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THE FLORISTS' MANUAL. 



worth 50 cents." The same with roses 

 and violets and all other flowers. It is 

 the same with all other businesses, 

 and why not with ours, where quality 

 varies so greatly? 



The most important feature in our 

 business next to quality of goods and 

 polite attention to customers, is 

 promptness. Many an elderly man is 

 worrying to get his orders off prompt- 

 ly on the time promised and agreed for 

 their delivery, while his shopmen are 

 lolling around with the serene manner 

 and thought that the old man need not 

 fret himself, the wedding* is not till 7 

 o'clock, or tha party till 3 p. m., or the 

 funeral till tomorrow. When these 

 events occur is no business of yours; 

 you have promised the order at a cer- 

 tain hour and you should never fail to 

 keep your promise. There may be sev- 

 eral reasons why the order was wanted 

 at a certain hour, of which you were 

 entirely unaware. No part of the busi- 

 ness is more important than prompt- 

 ness, and in no part do I notice a 

 greater inclination to ignore it. A 

 reputation for a late and disappointing 

 delivery is a deplorable handicap to 

 success. 



Finally the three great requisites to 

 success are to keep and supply a good 

 article, be prompt and deliver all or- 

 ders how, when and where you prom- 

 ised, and treat your customers with 

 polite deference and respect. If you 

 are asked for an article which you do 



one grown by the commercial florist. 

 The young shoots root readily in an 

 ordinary propagating bed. They grow 

 quickly and if given much root room 

 will not flower for a long time. They 

 are hardly of consequence enough to 



SWEET PEAS. 



Of late years the greatly improved 

 varieties and beautiful colors of the 

 sweet peas have brought them up to 

 be one of our most important spring 



Two Views of a Store Interior. 



not have, procure it if possible to 

 oblige, but never promise what you are 

 afraid you cannot supply. You will 

 never seriously offend a customer by 

 declining an order, but you will have 

 given great offense by promising and 

 not fulfilling. 



SWAIJNSONA GALEGIFOLIA. 



There are red, pink and white forms 

 of this plant and the latter is the only 



occupy bench room, but where you 

 have a chance to plant them out in a 

 box or confined space at the end of a 

 house the flowers will be at times very 

 useful. 



Pot very firmly in some good, coarse 

 sod. They can be thinned out and cut 

 back in the spring. A carnation house 

 temperature will suit them very well. 

 I know of no use that we can make of 

 them as 'small plants. 



flowers. And what can be more truly 

 springlike, for these you cannot have 

 any day in the year as we do now have 

 many of our other flowers. Early 

 April is as soon as sweet peas are seen 

 in any quantity, and they are then a 

 luxury, but middle to end of June they 

 are everybody's flower, and as long 

 as they last are favorites with all. We 

 have seen cool, moist summers when 

 the peas lasted till cut off by frost, but 

 usually our hot, dry August winds 

 them up. 



For forcing under glass they can be 

 sown in early September. If you de- 

 vote a whole bench to them the rows 

 ought to run north and south and be 

 2 feet 6 inches apart. Sow thinly and 

 support with chicken netting. My ex- 

 perience is that in a solid, deep bed 

 under glass they grow too strong and 

 do not flower freely, so I would rather 

 give them six inches of soil, rather 

 heavy and firm, with little if any ma- 

 nure. The first bed we tried under 

 glass in a fine, light house was a fail- 

 ure because the roots had too much 

 room and too good a soil. 



We sow a few seeds by the iron sup- 

 ports in our carnation houses on the 

 north side of a middle bench. They 



LONG'S 



FLORISTS' PHOTOGRAPHS, 



FLORAL ART CATALOGUE. 



Blank Order Sheets, Stationery, 

 Stock Booklets and Folders, 



Florists' Printing to order. Lists and Samples free. 

 Write to DAN'L B. LONG, Publisher, Buffalo, N.Y. 



