COTTAGE GARDENS 



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to say nothing of the pride and delight that it must have 

 been to its owner. 



There is scarcely a cottage without some plants in the 

 window ; indeed, the windows are often so much filled up 

 with them that the light is too much obscured. The wise 

 cottagers place them outside in the summer, to make 

 fresh growth and gain strength. 



These window plants are the objects of much care, and 

 often make fine specimens. The cactus, whose owner is 

 tying it up with a bit of soft 

 thread, stood in the cottage 

 window that was thickly em- 

 bowered by a banksia rose in 

 unusually full bloom. 



The old double white rose, 

 brother of the pretty pink 

 Maiden's Blush, never seems so 

 happy or looks so well as in a 

 cottage garden : and the old 

 kinds of cluster roses are great 

 favourites. 



The deep-rooting Everlasting 

 Pea (Winter-bean is its local 

 name) is a fine old cottage plant, 



and Nasturtiums ramble far and wide. Nowhere else does 

 one see such Wallflowers, Sweet- Williams, and Canterbury 

 Bells, as in these carefully-tended little plots. 



It is a sign of careful gardening and good upbringing, 

 when the little boys of a family are seen on the roads 

 with old shovels and little improvised hand-carts, collecting 

 horse-droppings. It means that the plants will have a 

 nourishing surface mulching that will be much to their 

 benefit. 



The Window Plant 



