoonings with Ivy and Ferns. The flowers 

 used were selected to match the colors of the 

 furnitui-e. There were twelve hand bouquets, 

 which included the choicest selection of Roses 

 and spring flowers. Each bunch was bound at 

 the stems with a hand-embroidered sash five 

 inches wide of same tint as the flowers.— Oftsenier. 



