0 & Ce Ray em ae, 
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DrcEemMBeER, 1908 
A sacred lily brought to flower in thirty days by 
an invalid in spite of a breakdown of the furnace 
Mildews are not likely to make their 
appearance on house plants but when they 
do show themselves the infected plants 
should be treated with fumes of sulphur. 
Sufficient fumes for this purpose may be 
generated by floating a small dish of flowers 
of sulphur in water that has been brought 
to the boiling point. If this water can be 
maintained at the boiling point while in 
the box all the better. These fumes 
will also prove detrimental to insects. 
Fumes from burning sulphur can never be 
used as they kill any plant they come into 
contact with. 
A discarded kitchen utensil will serve 
as a receptacle for the tobacco stems or to 
hold the hot water necessary to evaporate 
the sulphur. 
Rescuing a Greenhouse 
A. B. Bianton, Kentucky 
M* GREENHOUSE, which is forty 
feet long by twenty feet wide, was 
a bower of bloom in the middle of January, 
when there came a sudden change in tem- 
perature accompanied by an icy wind. But 
at eleven o’clock that night there was a good 
fire in the furnace and the drafts all right, 
so I felt safe. 
But at six o’clock next morning I found 
that the inside door of the greenhouse had 
not been closed tight and every plant was 
frozen stiff. 
I soon had the water boiling and the pipes 
hot; moved as many plants as I could to 
the floor; sprinkled all with cold water and 
made a dense tobacco smoke to help raise 
the temperature; and then I covered most 
of them with newspapers. 
Fortunately the day was cloudy and in 
the afternoon I found that, with a few 
exceptions, the plants looked as well as 
ever. There were a few black leaves on 
the blooming heliotropes, but the callas 
that were lying flat in the morning had 
straightened up and had not a mark to mar 
their beauty. 
. three, enough to fill the cylinder. 
THE GARDEN MAGAZINE 
My begonias and Piersoni ferns were 
killed, but the other ferns were not damaged. 
Jasmines, Murraya exotica, stephanotis, 
geraniums, and lilies went on blooming, and 
the roses never did better. I suppose the 
fact that the house and plants were quite 
dry may have helped. I have cared for my 
greenhouse for fifteen years and have never 
had a like experience. 
Moral: Be sure the greenhouse doors are 
locked every night. 
A Home-made Roller for $1.10 
CHARLES BILLINGS, Vermont 
I SAVED about $13 by making my own 
garden roller, which is thirteen inches 
in diameter, twenty-two inches long and 
weighs about 250 pounds. It cost me only 
$1.10. 
If you want one like it, have a tinsmith 
make a sheet-iron cylinder of the desired 
dimensions. Put a wooden head in either 
end, and a 3-inch steel rod, four inches longer 
than the cylinder, through the centre of 
the heads. Set the cylinder on end with 
the rod projecting two inches above and 
A home-made garden roller for $1.10—a saving 
of about $13 
below. Through one side of the upper 
head cut as large a hole as convenient. 
Mix thoroughly Portland cement and 
sharp, screened sand, in the ratio of one to 
Wet the 
mixture to the consistency of thin mortar, 
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219 
pour into the cylinder and let stand until 
dry. Remove the board ends, and ham- 
mer the projecting metal down over the 
edges. : 
Take two pieces of 1} x 1? in. scantling 
five feet long. Bore an 14-inch hole at one 
end of each piece and put them on the 
projecting ends of the cylinder rod. Bolt 
and brace a bar across them in front of the 
cylinder, and work down the front ends in - 
suitable shape for handles. 
Sacred Lilies in Thirty Days 
A., New York 
READ with much interest an article 
in THE GARDEN MAGAZINE, saying 
that the Chinese sacred lily will bloom in 
about two months. 
In December, 1906, some bulbs of the 
sacred lily were sent me from California, 
and I put one in a small jar with water and 
a few stones gathered from the roadway. 
At Christmas time I went away for a week, 
leaving the lily in my bedroom. During 
my absence the furnace broke down, and 
for a week there was no heat whatsoever 
in my room. I greatly feared my lily would 
be quite dead after such treatment, but on 
my return I placed it in my window where 
it had plenty of sunlight. 
The picture on this page was taken about 
the middle of January, a month after plant- 
ing, and at that time there were fifty blooms 
on the lily. 
A Flower-bed for Thirty Cents 
Etta M. BEALS, Massachusetts 
Eos the past two summers one of our 
neighbors has had a brilliant bed of 
annuals costing only thirty cents a year 
for seed. ‘The bed is about ro x 12 ft. 
The edging is of blue ageratums. Next 
is a double row of crimson feathered celosia 
and a single row of white asters. The 
centre is filled with tall African marigolds 
This flower bed was filled with annuals at a cost of thirty cents for seed. Edging of ageratum, then 
celosias, then asters, 
Marigolds in centre 
