26 



HOME AND FLOWERS 



Bego'.ia Trouble.— (h. H.) The leaf sent 

 shows a disease of bacterial nature. I would 

 advise the use of copperdine. 



Carnations for Winter. — Better plant out 

 during summer, as advised elsewhere, and pot in 

 fall. 



Hihiscus.— (Mrs. B.) When wanted for win- 

 ter let the plants rest in summer. 



Clematis.— (Mrs. J. H. E.) Clematis does 

 well in any well drained loam. 



Freesia.— (A. C.) Old roots will bloom again 

 if planted in September. 



FLORAL PERPLEXITIES FROM THE SOUTH 

 By Airs. G, T. Drennan 



The Hose Hedge.— ^verj Southern garden 

 should have some bold scheme worked out in 

 Eoses. Hedges of Eoses should be of strictly 

 ever-blooming sorts. The flowers of Agrippina, 

 Queen's Scarlet, Louis Phillip, Wooten and 

 Meteor are deep, dark, blood-red, ever-blooming, 

 and the foliage is rich, dark green. They are 

 fine for introducing in hedges. Plant hedge 

 Eoses three feet apart. The effect is better than 

 when crowded together. Polyantha Eoses make 

 exquisite, compact hedges, always in bloom. A 

 light espalier of wood or metal, painted green, 

 is a graceful support for ever-blooming Eoses. 

 Eeine Marie Henriette, Climbing Meteor, Gloire 

 de Dijon, Wm. Allen Eiehardson, and Marechal 

 Niel will make a rampart of gold and crimson 

 glory, draping the espalier. Wherever there is 

 a piece of rocky hillside or broken ground, even 

 if there are trees upon it, plant Crimson Eam- 

 bler, Sweet Brier, La Marque, Marie Leonidas, 

 and any other ironclad, strong climbers, turning 

 the unsightly places into a rose-brake, which 

 is ever a thing of beauty. 



Miss Mary B., Knoxville, Tennessee.— Trob- 

 ably your Fern ball was not kept constantly 

 saturated with water. They are always very 

 dry when received by mail or express, and should 

 be placed in water for a week before being sus- 

 pended, and then should be taken doAvn and be 

 put in water all night. Eepeated watering (and 

 never allowed to dry) is the treatment, and it is 

 better to suspend them in the shade. The New 

 Orleans florists do not recommend these Jap- 

 anese ball Ferns as highly as they do established 

 sorts to be grown in pots and baskets. 



Carrie, Baltimore, Maryland. — The Poinsettia 

 is an out-door plant only in the extreme South. 



In your city it would not only be a hothouse 

 plant, but strictly a stove plant, requiring high 

 heat. The conspicuous beauty of the plant is 

 not developed until autumn in Southern gar- 

 dens. The bracts that terminate each hardwood 

 branch then assume a dazzling scarlet hue. 

 Stove heat develops the same brilliancy in con- 

 servatories. The bright bracts endure for six 

 weeks before they drop. Poinsettia is deciduous 

 by nature. 



Mrs. L. T. M., New Orleans, Louisiana.— As- 

 ters are not available for latitudes above thirty- 

 eight or forty degrees. Chapman, in his "South- 

 ern Flora," says that among the fifty-odd native 

 American Asters less than a dozen are found 

 in the South. Asters vary in form, according to 

 class, and are exquisitely beautiful late summer 

 and autumn flowers, in Northern sections. Their 

 obstinate resistance to the long summers has 

 caused them to be regarded as an impossible 

 flower for Southern gardens. 



Lettie B., Pass Christian, Mississippi.— The 

 Tuberose bulb blooms but once. Get new bulbs 

 every spring, and you will have blooms; but 

 also cultivate the offshoots or bulblets that form 

 around the old bulb, and the third year they 

 will bloom also. 



Mrs. W. W. P., Memphis, Tennessee.— Meteor 

 is a dark, blood-red Eose, with velvety petals. 

 Both the bush and climbing form are ever- 

 blooming. You can not possibly select a finer 

 red Eose. It is also quite hardy South. 



Mr. Paul T., Atlanta, Ga. — Try the tuberous- 

 rooted Begonias in your shaded garden. Also 

 try Lantanas. They bloom under the shade of 

 trees all along the Gulf coast. 



Note. — Owing to an unavoidable delay the copy for ''The Well-Ordered Household" was received 

 too late for publication this month. That department will appear as usual in the August number. 



