226 MASSACHUSETTS HORTICULTUIL\.L SOCIETY. 



would have discouraged most adults from any attempt at a garden. The 

 boys got a sieve, sifted all the dirt and removed the coarse waste, just as 

 some classes were doing at school with the stones in the soil of their plots. 

 Sweet corn was planted, with flowering vines to clamber over the rough 

 board fence and the shed. A rude fence was built to protect the bit of 

 garden. Despite all discouragements a good crop of corn was raised that 

 greatly pleased their parents, and the flowers were still in bloom when the 

 writer visited the home in October. Such results pay. The report of 

 Joseph Perkins to your committee in the children's garden competition, 

 and that of Arthur Richardson enclosed herewith show the results of three 

 years of school garden work as reproduced in the gardens of two ninth 

 grade boys at their summer homes. Master Richardson sent the principal 

 in September a basket containing remarkably fine specimens of a dozen 

 sorts of vegetables that proved truly excellent on the table. 



The school garden is closely related to class room work in many ways, 

 as illustrated by the drawings and written work of all grades and classes 

 which we send you herewith. Thereby the schooF garden is enabled to 

 reproduce itself in hundreds of children's gardens. Last year a definite 

 series of lessons on garden soils was worked out with experiments, teaching, 

 and text. This was reviewed the present season, and was followed by 

 garden instruction and texts on the common root crops, evidence of 

 which will be noted in the written work herewith. Several classes under- 

 took a special study of weeds also. Our reports in previous years outline 

 in some detail the relations of garden work to the course of study, so 

 that no further statement is needed here. This autumn, however, a new 

 step has been taken in advance. The girls of the eighth grade take cooking 

 one session a fortnight. During these periods groups of boys from the 

 same grade are regularly taken by the principal for systematic instruction 

 in gardening. The work comprises class room instruction, experiments 

 with plants, all forms of work with plants in the gardens, care of plants 

 in the schoolhouse and cold frames, readings on gardening, related written 

 work and drawing; and every boy is expected to carry on gardening at 

 his home that shall parallel and apply the work and instruction taken at 

 school. 



Finally the Cobbet School gardens have proved their merit by their 

 influence upon the community. Among teachers and parents, as well 

 as with the children, they have so renewed and increased interest in horti- 

 culture that a new enthusiasm and energy have been awakened in the 

 Houghton Horticultural Society at Lynn. Its present increased member- 

 ship, broadened work, and improved financial condition are measurably 

 due to influences springing from the garden at the Cobbet School. To 

 fulfill a duty to a yet larger public, an account of "The Evolution of a 

 School Garden and Its Ideals" was prepared for publication and has 

 been accepted by the editors of the New England Magazine for their 

 columns. 



October 28, 1905. 



