Design foe a Rustic House, 
a pint of water you have as good a preparation for 
promoting the health and beauty of your plants as 
could he wished. Keep the solution tightly corked in 
a bottle. Once a week take a tablespoonful of it for 
three quarts of water, or in that proportion, and 
sprinkle your plants well with it. 
Should your plants be so unfortunate as to be in- 
stirring it up frequently, and an old table fork is about 
as good an implement as one can use for this purpose. 
Use once or twice a week, just before watering. 
Give your plants plenty of water, especially through 
the heat of summer, and if kept in a dry hot atmos¬ 
phere through the winter. Water by sprinkling in¬ 
stead of pouring. I use a small tin water pot, hold- 
air by day and dew by night, when the weather is 
warm enough. 
In making your selection of plants choose beauty 
of foliage as much, or more, than blossoms, as the 
latter can delight you only occasionally, while the 
former is a constant pleasure. 
Mrs. Mary I. Herron. 
Bf Henry T. Williams. 
Vol. IY. 
HEW YORK, AUGUST, 1875. 
No. 44. 
Price 12 Cents. 
A FEW HINTS ABOUT PLANTS. 
When rain water cannot be had for watering plants 
some sort of a fertilizer is needful to their thrifty and 
perfect growth. If two ounces of nitrate of potash 
and four ounces of nitrate of ammonia be dissolved in 
fested with aphides, or insects of any sort, the free use 
of quassia tea will remove them, as well as multiply 
the blooms and invigorate the plant. 
If abundance and richness of blossoms is needed be 
careful to use medium sized pots. It is also of great 
importance to keep the soil loose about the roots by 
ing about a quart, and find it much easier and nicer 
than my old method of sprinkling by hand. 
Eresh air and sunshine are both very necessary to 
the health and beauty of plants, as well as people, 
therefore a southern window is the best the year 
round ) and the windows should be raised to let in 
