67 



CHAPTER XIY. 



PLANTING OF FLOWER BEDS. 



We are now almost ready to plant our flowers, but one 

 small operation Is yet necessary to make the beds ready for 

 •their Intended occupants. The beds should be somewhat 

 higher than the general level of the surroundings. In digging 

 the beds the soil should be slightly raised in the centre and 

 gradually fall to the border, at which point it should be about 

 two inches below the level of the top of the sod. The object in 

 raising the centre Is to show the plants more prominently. 

 Be careful that this be not carried to such an extreme that all 

 the water will drain ofl". The objects in recommending that 

 the soil at the border of the bed be Zoi^er than the surroundings, 

 are: 1st. It keeps the outlines plain and distinct, and to a 

 great extent prevents the grass from encroaching upon the 

 space occupied by the flower bed. This having been done, the 

 beds are ready for planting. This Is a very important opera- 

 tion ; not that it requires a great amount of skill to remove a 

 plant from a pot and put it in a hole in the ground, but because 

 in order to produce a beautiful eflect we musst use judgment in 

 the arrangement of our plants. To be enabled to use this judg- 

 ment we must be acquainted with the habits and colors of the 

 flowers of the plants we intend using. We have frequently 

 seen handsome plants bedded out by novices who had no idea 

 what the plants would grow to be ; all they knew about them 

 was that they looked pretty in the greenhouse, and they should 

 look pretty in the garden. The plants were all about the same 

 size, and from this (if at all) the inference was drawn that ther 

 all grew with the same rapidity. The result of this promiscu- 

 ous planting was that some of the tender plants died, and the 

 rapid growing varieties smothered the weaker, thus making 

 the bed, instead of a thing of beauty and pride, an irregular 

 mass of confusion and a constant reminder that our ideal 

 flower bed is a miserable failure. Without stopping to inquire 

 into or investigate the why and the wherefore of this failure, 

 the disappointed novice declares that he or she '* cannot grow 

 plants to make them look as pretty as Mr. A's or Mrs. B's, aud 



