GA RDENING BY M YSELF. 1 6 5 



vate sitting-rooms and sunny windows of 

 plain, quiet dwellings, shew almost any- 

 thing else. Geraniums, oleanders, myrtles, 

 pittosporums, hydrangeas ; old - fashioned 

 fuchsias, never promoted beyond their ori- 

 ginal name of " ear-drop ;" roses — more 

 bush than bloom ; even a prickly cactus or 

 two, — all these you will find grouped to- 

 gether. Growing as they best may in boxes, 

 pitchers, unwholesome glazed flower-pots ; 

 furnishing '' slips " now and then for a visi- 

 ter, but loved by the owner more for the 

 care they cost, and the hard struggle their 

 life seems to be, (often so like her own,) than 

 for any return that life can ever hope to 

 make. I know she comes to have a sort of 

 tender regard for even the Httle bare twigs 

 and leafless sprays that one by one give up 

 the struggle and must be clipped off". It is 

 hard to gather them up and fling them into 

 the fire. They bore up against adversity so 

 long, — so long lived on without the sun- 

 shine, so many times were nipped by frost 

 or parched with drought, or withered with 



