1911. 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER 
409 
Achimenes and Primulas. 
The last day of September, 1909, some 
one brought me a small potful of 
Achimenes, recommending them to my 
care and saying they had not been doing 
their best that season. There were a 
half dozen or more plants in the four- 
inch pot, some of them too small to 
blossom. There were three or four 
flowers and a few buds, so that we 
learned to know their cheerful blue- 
lavender faces and to hope for a longer 
succession of them the next year. 
The pot was set away in a closet 
where it would not freeze and kept with¬ 
out watering till Spring. Emptying out 
the soil there came to light, as we had 
been warned, only a few small bulbs, 
“about as big as baby teeth," and shaped 
not unlike them. Carefully searching the 
soil for every one I repotted them in a 
six-inch pot and gave them a quiet cor¬ 
ner with plenty of light. Occasionally 
as they grew a little weak stimulant was 
given, for 1 have found that all bulbs 
grown in pots are much benefited by 
liquid fertilizers applied frequently when 
they are in active growth, but always the 
“tea" must be used well diluted. They 
were in bloom by the middle of July. 
That we might enjoy their prettiness, I 
carried the pot to the veranda, but soon 
found that some of those enterprising 
young pullets who would always go 
where they were not wanted had devel¬ 
oped a taste for Achimene flowers. They 
evidently found them as good salad as 
the Tradescantia of the veranda box. 
So my blue-lavender pet must be either 
surrounded by netting or placed out of 
reach. I found a small round basket into 
which the pot fitted and suspended the 
improvised hanging basket where there 
was plenty of light, but direct sunshine 
only in late afternoon. As it was nearly 
opposite the kitchen door, there was the 
less chance of forgetting to give plenty 
of water, for all sorts of hanging baskets 
dry out so promptly. The Achimenes 
seemed to approve of the situation and 
from the six or seven blossoms which 
had been about the daily allowance they 
increased, as the smaller bulbs began 
adding their flowers, to 18 or 20 at one 
time. It was never a truly gorgeous 
plant, but odd and sure to be noticed 
because uncommon in this locality. As 
the flowers, which are stemless in the 
axils of the leaves, have tubular throats 
an inch and a half long and a flat disk 
as large as a silver dollar each one adds 
noticeably to the display. 
My Achimenes were still in full bloom 
when frosty weather came in the Fall, 
so I took the pot down from its basket 
and placed it in a jardiniere in an east 
window. Though I had considered the 
plant a veranda bulb and only for Sum¬ 
mer display, I found that in the sheltered 
air of the sitting room and with faithful 
watering and a little stimulant now and 
then, its satin-textured flowers grew 
larger and more plentiful. Almost up to 
the holidays it continued so full of blos¬ 
soms that it was a pleasure to count 
them over each morning. After a bulb 
began blooming it would put out three 
or four flowers with each new whorl of 
leaves, and as I had quite a potful of 
bulbs the effect was very pretty. 
Achimenes may be well known in other 
localities, but if any window gardener 
has never tried them they will prove 
well worth becoming acquaincd with. 
Keep always in the pots and encourage 
active growth till well into Winter that 
next season’s bulbs may be full of vigor 
and you may be sure of an endless suc¬ 
cession of blossoms from July to De¬ 
cember. 
No one who reads plant notes needs 
be told that Primula obconica is a desir¬ 
able window plant. I am always promis¬ 
ing myself to buy a paper of seed and 
see if I cannot grow some as mid¬ 
winter gifts to my friends. But what 
country woman ever does half she plans! 
In the Fall I made a trip to the green¬ 
house in the village to buy a Mahernia 
odorata, a window plant we used greatly 
to enjoy, but now lost to our collection 
these many seasons. Its tiny-leaved, 
compact little bushes used to be thickly 
hung with yellow bells, which gave out 
a delicate but charming fragrance. 
Never heard of it” was the young 
florist’s, reply to my inquiry. Walking 
about in his neatly kept houses I was 
struck by the change from greenhouses 
in that same village 50 years ago. Then 
one S 3 w Calceolarias, Camellias and all 
sorts of things not to be grown except 
under glass, and a supply of such of 
window plants as were popular at the 
time. Now almost no one keeps blos¬ 
soming house plants, and there were long 
houses filled with plants which would 
furnish cut flowers. Chrysanthemum 
houses, carnation benches many feet 
long, roses for cutting, Stevia to furnish 
the fine white that “sets off" handsome 
blossoms so effectively, ferns and aspara¬ 
gus for green and, in a corner, some 
much-clipped plants of the fragrant¬ 
leaved myrtle from which the Swedish 
brides like their wedding wreaths made. 
The place had a thriving air, and I know 
that every village funeral, party or dance 
sent customers to its doors, while many 
people bought flowers as freely as they 
did oranges and grapes. But I must 
return without my Mahernia. So I paid 
20 cents for a primrose and said absent 
mindedly as it was being wrapped up: 
“So you will warrant this to blossom 
all Winter?” 
“Oh, no," was the quick response, 
“We warrant nothing. But if it stayed 
here it would be in flower till Spring.” 
It has done as well in my sitting room 
a§ plant could. Every little while a new 
flowering stalk pushes up and still the 
earlier ones keep blossoming. In Janu¬ 
ary the original bunch of bloom was 
still keeping up its succession of flowers 
and eight others were outdoing it in size 
and in number of blossoms. 
