70 



My GARDEN. 



condition, and as a result of the whole arrangement healthy vegeta- 

 tion is secured with the least possible amount of artificial heat. My 

 house has only two 3-inch hot-water pipes, and many plants may be 

 grown in it without any heat. No one who loves plants and likes to 

 see them grow should be without a Poor Man's House ; for there is 

 no method in which so much pleasure may be obtained with so 

 small an outlay. 



Passing from the Poor Man's House, which everybody should have, 

 we have to examine my Orchard-house : this is simply a luxury, 

 and may be more easily dispensed with. My orchard-house (fig. 84) 

 is literally a glass shed, in which fruit-trees and plants are grown 



Fig. 84.— Orchard House. 



between March and November. It is about eighty feet long and 

 fifteen feet wide, and arranged due north and south, so that the sun 

 shines through the east side of the house in the morning before 

 twelve, and through the west side in the afternoon. My orchard- 

 house is not placed in a sufficiently open situation, as there are 

 trees within 150 feet of it, which shade it from the rays of the 

 sun in the early morning. It is desirable so to place an orchard- 

 house that it may catch the first rays of the rising sun, and the last 

 of the setting, so as to perfect the flavour of the fruit. 



My orchard-house is ventilated by boards on hinges, passing from 

 one end of the house to the other below the glass. There are ventila- 

 tors also at the top ; but if I constructed a house regardless of ex- 

 pense, I would completely throw back the glass in summer, and only 

 close it in cold nights or in stormy days. 



