THE COTTAGE GARDENER. 
merely be kept, not grown. T should also have been 
able to give better advice if I had known what “ the 
flowers ” are which are designed to be kept. For in¬ 
stance, if not too warm and dry, from being kept near 
the fire-place, deciduous plants, such as the fuchsia, 
might be kept in the recess during the winter; hut the 
attempting to keep one of our choice pelargoniums 
there, in the darkest corner of a dark room, would 
ensure its safe destruction. Such a plant could only be 
made to live by placing it at A, close to the window, 
instead of at the side wall, E, merely keeping it healthy, 
but without growing much — giving, therefore, little 
water at the root, but rubbing the leaves frequently 
with a wetted sponge instead. Of course in cold weather, 
when the frost was severe, the plant instead of standing 
at A during the night, had better stand at E, or, better 
still, in the middle of the room. 
In growing plants iu a window, it is always hest to 
have them set upon a narrow table there instead of the 
window-sill, as then the table and plants—or a stage, if 
thought better—may be moved at once. Confined solely 
to this room, with the window to the north, and there¬ 
fore no direct sunlight, it would bo advisable to set the 
plant out of doors, in a fine, dry, sunny day, for an hour 
or two, when the thermometer stands from 40° to 45°. 
At such a window you may safely preserve scarlet gera¬ 
niums, calceolarias of the shrubby kind, and the hardier 
verbenas, if young plants, for bedding purposes; but 
you must turn the plants frequently, and keep them 
close to the glass, unless when it is frosty, and use 
water more for the purpose of refreshing and cleaning 
the foliage than for soaking the soil at the roots. With 
a window facing the south, the south-west, or the south¬ 
east, you might in addition to these things have had 
Chinese and other primroses, hepaticas, epacrises, cytisuses, 
bulbs, &e., in bloom. The plants must be got out of 
the north room as early in the spring as you can protect 
them from the cold, either by the side of a wall or in your 
turf pit, supposing you have no glass for it, for if you had, 
the plants would have been better there all the winter 
than in your room, provided you use the means for 
avoiding damp—such as raising the bottom above the 
surrounding soil, concreting it, and surface-concreting 
the outside to prevent damp penetrating, as was suffi¬ 
ciently adverted to last season. The recess by the side 
of the fire-place might also be useful for bulbs in 
pots—such as crocuses, tulips, hyacinths, &c.—as they 
would soon fill the pots or glasses with roots in such a 
situation, and might be placed at the window when the 
flower stems appeared, though even then they would do 
better with a better aspect, so as to catch at times a 
gleam of the sun’s rays. 
I should not have said so much of this recess did I 
not know that such little side-boards—common as the 
coverings of little cupboards by the side of parlour chim¬ 
neys—after having served the purpose of showing off’ 
various fanciful and gimcrack articles during the 
summer, were appropriated during the winter as nice 
snug warm corners for preserving the plants that deco¬ 
rated the outside of the windows, and a little flower 
plot during the summer season. 
A lady, the mistress of a neat little cottage, not more 
distinguished for her love of flowers than for her un¬ 
tiring activity and benevolence, lately pointed with 
great satisfaction to a couple of such recesses, upon 
which no direct ray of light could fall, as the intended 
abode of her beautiful geraniums , fuchsias, &c., during 
the winter; hoping that she woidd be more fortunate 
than last season, for with all her care she saved only a 
very few, and languid and miserable they looked. 
Alternations of heat and cold, the expansion of the 
tissues of the plants without the addition of anything 
solid to their substance, which addition can only be 
made in light, induced the languid dropsical appearance 
[October 3. 
that at length ended in decay and dissolution. Fuchsias 
might have stood there until the fresh foliage was 
beginning to break, but then they must have as direct 
light as possible. Scarlet geraniums, whose stems were 
well ripened, might stand on such places until the fresh 
buds were breaking; and in very frosty nights good 
plants might be removed there from the window. With¬ 
out this attention such plants as scarlet geraniums, with 
succulent stems, and such plants as fuchsias, with 
deciduous leaves, would keep better in the middle of an 
empty room well lighted, with a protecting material 
thrown over them in very frosty weather,—in an empty 
stall, in the byre or stable, where light was admitted, or 
even in a hayloft where there was a window near, as all 
that would be necessary would be the throwing a little 
hay over them iu very severe weather. In neither of 
these places would light be required until fresh growth 
had commenced; and the superiority of such uncouth 
places to the recesses by the parlour fii'6 would consist 
chiefly in the greater regularity of temperature and 
atmospheric moisture, by which, as it were, vital energy 
would be husbanded until called upon to act with vigour 
by the gradually increased temperature of spring. 
In turf pits almost any window plants and bedding- 
out jfiants may be kept over the winter, if the pits are 
well formed and they are covered with glass. Oil paper 
frames, and even glazed calico frames, are of little use 
for such a purpose, as the damps of winter and the 
covering requisite in frosty weather, soon rot and destroy 
them. A turf pit is, for this purpose, better than a com¬ 
mon brick pit, because if damp is thoroughly excluded, 
it is a good non-conductor of heat. The best method 
for protecting the glass would be by using board, as¬ 
phalt, or straw covers. Where glass would be too great 
a luxury, boarded covers, tarred or painted, or asphalt 
felt covers, tarred every season, would enable a person, 
who knew what he was about, to save the most of these 
common window and bedding-out plants. Air could be 
given hack and front, when the thermometer was above 
35° or 40°, when it was too wet or stormy to remove 
them altogether. In fine days they could be lifted oft’ 
entirely for several hours, and in cold dull weather they 
might be shut up for weeks without sustaining injury. 
Unless when rotten with damp, and this should be 
guarded against by having everything dry, or when 
several degrees of frost have penetrated, which should 
be avoided by coverings of litter, plants will sustain no 
harm when covered up in cold weather. I have had 
them shut up for seven or eight weeks, and by exposing 
them gradually to light and air they looked as well as 
the day they were shut up. Dryness iu such cold pits, 
whether with glass or other coverings, is an essential ; 
element of success. For several months in winter the 
moisture iu the atmosphere will pretty well supersede 
the use of the water-pail. Your object should be to hus¬ 
band and preserve the resources of the plants, not to 
develop them, until the bright suns and fanning breezes 
of spring arrive. Hence everything in the shape of 
warm dung linings must be avoided, as in warm weather 
they will ferment, and thus cause growth and moisture. 
I once lost a fine collection of cinerarias in a frame, 
where there was some heat below, and dung linings 
round the box; the plants rotted off when covered up 
in a severe frost. Had they been cool, and the frost 
merely excluded, they would have been safe. The supe¬ 
riority of glass over other covering arises from the ability 
to obtain light and air when otherwise both would be 
impossible. 
Such pits, with a rail back and front and cross pieces j 
for lights, or covers to rest upon, are likely to be favour¬ 
ites with many of our young friends. I once had a 
number of these pits myself, but having to be removed 
I obtained a long brick pit, with sashes, as compensa¬ 
tion for them without sashes. I was reminded of them 
