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U52 



The Weekly Florists^ Review* 



Mabch 28, 1007. 



seasons cannot be changed to suit a tra- 

 ditional college year. If the subject of 

 pomology is worth teaching at all it is 

 worth teaching in its entirety and 

 throughout the year; and it is worth the 

 time that is required for good prepara- 

 tion. 



"How is floriculture to be taught if 

 not by means of floriculture? You can 

 never teach it by means of lectures alone, 

 nor even by lectures and more or less 

 relevant and entertaining piecemeal lab- 

 oratory work. You must have a real 

 floricultural equipment, manned by a real 

 florist who does real work, and who has 

 a sufficient corps of assistants who really 

 know the several parts of the business to 

 aid him in carrying the student through 

 a real training. In like manner, if we 

 are to teach nursery work, we must have 

 a nursery, and men who know the nurs- 

 ery, and if vegetable culture is to be 

 efficiently taught there must be a large 

 kitchen garden, under the charge of a 

 man who is skilled in vegetable culture. 

 Above all, the teaching of science and 



practice should not be separated, but go 

 hand in hand." 



SWEET PEAS IN POTS. 



Any one having a greenhouse can eas- 

 ily have a few early sweet peas to flower 

 in pots with a minimum of trouble, says 

 a writer in the Gardeners' Magazine. A 

 number of 3-inch pots should be pre- 

 pared in the usual way, and filled with 

 soil. Into each insert two seeds, about 

 half an inch below the surface of the 

 soil. Should both germinate, destroy 

 the weaker, and pot the other one as soon 

 as the roots commence working through 

 the soil. Either one shift or two shifts 

 may be given, viz., to 5-inch and thence 

 to 7-inch pots, or straight into 6-inch 

 pots, the latter being the flowering size. 

 A twig should be given as soon as the 

 plants show a tendency to run up, and 

 finally a nice sprayey hazel bough should 

 be afforded when the first buds show. 

 On this the plant will display itself in 

 full beauty if assisted thereto by liquid 

 manure. 



FISHERMAN*S LUCK. 



"Speaking o' catfish," remarked 

 Jaggs, after the man who had been south 

 ceased his description of an alleged six- 

 foot tarpon which got away, * ' a chap 

 don't rightly know what a fish story is 

 till he gets into them tropic seas. I 

 knowed a chap down at Kingston that 

 put in seven years shark-fishin ' on ac- 

 count o' some sea pirate as threw a mess 

 o' dockyments overboard as was swal- 

 lowed by a shark — he reckoned he 'd be a 

 full-blooded duke if he ever found 'em, 

 and you never see such a bunch o ' stuff 

 as he tried out o ' them shark post-mor- 

 tems. I reckon he 'ad about eighty-seven 

 dog collars, to say nothink about beer 

 bottles and general 'ardwarc. And once 

 he come across a pair o ' spectacles and 

 a purple velvet bunnet, as I could swear 

 belonged to my Aunt Eliza, as kept a 

 greengrocer shop down 'Ammersmith 

 way, ' ' 



"Was your Aunt Eliza drowned?" 

 asked the new rose gro\\-er, respectfully. 



' * Well, no, ' ' said J.aggs, with the air 



of a man who must tell the truth ar any 

 cost. * * But it 's a sing 'ler thing ; that 

 there bunnet was blowed overboard one 

 Saturday afternoon, when Aunt Eliza 

 was sittin ' on the pier at Ramsgate, 

 'avin ' six penn 'orth o ' shrimps and a 

 drop o' stout, and it was the very next 

 Saturday, as near as I could reckon, as 

 Ed 'ard Snagsby hooked that identical 

 shark in Kingston harbor. He 'ad a 

 kind o' sufferin' expression, Snagsby 

 said ; seemed like that purple bunnet 

 'adn 't set very well. ' ' 



There was a temporary pause, during 

 which the voice of the greenhouse terrier 

 was heard in vociferous protest, as the 

 tame crow, a recent introduction, un- 

 earthed a favorite bone from the com- 

 post bin, and threw it into a stoke-hole. 

