three] growing the HOUSE 



tell you to what I have settled down. I began with 

 a small conservatory, capable of holding perhaps 

 fifty pots. This was placed, as it ought to have 

 been, facing the east — with the south end closed 

 against the sun. The morning light is best for 

 plants, as it is for folks. Grow^th goes on mostly 

 under the impulse of the dawn. Babies and plants 

 should be seen by the rising sun — old folks also, 

 if they would have sweet dispositions and long lives. 

 But after a time I found it difficult to keep the 

 floor from having wetted spots, and there were rot- 

 ting boards. The atmosphere was not the best, and 

 not good altogether to let loose into the house. 

 There is nothing worse than sick plants to poison 

 the atmosphere; and it was not always easy to keep 

 every plant in robust health. Then I tried a simple 

 table and a sunny window — using the conservatory 

 for another purpose. I turned a couple of marble 

 tops bottom upward, and they made capital plant 

 stands. On one of these, in a large, sunny window, 

 I now grow magnificent pelargoniums, five feet high, 

 and back of these there are a few fuchsias. On an- 

 other stand, in a north window, grow Rex Begonias. 

 Other plants are kept in the balcony that is enclosed 

 for winter, and for summer is open for a hammock. 



[49] 