OLD-FASHIONF-D PLANT LOVER. 
R. N.-Y.—Primula obconica is one of 
the prettiest and most satisfactory pot 
plants one can grow, admirably suited 
to the ordinary living room. But handle 
its cut blooms with caution. Those tiny 
fuzzy bristles on the flower stem prove 
poisonous to many people, and many a 
florist has suffered misery from “prim¬ 
rose rash.’ It varies in intensity from a 
slight rash like prickly heat to an erup¬ 
tion as severe as a bad case of poison 
ivy, according to the susceptibility of 
the subject, some being entirely immune. 
Puddings in Variety 
Vermont Pudding—Melt one-half cup 
of butter, add three-quarters cup of mo¬ 
lasses and beat, add two well-beaten 
eggs, one cup of sour milk, one salt- 
spoon each of cinnamon and nutmeg, and 
a level teaspoon of soda dissolved in 
two tablespoons of boiling water. Beat, 
add three cups of sifted pastry flour and 
turn into a buttered mold, cover tightly 
and.steam three hours. Serve with a hot 
liquid sauce. Lemon sauce is excellent, 
made as follows r Cream one-quarter cup 
of butter, add slowly three-quarters cup 
of sugar, one egg slightly beaten and 
one-third cup of boiling water. Cook 
until it thickens, add three tablespoons 
of lemon juice or one of lemon juice 
and two of orange juice. 
Rich Sago Pudding.—Soak six heap¬ 
ing tablespoon fuls of sago in a quart of 
sweet milk for five hours. Then add a 
quart of boiling milk. Cook till soft. 
Beat the yolks of six eggs in a pudding 
dish with a teacup of sugar and a little 
nutmeg. Then when the sago is soft 
stir it into the eggs and sugar. Bake 
20 minutes. After the pudding has been 
set away to cool, beat up the whites of 
the six eggs until they are a stiff froth 
and -fold into them three tablespoonfuls 
of sugar. Spread this meringue over 
the top of the pudding and brown it in 
the oven. A little jelly is sometimes 
spread over the pudding before adding 
the meringue. 
Cocoanut Pudding.—Mix a cupful of 
fresh bread crumbs, two cupfuls of 
shredded cocoanut and half a cupful of 
sugar. Beat the yolks of two eggs 
with a cupful of milk, pour over the first 
mixture and mix thoroughly. Turn into 
a buttered pudding dish and bake in a 
moderate oven until the custard is set. 
Cover with a meringue made of the 
whites of two eggs and a fourth of a 
cupful of sugar. Flavor with vanilla 
and sprinkle with cocoanut. Bake until 
firm in a slow oven. 
Lemon Rice Pudding.—Boil a half 
pint of rice in a quart of milk till very 
soft. Add to it while hot the yolks of 
three eggs, three large tablespoonfuls of 
sugar, the grated rind of two lemons 
and a little salt. If too thick add a little 
cold milk. It should be a little less 
thick than boiled custard. Turn it into 
a pudding dish. Beat the whites of the 
eggs very stiff with eight tablespoonfuls 
of sugar and the juice of two lemons, 
arid brown the top delicately in the oven. 
Thoroughly chill and serve. 
Baked Raisin Pudding.—Put eight 
ounces of sweet drippings or suet into a 
basin, warm it and work in one pound 
of flour mixed with one teaspoonful of 
baking powder and one scant teaspoon¬ 
ful of salt. Add one teaspoon” 1 of 
ground mixed spic:, one ounce o: can¬ 
died lemon peel cut up small, four ounces 
of moist sugar and six ounces of seeded 
raisins._ Mix them well and make the 
whole into a paste by adding two eggs 
beaten up in a teacupful of milk. Turn 
the mixture into a well-greased tin ol¬ 
dish, put in a moderate oven and bake 
for an hour. When done turn the pud¬ 
ding out into a serving dish, sprinkle 
with sugar and serve with hard sauce. 
English Jam Pudding.—Line a but¬ 
tered bake dish with a good rich pie 
crust. For a batter allow two eggs and 
their weight in butter and in dried and 
sifted flour. Cream the butter and sugar, 
whip in the yolks, beaten smooth, and 
then the frothed whites alternately with 
the flour, which has been sifted twice 
with a teaspoonful of baking powder. 
Now spread the paste in the bake dish 
with peach jam, or with preserved 
peaches, mixed with a tablespoonful of 
preserved ginger, cut fine. Pour the 
batter upon this prepared bed and bake 
in a steady oven. Cover with paper as 
you would cake, removing to brown 
after the pudding has puffed up well. 
OLD 
PEAMJTS 
DIRECT FROM 
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RICHMOND,VA 
SEED PEANUTS 
WE HAVE A LIMITED SUPPLY OF 
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especially raised and carefully 
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If yon have never raised pea¬ 
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Peanuts,” will tel) you. We send 
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T It takes about four bushels 
to plant an acre. 
We will ship a bag containing 214 
bushels for $5.00 or 5 bushels for $9.50~. 
All shipments made by freight or express 
F. O. B. Send-check, P. O. Money Order or 
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Mutual Building, Richmond, Va. 
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Write today for SPECIAL introductory 
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BEAUTIFY YOUR HOME 
GROUNDS WITH A PRIVET HEDGE 
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