STATE POMOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 55 



of Mrs. Quint's petunia. Sl)e could not well refuse tliera, and Editli 

 had such a ''knack" of getting tiiem to root and thriftily growing in 

 her pretty papered and netted cans and di.saliled ci'ocker}', almost 

 before she knew it, Mrs. Quint had her window U-dge full of plants, 

 and was just as eager and ambitious as any ol' her neighbors to have 

 the best variety of house plants in the community. 



Some one has said that when a woman takes a new tack, she never 

 goes it l)y halves, and Edith's mother was no exception. She sub- 

 scribed for a leading lloral magazine that she might wage war against 

 red spiders and rose lings, plant lice and scales, underslandingly 

 and with sure destruction. Indeed, she became such an authority 

 on the subject of insect extermination, and in tiie ready recognition 

 and correct naming of rare plants, by the help of her well studied 

 journal, she became a subscriber to other standard floral and agri- 

 cultural periodicals, that she might keep fully posted and her repu- 

 tation might not suffer from any mistakes. 



Edith and her brothers also read this new literature that had come 

 into their home, and enjoyed it. Wide-awake growing boys will read 

 something, and if interesting, pure matter is not furnished tliem they 

 are apt to turn to that which is entertaining and unclean, thus stain- 

 ing their minds and hearts. The Quint boys were just at that age 

 when yellow-covered, "blood and thunder" literatuie creeps in. but 

 their mother's beautiful floral magazines and fresh, breezy journals, 

 coming into their home every week or month, headed it ofl? and filled 

 their minds with a real love and zeal for better things. The clean, 

 bright pages illustrated the making of rustic shelves and seats, 

 hanging baskets and other iagenious designs. The boys read, 

 thought, planned, whittled, sawed and hammered, and prett}' brack- 

 ets, rustic trellises and swinging plant rests, ''just like those in moth- 

 er's book," grew under their busy hands, all helping in the good work 

 of making home beautiful and the children happy and contented in it. 



One article on "Window Slielves" sent them clattering round in 

 the garret, till they had unearthed from a pile of rubbish two old 

 bedstead head boards of bird's-eye maple, richl}' stained with age and 

 past all warping with their seventy years of seasoning under that 

 same house roof. The boards were cut down to the right length and 

 width, and mounted on stout, iron brackets before upper lights of a 

 south window. When Edith's thrifty seedlings and clambering vines 

 had been placed on them, filling the window from sill to top with 

 beauty, antl tlie neighbors came in to admire and approve with hearty 



