April, 1911 



THE GARDEN MAGAZINE 



175 



consumes air in great quantities, but as 

 it is connect ?d with a chimney the air 

 from which the oxygen is taken passes 

 out of the room and is replaced by air 

 that comes in through door, window or 

 cracks. With these little gas heaters, 

 the vitiated air stays in the room and 

 keeps getting worse and worse. 



Can city people who live in flats and use 

 gas ranges economize with fuel? Cer- 

 tainly, by using an oil stove. There are 

 several makes, and I have used them all. 

 Beware of the old-fashioned wick stoves. 

 They are a nuisance. The wick blue 

 flame is particularly good. It is smoke- 

 less because a mechanical contrivance 

 prevents the wick from being turned too 

 high. It is better than the wickless in 

 that it starts quicker, has fewer parts to 

 clog and does not emit such a disagreeable 

 odor when it is put out. 



Stoves, with oil at twelve cents a gallon, 

 burn at an expense of two-thirds of a cent 

 {>er burner per hour, whereas coal gas 

 at one dollar per thousand costs one and 

 one-third cents per burner per hour. 

 Oil, then, would seem to cost about half 

 as much as gas. 



Kerosene and gasolene used in new ways 

 and in the latest appliances are a boon to 

 people outside the cities and large villages. 

 Wood is rising in value, coal is getting 

 more and more costly. Large areas of 

 the country cannot have either wood or 

 coal without importing them a long dis- 

 tance. But the petroleum fuels can go 

 easily where coal and wood are transported 

 with difficulty, and are able to do all that 

 coal could do under the same conditions 

 and even more. "Kerosene is recognized 

 as the coming fuel" has been said with 

 emphasis. Whether this be so or not 

 it is eminently the most economical cook- 

 ing fuel for people of moderate income, 

 and the wide-spread use of blue-flame 

 stoves and of oil-driven machinery would 

 seem to indicate that kerosene has a 

 far greater future than has been sus- 

 pected. 



The best fuel for rural dwellers, however, 

 is gasolene when generated into gas. Take 

 the equalizing gas machine. It consists 

 of a tank for gasolene buried in the ground 

 a short distance from the building, con- 

 nected with apparatus in the house for 

 driving air over this gasolene, thus pro- 

 ducing carburetted gas, which then is 



An " equalizing " gas machine, for lighting, cook- 

 ing, heating, etc. 



Wick blue-flame oil stove, smokeless, quick to start 

 and practically odorless when put out 



distributed through pipes wherever it 

 may be needed. After the machine is 

 installed the operating expenses are very 

 low: "Cheaper and better than city gas:" 

 "Two dollars per month as against six 

 dollars per month for the same kind of 

 use in the city." This machine furnishes 

 gas to cook the food, to light the house, 

 to run pumping engines and other kinds 

 of engines, run an instantaneous water 

 heater, and to do any number of other 

 useful things that the owner may arrange 

 for. It can also furnish fuel for the hot 

 water heating system. 



Here then, is a fuel for the country 

 which bears the same relation to country 

 life that coal gas does to city life, and does 

 it at about one-third of the expense. 



Plant for Winter Beauty 



T WAS much impressed with the beauty 

 ■*■ of my garden during last winter, as seen 

 from my window. All December there was 

 thick, deep, dazzling snow and on some 

 days there were twigs cased in ice, other 

 days thick masses of snow on all the trees; 

 and in the midst of this winter scene the 

 oaks were wearing all their thick foliage; 

 hardly a leaf had fallen from the scrubs 

 and the larger white oaks and red oaks that 

 mass in the valley. This foliage was in all 

 possible, wonderful shades of deep maroon 

 and tapestry tints; all the shades imagin- 

 able of purple and wine colors and dull red 

 browns, besides light tan that shows gold 

 against the sky in the sun and dark tan 

 and a rare ashes-of-rose color, and some 

 beautiful deep chestnut browns and cop- 

 per browns. Wonderful suggestions for 

 indoor color combinations if only such ex- 

 quisite tints could be obtained in manu- 

 factured articles! And I ask: Why do we 

 not plant more with an eye to winter 

 beauty and comfort? — L. L. D. 



Destroying Scales on Ferns 



I HAVE a splendid great ostrich fern 

 which has been infested with scales 

 for three winters. It is kept in an east 

 window of a living-room, and because of 

 its great size is not moved except to be 

 taken in the spring to a sheltered porch and 

 brought back in the fall. It cannot be 

 sprayed in a room properly carpeted and 

 papered. The scale cannot be fumigated 

 to their last sleep, because my family 

 insist that cyanide gas is not their poison, 

 and carbon bisulphide gas is nasty. There- 

 fore, once a week, generally on Sunday 

 morning after breakfast, I take a small 

 sharp cutter or a penholder with a new steel 

 nib and scrape off scale bugs by hand. 



I used to let the fallen enemy lie on the 

 field — that is to say, on the table edge 

 and the carpet. Some of the scales were 

 soft, juicy, and pretty colored; some were 

 bright, shiny brown hard-shell, full of white 

 powder and fine webs. In going over the 

 fern regularly once a week, I came to notice 

 that young scales were most numerous 

 where the fronds brushed the edge of the 

 table and lay upon the carpet, the stems 

 near the roots and the three feet between the 

 table and floor developing few new insects. 

 When a magnifying glass showed the white 

 powder of the grandfather hard-shells 

 to be little bugs, I began to suspect that 

 I was spreading scales as fast as killing 

 them. In their first stages they were able 

 to crawl, and I was helping them to new 

 pastures via the table edge. Latterly 

 I have been burning the old bugs and all 

 heavily infested twigs, and the birth rate 

 is going down steadily. 



Pennsylvania. E. S. J. 



Spinach Salad 



T EFT-OVER food may often be "re- 

 -*— ' made," as it were, into very appetiz- 

 ing dishes. Spinach is particularly taste- 

 less when cold. 



However, a delicious salad may be made 

 by chopping very fine a quantity of cold 

 spinach. Season to taste with salt, butter 

 and pepper. Shape into individual nests 

 and on each place the yolk of a hard-boiled 

 egg, cutting the white into strips. Garnish 

 with small, crisp lettuce leaves and stuffed 

 olives and serve with mayonnaise dressing. 



Massachusetts. M. H. N. 



A salad made from cold spinach, decorated with 

 boiled egg, lettuce and olives 



