March, 1908 



AMERICAN HOMES AND GARDENS 



105 



it has been noticed that it is about two weeks 

 later than the gardens of the earth, probably be- 

 cause those lower down are protected from the 

 cold winds of spring by the houses, fences, and 

 trees, while the house-top garden takes the 

 weather as it comes, hot or cold, fair or stormy. 



The summers are long in Seattle, and all the 

 season the garden is filled with flowers, even in 

 winter some are still blooming. First come the 

 early bulbs, primroses, mountain snow, forget- 

 me-nots, and lilacs; then the wealth of roses, 

 daisies, heliotrope, pinks, and sweet peas; later 

 the fall flowers, all blooming in their season just 

 as they do in an ordinary garden. The care and 

 cultivation of the garden is the same also. In 

 the fall all annuals are taken away and spring 

 brings the spading up of flower beds and enrich- 

 ing of the soil with cow manure. The lawn is 

 mowed once a week, and watered with a 

 sprinkler like any carefully tended lawn, and 

 the grass grows and thrives as well on the house- 

 top as on the ground. 



Some of the trees and large shrubs are in tubs, 

 some planted in beds, all of the lilacs are in beds. 

 One can plant as large a shrub in the house-top 

 garden as in a ground garden, and the cost of 

 large plants varies with their size and locality. 

 Seattle is so new and is growing so rapidly the 

 demand for plants is very great, and the prices 

 are consequently higher than in older and more 

 settled communities. The price of lilac bushes in Seattle 

 ranges from one dollar and a half to five dollars. Ten dollars 

 was paid for a jasmine, and five dollars each for English 

 holly. 



The house-top is not exempt from weeds, but they are not 

 as plentiful as on the ground; the greatest trouble has been 

 with slugs. Toads have been introduced as exterminators, 

 but they disappear and leave their duty unperformed. 



The pergola and tea house add immensely to the attrac- 

 tiveness of the garden. To sit at one's ease surrounded by 

 flowers, and between the swaying vines that drape the pillars 

 of tea house and pergola, to look out upon the beautiful 

 scenery for which Seattle is noted is one of the treats the gar- 

 den affords. Of course the view from the top of this seven- 



A Roof Garden of a New York Residence. A Glass Roof and Steam Heat 

 Renders It Comfortable Even in Winter 



story building in a city where skyscrapers are not, is very 

 fine, and from parts of the garden the waters of Puget Sound 

 appear to reach to the edge of the roof. 



Occupying an almost central position in the garden is the 

 glass roof covering the court below. Its top is almost hidden 

 with vines. The sides extend four feet over the floor of 

 the house roof, and the space underneath the four-foot glass 

 extension is filled with growing ferns planted in boxes. This 

 gives the glass roof the appearance of a conservatory in the 

 midst of the garden. 



The ten foot square light wells, of which there are three, 

 are prettily concealed by bamboo poles bent over from each 

 corner and covered with Virginia creepers and with sweet 

 pea hedges around the sides. 



