A 



OUR BACK YARDS. 



bia, very large, reflexed and whorled white ; Elliott 

 F. Shepard, paper yellow ; London Humphrey, 

 pink, large, distinct ; Mrs. Ley, white, like Domin- 

 ation, with pink shadings ; Lemonade, bright lemon, 

 early ; Cypiere, rose and white ; Mme. Ed. Rey, 

 currant red ; Perle Poitevine, white ; Exposition 

 de Triomphe de Marsielles, buff ; Comte de Monstic, 

 red; M. H. Payne, flame red ; M. Bernard, amar- 

 anth ; M. Paukouski, anemone, bronze ; Sabine, 

 anemone, lemon and white ; Nelson, amaranth, 

 anemone ; Veil d' Or, gold ; M. Garnar, gold ; Mad. 

 Baco, rose pink ; Claude Sahut, blush, tubular ; 

 Alcyon, solid rose pink ; Mme. L. Leroy. pure white. 



Here are 20 American seedlings, 8 Japanese im- 

 portations, 6 English varieties and ig French kinds 

 — a total of 43, and all meritorious. 



Of the new seedlings which have been shown at 

 our exhibitions or have come under my notice, the 

 following promise to be most valuable acquisitions : 



Ada Spaulding, a large and fine globe shaped 

 Japanese of sturdy habit, silvery white and blush 

 rose, beautiful ; Grove P. Rawson, buff and apricot, 

 new color, very fine : Henry Elkius Widener, clear 



golden yellow, excellent ; Mrs. Thos. A. Edison, in- 

 curved, pink, silvery, reflexed, distinct ; Cyclone, an 

 immense white flower of a new shaj>e ; E. G. Hill, 

 rich chrome and bronze, flowers of fine shape, re- 

 flexed and full ; Rosebank Gem, large flower, pink 

 and white, distinct shape ; Peculiarity, a variety 

 with tube petals, distinct pouch-like, notched and 

 toothed at the extremities ; Oriole, golden yellow 

 with twisted petals. Here are 29 new candidates, 

 and as I have said, they all promise to be of the 

 highest merit. It must be borne in mind that I have 

 not seen all seedlings this year and there may be 

 some even better than any here named. I have 

 passed over at least 300 varieties in making the above 

 selection. Before closing this box, there is room to 

 mention the new imported Louis Boehmer, a pink 

 Mrs. Hardy ; it will be a valuable acquisition. In 

 the same collection is Omar, a reflexed flower hav- 

 ing petals of a deep blood color and \ of an inch 

 wide. The sports from the Chinese varieties, Mrs. 

 S. Coleman, Violet Tomlin and Miss M. A. Haggis 

 will find many admirers. 



John Thorpe. 



OUR BACK YARD. 



A SMALL LAY SERMON. 



E HAVE societies for 

 the fur therance of 

 many ends which we 

 consider desirable, 

 and we have societies 

 for the prevention of 

 most things we con- 

 sider undesirable. In 

 fact, it seems impos- 

 sible in this age for 

 any two men to wish 

 for the same state of affairs without uniting them- 

 selves into an association in the hope of bringing it 

 about. Why not then have a Society for the Im- 

 provement of Our Back Yards ? 



The necessity for such a combination all must 

 admit who are familiar with city life. Walk through 

 some streets lined with comfortable, even preten- 

 tious, houses, and you will find all in front neat and 

 clean, with every possible adornment of windows 

 and grass-plots ; growing palms, perhaps, on each 

 side of the doorway of one house, flowers in the 

 windows of another. 



Yet is all this but a blind, a whitening of the 

 sepulchre, a putting of the best foot foremost be- 

 yond all proper limits. Enter one of these same 



houses and take a view from an upper back window 

 and what is there in the outlook to please the eye 

 or cheer the mind ? A dreary, brick-bounded waste, 

 sub-divided into smaller deserts by hideous board 

 fences (inventions of the father of all ugliness in 

 one of his most dyspeptic moods !), diversified by 

 ash-barrels, trash-heaps and many other melan- 

 choly objects, and ornamented by a variety of tin 

 cans and sardine boxes in all stages of oxidation, 

 broken crockery and debris of every description. 

 Here and there, perhaps, a stunted tree, or even a 

 rose-bush, struggles into sight, as nature's feeble 

 protest against the all-prevading ugliness, yet only 

 serving to accentuate it, like a very small light in a 

 very large darkness. 



Even the houses themselves from this view par- 

 take of the general air of neglect. While the brick- 

 layer's or the mason's art is exhausted in adorning 

 so much of them as is visible from the street, the 

 "alley fagade," if I may be allowed the term, is 

 slighted alike by architect, builder and tenant. If 

 the design is to be skimped, and thought and draw- 

 ing saved, it is here that the loss falls ; if bad bricks 

 cr slovenly workmanship are to be put in to make 

 Ihe contract "ipay," here is where it may safely be 

 done. If shades, curtains or blinds must be econo- 



