Home Adornment in the West. 275 



when all else seems desolate without, and am cheered by these bright and 

 living masses of green ; and I rejoice to contemplate the beneficent mission 

 of the evergreens soon to become extensively prevalent on these prairies. 

 You will get them, reader, in the spring, if they are not already giving 

 beauty and cheer to your home ; these at least, — the pine, fir, spruce, hem- 

 lock, arborvitae, and juniper. And do not forget the airy larch and the 

 graceful canoe-birch : though nude in winter, the latter pleases at all times ; 

 while the former is indispensable in summer for beauties all its own. 



In works of Creative Goodness, beauty is the attractive quality. " He 

 maketh every thing beautiful in his time." So he gives us the flowers. 

 They greet us everywhere, and we take them to our homes for the cheer 

 they give us. 



There are rich stores of them on these prairies. Let us secure in garden 

 culture the choicest of these, before the ruthless plough, and tramp of 

 the cattle, shall have quite laid them waste. We prairie-dwellers should 

 feel special interest in the outgrowths of the prairies. We ought to pre- 

 serve and cherish these flowers, not only because they delight us now, and 

 will minister to aesthetic pleasures in times to come, but because to us, 

 pioneers of a new domain, they are bright memorials of the past. Exotics 

 of less decorative value, and not so well adapted to our soil and climate, 

 are eagerly sought and fondly fostered. We welcome these foreigners : 

 shall we not appreciate our native-born ? Some time-honored plants there 

 are which we prize, and must have for their intrinsic w^orth or clinging asso- 

 ciations. Be it so. We will not omit the petted bloomers of old-time mem- 

 ories : there is room for them and for these. 



Any intelligent observer, while engaged in the process of carefully re- 

 moving plants, will often be struck with the curious methods by which 

 Nature fixes and secures her delicate pets. Some are found in peaty loam, 

 deep down beneath a covering of vegetable mould, as the bulbs of the wild 

 hyacinth : there they securely mature, and then push up, about mid-May, 

 their sightly spikes of pale, pearly blue, which, maturing seed, are soon 

 after lost from view amid coarser herbage : this, in turn, decays, and gives 

 them a new coat of mulching. 



Some nestle among or beneath the roots of hazels and other stronger 

 growths : these push forth their delicate leaves and blossoms, and accom- 



