1870. j 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
343 
those who read this will do something towards 
association in every section lacking in this re¬ 
spect. Experience universally teaches that 
“ union is strength.” Tiie only question is how 
to unite. What I have said in relation to rasp¬ 
berries is equally true ot' strawberries, and oili¬ 
er small fruits in this section. 
Gardens or Greenhouses upon the Roof. 
BY SAMUEL B. PAESONS. 
Some ten years ago we suggested an idea of 
roof gardens, which was conveyed by the Agri¬ 
Fi£T. 1.—MANSARD ROOF CONVERTED INTO A GREENHOUSE. 
Mansard-roof glazed in this manner is shown in 
figure 1. Now for heating: Every one knoivs 
that the upper rooms of his house are so warm 
from the ascending heat of his furnace that reg¬ 
isters are scarcely needed. Let the doors be 
kept open and the waste heat of the house will 
keep the garret at the highest desirable temper¬ 
ature. Thus the greenhouse is heated without 
any extra trouble or expenditure. 
Its care would be a pleasant recreation for 
any of the family, provided they enjoy working 
among plants as much as a friend of ours, who 
would leave the counting-house and its engross¬ 
ing cares at a reasonable hour in the afternoon, 
and after leisurely dining, would 
put on an apron and go among 
his camellias, potting and trim¬ 
ming, and enjoying their beauty 
while giving them those nice 
manipulations which only a true 
lover of flowers knows how r to 
administer. A lady fresh from 
such occupations would lend new 
charms to the evening hours; and 
the memory of her children in the 
upper air would always have pow¬ 
er to bring a sparkle to her eye or 
a glad expression to her lip. And 
then the pleasure of cutting one’s 
own flowers or sending to a friend 
one’s own roses or camellias or 
culturist to its numerous readers. Since that 
time the almost universal adoption of the Man¬ 
sard roof has increased the availability of our 
plan, and has led to numerous inquiries which 
make necessary an improved description. Time 
has not diminished our sense of the value of an 
adaptation of this idea to city buildings where 
land is almost fabulous in price, and the air in 
which to build is free of cost. 
Marvellous accounts have come down to us of 
the beauty of the hanging gardens of Babylon, 
and the lavish expenditure upon them by the 
monarclis of that magnificent and wonderful 
city. We think of their beauty as something 
unattainable now, and scarcely realize that in 
any of our cities they can be rivaled without ex¬ 
traordinary expenditure. It is within the 
means of any man who builds a house to rent 
for $800 per year, to have a garden on the roof 
which, during the summer can be filled with 
the most luscious grapes, peaches, plums, etc., 
and in the winter with plants, the beauty of 
the flowers of which will afford a charm far 
beyond the trifling cost of their maintenance. 
A glass roof costs very little more than a tin 
or slate one. Let the roof, therefore, be cov- 
48 
PLAN OF GREENHOUSE WITH PLANTS BEDDED OUT. 
ered with glass, and let the garret floor be cov¬ 
ered with concrete, sloping gently from the cen¬ 
ter to the sides, around which a slight depres¬ 
sion in the floor can carry the moisture or drip 
into the leaders which pass from the roof of 
every house to the ground. With this slight 
expense, a perfect greenhouse may be had. A 
Black Hamburg grapes, is not to be despised. 
In case the demands of the counting-house or 
the drawing-room are too engrossing to allow 
any attention to flowers, there are numerous 
florists in every city who would be glad to keep 
such a place in perfect order for 
a very moderate compensation. 
If a little extra strength is 
given to the beams which 
sustain the upper story, suf¬ 
ficient earth could be placed 
there to lay out • the whole 
space of twenty-five by fifty 
feet as a garden, with winding 
walks, delightful carpets of 
moss and roses, camellias, etc., 
planted in the soil, as in figure 
2. By this mode the illusion 
will be complete, and in the 
middle of winter one may 1 , " AN 01 ' 
have a tropical landscape. Those who have 
visited the greenhouses of Prince Demidoff, at 
Florence, will have some conception of the 
beauty of such an arrangement of the plants. 
But for fruit as well as flower culture the use 
of pots will be preferable. Let us see what can 
be done with these. The super¬ 
ficial area of nearly every 
good city house is more than 
twelve hundred square feet. 
Deducting the space required 
for the walks and the stairway, 
there will be more than eight 
hundred square feet on which 
pots can be placed.—By the 
most approved mode of prun¬ 
ing for pot culture, the diame¬ 
ter of foliage in a fruit-tree 
should not exceed the diameter 
of the pot. We could thus 
place eight hundred fruit-trees 
in the garden, but in order to give abundant 
room and air, we will estimate for only two 
hundred. If one wishes no flowers, but fruit 
only, he can harm forced peaches and nectarines 
at a season when he cannot buy them of the 
confectioner for less than a dollar each. The 
two hundred trees ought readily to yield a crop 
of a thousand peaches. If one’s taste runs on 
strawberries these will yield a good return. 
But if it be desired to have the house filled 
with flowers through the winter, we cannot cul¬ 
tivate forced fruit. We can, however, have 
flowers, stone fruit, and Black Hamburg grapes 
in succession. If the house has been filled with 
flowering plants in the winter, and there is 
plenty of yard room, they can be taken out and 
arranged in groups in the yard as soon as all 
danger of frost is over. The house can then 
be filled with peaches, plums, and nectarines in 
pots, which can be obtained of the nursery¬ 
men ready for fruiting, or prepared the previous 
year by the florist having charge of the house, 
and kept in the cellar during the winter. These 
can remain in the house until the fruit has at¬ 
tained sufficient size to be safe from the enreu- 
lio, when they also can be grouped in the yard 
where they will grow, and ripen early and well. 
Their place in the house can then be supplied 
with grapes in pots which have been retarded 
by being kept in a cool, dark place in the cellar. 
These will then bear abundantly during the 
summer, and, before the flowering plants require 
to be taken in the ensuing autumn, will duly 
respond to the tiller in Black Hamburg's and 
Muscats. Two pounds to each vine, or four 
hundred pounds of grapes would be a moder¬ 
ate estimate for the space mentioned. 
Both stone fruits and grapes are easily man¬ 
aged, and a man of ordinary intelligence could 
soon learn to grow them even if his life has 
been passed in the midst of dry goods or hard¬ 
ware ; if, however, his own skill fails him, florists 
are alwavs attainable. Here then are new lux¬ 
GREENHOUSE WITH SHELVES AND STAND. 
uries—flowers, peaches, and grapes—within the 
reach of every man of moderate means. 
If the capabilities of this plan and its econo¬ 
my were thoroughly understood by architects 
and proprietors, the time would soon come 
when a roof garden would be considered just 
as essential an appendage to a house as a bath¬ 
room. The demand for care takers would bring 
forward a host of candidates for this new branch 
of industry, and it might furnish an excellent 
and remunerative vocation for women. 
The Twelve-Spotted Squash-Beetle.— 
Last month we gave on page 303, an "engraving 
and some account of the Twelve-Spotted Squash- 
Beetle —Diabrotica 12-punctata. Heretofore we 
had only known 
perfect insects, 
finding them so 
Fig. 1. LARVA. 
structive we had picked them off before they 
had a chance to propagate. This year the in- 