 As the arbitration committee settled 

 down, after soothing the terrier's injured 

 feelings, Jaggs continued: 



' * It ain 't often you meet a man with 

 a head on him like James H. Saggers. 

 He 'd never set around ketchin ' sharks 

 like Snagsby ; he 'd 'ave some scheme for 



makin' the sharks ketch themselves. It 

 was down in Central America where I 

 first met him ; remember that time I 

 went into the coffee business, and an 

 earthquake come along and yanked the 

 ranch down into the sub-cellar,- so to 

 speak? 



' * Saggers was the big noise in some 

 rubber syndicate that was holdin' up the 

 government for real estate — not as a 

 rubber syndicate needs real estate nor 

 anythink else, except postage stamps and 

 hot air. When the earthquake quit, all 

 Saggers 'ad left was his pajammers and 

 a one-eyed bull terrier. There was a 

 brand-new volcano open for business just 

 where he 'd picked out a site for a brew- 

 ery, and a full hand of hot springs and 

 geysers camped out where he was plan- 

 nin' a pleasure park for his new trolley 

 line. But you couldn't discourage 

 James H, Saggers; he says, *if we can't 

 do nothink else we can go in swimmin ', * 

 and it was while we was dryin' off on 

 the beach he tells me he's got a new 

 scheme. Them there hot springs and 

 mud geysers has West Baden and Mount 

 Clemens faded out o' sight; put up a 

 few ^hacks and a thirst parlor, get an 

 advertising man to fix up a few sheets 

 o' dope, and there you are, 



* ' Well, Saggers goes ahead with it, 

 and pretty soon every boatload o ' tour- 

 ists as was turned loose makes a bee- 

 line for the wonderful hot springs. You 

 see. Saggers always was original, and 

 where he made his grand-stand play 

 was in providing' electric baths, with 

 them tropical eels to furnish power. Of 

 course you chaps has 'earu of them elec- 

 tric eels ; we kept 'em in tanks, and when 

 we wanted a trifle o ' chain lightnin ' 

 all we had to do was to send a Dago to 

 stir up the eels an' ketch one about so 

 long — no dynamos nor wirin ' nor any 

 other foolishness," 



' ' I don 't see what brings you back in 

 the greenhouse business, .Taggs, ' ' re- 

 marked Tommy. "After a chance like 

 that you must be a millionaire, doin' a 

 little slummin ' for amusement. ' ' 



Jaggs shook his head sadly, as he 

 scraped the last remaining grains from 

 his tobacco pouch. * ' I often told Sag- 

 gers, " he said, "as we was too pros- 

 perous. There's always some cross-eyed 

 hoodoo out with a flub for a man as 

 tries to get along by honest industry, 

 especially if he mixes in politics. That 

 was Saggers 's weakness. I says to him, 

 * Saggers, ' I says, * it ain 't our funeral, 

 no matter 'ow many revolutions a min- 

 ute they runs their dinky little republic. 

 If the president o' this 'ere bloomin* 

 country gets in office, ' I says, * by 

 roundin' up the retirin' cabinet agen a 

 wall and 'avin' a file o' tin soldiers 

 shoot 'em up, why, ' I says, * it 's just a 

 matter o' habit, like playin' cribbage or 

 \vearin ' side whiskers. If you 're tryin * 

 to get a shock, ' I says, ' you stick to 

 your electric eels, and leave politics 

 alone, ' 



' ' I don 't just know what 'appened 

 after I left; after bein' shot at three 

 nights runnin' I got a notion the cli- 

 mate was a bit sultry, but I hear as the 

 navy was blowed up one night — she was 

 a side-wheeler as they used to run down 

 to Rockaway when I first come over — 

 and the government got a notion that 

 Saggers was touchin' off submarine 

 mines with trained electric eels, Some'ow 

 it don 't 'ardly seem possible, but you 

 never can tell. I left the country my- 

 self in a cargo o ' green bananas, along 

 ' more tarantulas than I really needed, 

 if I was pickin ' my own society, and I 



