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FLOWERS FOR THANKSGIVING. 



Thanksgiving Day ought to mean much to gardening 

 folk, and their very biggest and bonniest bouquets be 

 placed upon the Thanksgiving dinner-tables. After all 

 the scrambling to get tender plants into the house before 

 frost, the storing of roots in frost-proof places, the prun- 

 ing and planting and protecting to be done outdoors, the 

 gardener well deserves to be feasted, and should give 

 thanljs— that it is all over for the year. 



PLANT-HARDIHOOD. 



We crowd too many plants under shelter that, if rightly 

 planted and well protected, might live over winter out- 

 doors. Professor Massey's notes, in Questions Asked and 

 Answered, tells how easily this is done in the south, and it 

 seems that even up in cold Maine, carnations and Eng- 

 lish ivy, two favorites for all sorts of bouquet and basket- 

 work, thrive under such treatment. This is what a 

 practical Maine gardener says : 



"Many plants not usually considered hardy may be 

 wintered out in Maine, if they are only set in the right 

 place. This is on the north side of a building, where the 

 winter sun will not start them into premature growth. In 

 Portland, and even north of here in Canada, the English 

 ivy will live in the ground all winter with such a posi- 

 tion, and with a few evergreen boughs to further pro- 

 tect it. Carnations that have been in the ground all 

 summer, and have not yet bloomed, will usually winter 

 well in this climate with some protection of leaves and 

 boughs, and so often will old plants. Though these old 

 plants may appear to be dead in the spring, if cut back 

 within an inch of the ground they will send up new 

 shoots in a week or two, and grow and blossom, though 

 they will not be so vigorous as those young plants that 

 kept all their leaves alive." — D. Lawrence, Maine. 



VERBENAS FOR THE WINDOW. 



I never fancied the verbena for a window plant. It 

 is apt to be too sprawling, and in my hands does not bear 

 leaves or flowers enough to be very ornamental, though 

 in beds on the floor of the greenhouse I have had it in 

 bloom nearly all winter. But the verbena lasts quite a 

 while after cutting, and is so bright and pretty for low 

 dishes of flowers or flat bouquets that it should have a 

 good trial, and it seems that this same Maine correspon- 

 dent has been more successful with it than I have : 



"Chrysanthemums and cosmos will supply plenty of 

 flowers for Thanksgiving Day , and numbers of other plants 

 in the window will then be bright with bloom, but we 



must look ahead. October last or November first is a 

 good time to prepare verbenas for early spring blossoms. 

 Last fall we filled a window-box with earth, took cuttings 

 from verbena-plants that in summer had borne the finest 

 blossoms, and inserted them in the earth, pressing it 

 firmly about their stems. This box was placed on a 

 piazza on the southwest side of the house. Not much 

 watering was required, the temperature being so cold, 

 and by the time freezing weather came more than half 

 of the cuttings had rooted. Each one was given a lYi 

 or 3-inch inch pot and set in a south window close to 

 the'glass, so close, indeed, that the frost sometimes glued 

 their leaves to the panes. Here they spent the winter, 

 save for the time occupied by their weekly bath, and one 

 or two temporary retirements to a table on nights when 

 the mercury went below zero. In March they began to 

 bloom, and such large and bright flowers are seldom 

 seen in an outdoor bed." — D. Lawrence, Maine. 



Have we anything prettier or daintier in the plant 

 world than grasses ? Their slender, feathery stems and 

 plumes add fairly-like grace to any arrangement of flow- 

 ers, toning down with a mist of pale green, pink and 

 brown tints any too gay combinations. Many people 

 grow fine grasses in their borders, but few think of grow- 

 ing them in windows, to mix with cut-flowers in winter. 

 They are humble unexacting tenants, and have been per- 

 secuted so long that with the surprise of cultivation they 

 stretch up into eager growth. It is better to grow them 

 in 5 or 6-inch pots by themselves, to preclude their old 

 habit of poaching. As they grow tall, if they bend too 

 much, four light, long twigs set by each plant, with 

 a thread about the top, will keep them in order. Agrostis 

 nebulosa and pulcliclla, Briza inaxima and minor and 

 some species of lagurus and bromus are fine for this 

 purpose. Or, suppose you take up any pretty, tall-grow- 

 ing grasses with feathery heads that you find outdoors 

 this fall, and try growing them in the window. 



BULBS again. 



We gardeners could not keep house without bulbs ; 

 there is always something to do to them or with them. 

 In " Lilies -of-the-Field," Mr. Boyle tells how to plant 

 them outdoors for spring bloom, and this reminds us that 

 it is time to bring potted ones from the cellar up into light 

 and start their buds for Christmas bloom. Roman hya- 

 cinths and freesias are sure holiday bloomers. 



