February 23. 
THE COTTAGE GARDENER. 
393 
WEEKLY CALENDAR. 
M 
D 
D 
w 
Weather near London in 1853. 
Sun 
Rises. 
Sun 
Sets. 
Moon 
R.&S. 
Moon’s 
Age. 
Clock 
bf. Sun. 
Day of 
Year. 
FEB. 23—MARCH I, 1854. 
Barometer. 
Thermo. 
Wind. 
Rain in 
Inches. 
23 
Th 
Small Brindle; oaks. 
29.e29-29.540 
43—25 
W. 
02 
1 a 7 
27 a 5 
5 10 
26 
13 
38 
24 
P 
St. Matthias. 
29754—29.305 
40—32 
N.W. 
09 
58 a 6 
29 
6 4 
27 
13 
25 
s 
Clouded head; oaks. 
29.732—29.456 
40—29 
N. 
15 
50 
31 
6 44 
28 
13 
20 
26 
Sun 
Shrove Sunday. 
29.182—29.086 
44—30 
W. 
09 
54 
32 
7 12 
29 
13 
10 
57 
1 27 
M 
29752—29.441 
39—22 
N. 
— 
52 
34 
sets. 
@ 
13 
9 
58 
28 
Tu 
Shrove Tuesday. 
29.900—29.809 
40—24 
N.W. 
— 
50 
36 
7a 15 
1 
12 
49 
1 
1_ 
W 
Lent begins. Ash Wednesday. 
29.696—29.653 
39-2 4 
s.w. 
27 
46 
40 
8 32 
2 
12 
37 
60 
Meteorology of the Week. —At Chiswick,from observations during the last twenty-seven years, the average highest and lowest tem¬ 
peratures of these days are 47.7° and 34.2° respectively. The greatest heat, 64°, occurred on the 28th in 1846 ; and the lowest cold 18° on the 
23rd in 1852. During the period 108 days were fine, and on 81 rain fell. * * 
FLOWER-GARDEN PLAN.—No. 12. 
This Plan is a duplicate of Plan No. 11, at page 213, and 
all that I said about that plan refers equally to this one. 
There were two blocks of beds in No. 11, and there are 
four blocks of the same beds in this plan. That is on the 
principle on which Sir Joseph Paxton proceeded with the 
Crystal Palace. First of all, he hit on making one complete 
square or block of a house for Water Lilies, for the Duke of 
Devonshire; then it struck him, how easy it would be to ex¬ 
tend this block system, east and west, or north and south, 
or in all directions. All after that was but a question of 
money. The circular part, called the transepts, was merely 
to break the uniformity of a great many blocks when put 
together. That curved portion, or rather the curve system, 
was an old way of hothouse building with him, and with 
others before him. Regularity was, and is, the grand secret 
in the Crystal Palace, and from it to the one-bed system on 
the little piece of grass in front of the casement window, 
regularity evinces taste and adaptation of means to an 
end. If you had room for only one flower-bed, the situation 
of that one bed ought to show that the owner of it was alive 
to the beauty of regularity. 
If you have room for one bed only, that bed must not be 
placed at one of the corners, or at one of the sides of your 
small piece of ground, and for this reason, that there is not 
a second bed to match it at the other corner, or side, so as to 
make the space equally divided, or regular. In the centre, 
however, this bed would be quite regular, because we cannot 
put two beds in the centre of a small piece of grass, and 
each of them be in the middle; therefore, single beds, or 
single blocks of similar beds, ought to stand in the centre 
of confined places; but, if more than one block is to be made, 
the very middle of the space must be avoided as a plague 
spot, for the reason just given. 
There is an old story, in Scotland, about two daft bodies 
happening to meet of an evening at a farm house, and a 
bed for them was made in the barn for the night; but even 
poor idiots are not always harmless, as people say, for these two 
disputed about who should occupy the middle of the bed; 
No. CCLXXXII., Vol. XI. 
