U' I N D FALLS . 



250 



of Stevens Hammer, in London, Recently I found it 

 again, in a locality some 200 miles from the place where 

 I first discovered it. The color is dark blue. 



Cattleya Skinncri, var. alba. — Pure white. This form 

 has almost been exterminated, and is now in the hands 

 of the natives only. They sell the plants for their 

 weight of gold. 



Masdevallia Gaskelliana . — Thisis an interesting novelty 

 for the hairy and long tailed section. Rare. 



Tyicliocctitriiin Pfaiii. — Illustrated in Gardeners' 

 Chronicle, 1882. 



Fertilizer for Orchids. — In order to obtain the best 

 results with orchids one should use the following ferti- 

 lizer : 



40 grammes Carbonate of Ammonia. 



30 " Azotale of Ammonia. 



40 '■ Biphosphate of Ammonia. 



10 " Azotate of Potassium. 



Mix thoroughly and use one gramme to a quart of 

 water. Never water the plant with anything but this 

 liquid. For other potted plants besides orchids the 

 solution may be made two or three times as strong. — Z' 

 Orclndophilt-. 



The Peanut Crop of Virginia for the year iSgo is 

 estimated at 2,700, 000 bushels, worth to the producers 

 $2,000,000. The greatest item of expense in raising this 

 crop, as well as many of the market garden crops, is the 

 labor bills. Immense sums of money are paid out 

 weekly to the laborers. This brings prosperity and 

 keeps money in circulation all the time. The peanut 

 crop is a profitable one. It is one of the South s special 

 crops. — Cornucopia. 



A Little Path in the Mountains. — It seemed at one 

 time to be the ruling passion to make as many graceful 

 curves in the roads and walks of our larger parks and 

 pleasure grounds as possible. Trees, shrubs and flow- 

 ers were crowded in, giving one the idea that the flow- 

 ers and shrubs were a secondary matter in the landscape. 

 How different is Nature's way ! We once ran across a 

 little path, a charming one in its way, which wound 

 through a giant forest up a mountain side. There were 

 mossy rocks and graceful ferns on either hand, and 

 higher up among the cliffs, we passed a bank of alpine 

 plants. Then breaking away to the right we passed 

 around a huge boulder, with little patches of polypodium 

 growing along its surface. Then the path leads us on 

 to the edge of the cliff, where we get a glimpse of the 

 beautiful country below and see the cheilanthes fern in 

 its home, growing in great clumps, along the face of the 

 wall of rock, in open sunshine. One more turn, and we 

 are under a great shelving rock or projection of a cliff 

 and here stand in the presence of the rare and beautiful 

 Asplenium parviihtiii, sheltered from the sun and storms. 

 The dark ebony stipes and little green fronds are 

 shown to the best advantage against the natural back- 

 ground of fine, light colored rock masses. We then pass 

 out and over the cliff. The scene changes, and we find 

 ourselves on the border of one of the great rhododen- 

 dron gardens of the southern Alleghanies, but the path 



turns abruptly, leaving this great patch of perpetual 

 green, and leads us down through a hollow, across a lit- 

 tle rivulet that goes singing down over the mossy rocks, 

 and whose course we follow to the valley below. This 

 little path which we have followed in its windings was 

 not a costly one. It had not been sanded and graveled, 

 and probably never heard the rattle of the lawn mower; 

 yet it was evident that in every turn or angle along its 

 way, there was a purpose : some obstruction, a tree, 

 clump of sbrubs, agorge, or rocks, to pass. The scenery 

 changed at every turn, but the path we had hardly 

 noticed. It was not a prominent feature in this land- 

 scape, and this was the secret of its charm. It was an 

 accommodating feature rather than one of display. If 

 this principle were more fully demonstrated in some 

 of the great art gardens, they would better represent 

 nature's landscape, which is supposed to have been taken 

 as a pattern. — Edward Gillet, I\Iass. 



Bryant and the Yellow Violet. — How have we hy- 

 percritical sticklers for truth stumbled upon that shy 

 " yellow violet " of Bryant's verse ! 



He apostrophizes it as the avaiil-coiirier of spring ; 



" Of all its train the hands of Spring 

 First plant thee in the watery mould." 



No ; of all her train the first flower that is planted in 

 the watery mould by the hands of spring is the skunk- 

 cabbage, and the bees know it and gather sweets from it 

 even though the poets do not. But if the too fastidious 

 must needs rule out this plebeian of the bog simply be- 

 cause he does not appear to advantage in a buttonhole, 

 what then ? What a brood of wood blooms stand ready 

 to look down on him as they usurp his place ! The in- 

 comparable arbutus, darling of the mould ; the airy rue- 

 anemone ; the wind-flower, with its pink and white 

 saucers or drooping bells ; the rock-flower — a tiny white 

 boutonniere in itself ; the liverwort ; the downy dwarf 

 everlasting ; the bloodroot, with ruddy pulse ; the squir- 

 rel-corn, redolent of hyacinth ; the coltsfoot, with its 

 ginger roots, and the pale spring beauty, to say nothing 

 of the whitler-flower and dandelion. Which one shall 

 wear the stolen pennant ? What change of heart has 

 now come over our beloved poet of the violet ? What 

 is the testimony of his later years in his ' ' Winter Piece" 

 as he seeks for the first heralds of spring ? 



" Lodged in a sunny cleft 

 Where the cold breezes come not, blooms alone 

 The little wind-flower, whose just opened eye 

 Is blue as the spring heaven it gazes at — 

 Startling the loiterer in the naked groves 

 With unexpected beauty, for the time 

 Of blossoms and green leaves is yet afar." 



There is no " yellow violet " here ; but as the ' ' wind- 

 flower " is never "blue," and the hepatica often is, it 

 was of course the latter flower that really "blossomed 

 alone " amid these lingering snows. — William Hamilton 

 Gibson, in Harper' s Magazine . 



Thirteen Acres Enough. — Peter Henderson said 

 " ten acres is enough.'' One of our old Norfolk county 

 citizens has come very near endorsing Peter's statement. 



