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A GARDEN OP MY OWN. 
I always admired flowers, and longed for a flower¬ 
bed of my own. I had read many lengthy articles 
about raising flower seeds—all good no doubt—but 
they were beyond my reach. Now, a hot bed, or a 
cold frame is a great help if you can have one, and 
not very expensive if you have a father, husband, or 
brother who will make you one; but I am aware of 
the fact that there are a great many families where 
the men are always too busy for such things. Do not 
be discouraged ye lovers of flowers ; I have never had 
a hot bed or cold frame ; but I have had beautiful 
flowers. I found some old boxes, nailed some strips 
of leather on the ends for handles to move them with. 
I then filled them nearly full with light sandy soil, 
which consisted of decayed sod and sand ; then sowed 
the seeds in rows in the boxes, and took an old sieve 
and sifted some soil to cover them with. My reasons 
for sifting the soil is, the seeds can be more evenly- 
covered. Many of the smaller seeds when covered 
with soil that is lumpy spend all of their vitality in 
trying to reach the light; and when they do reach it 
their strength is exhausted, and they turn yellow and 
die; or if they do manage to live, they are siekly- 
looking plants, and the flowers they produce, if any, 
are small and stunted. 
Some of you may say, “ That is all sham, I have 
just as nice flowers as anybody and I don’t sift the 
soil either.” 
Remember, friend, that “ there are exceptions to all 
rules.” I had reference to the small seeds produced 
by some of our tender flowers. 
After covering the seeds I cover the boxes with 
glass, and set them on the veranda, which is on the 
east side of the house. If the nights are very cool I 
bring them into the house; if the sun shines very hot 
I raise the glass from the boxes, just a little, to pre¬ 
vent the seeds from scorching. I do not have the 
boxes quite full, leaving two or three inches so that 
the plants can get a good start before I have to re¬ 
move the glass. I have thus been enabled to have 
good strong, thrifty plants ready for the border as 
soon as the weather will permit me. to transplant 
them. 
I find that I can take better care of the young 
plants, if I sow seeds that require about the same 
length of time to germinate in the same hase. The 
Asters, Phlox Drummondii, Nemophila and Cocks¬ 
comb require from four to ten days in a favorable situ¬ 
ation. The Cacalia, Datura, Verbena, Tropseolum, 
and others require from twelve to eighteen days. If 
you are just commencing the culture of flowers do not 
try to do too much. 
A few thrifty plants of the hardier flowers well 
cared for will give you more pleasure than a garden 
overstocked with pale sickly plants of the choicer va¬ 
rieties. In order to make a wise selection it is essen¬ 
tial to know the habits of the different flowers, and 
also what place you wish them to occupy. The Sweet 
Pea will make a beautiful hedge ; but if planted in a 
bed of Asters or Phlox it will only disappoint you. A 
nice bed of Pansies we all admire; but if they are 
planted in a hot, dry place they will prove a failure; 
and we will be no nearer success if we assign the Par- 
tulacca to some shady place ; exchange their positions 
and you will be surprised with your success. 
When prepaiiug a place for your Pansies in some 
cool shady nook do not forget to leave a corner for the 
little Nemophila; for treatment that will secure suc¬ 
cess with one will prove equally successful with the 
other. You must have a bed of Phlox Drummondii. 
I think there is no flower that surpasses it in bril¬ 
liancy when cultivated for a mass of colors. This little 
flower is a native of America, and was first discovered 
forty-one years ago in Texas, by Drummond, a collec¬ 
tor sent out by the Glasgow Botanical Society. The 
bud before opening resembles a flame, hence the 
name Phlox, or Flame. 
If you wish a showy bed on the lawn with but lit¬ 
tle labor, you may have it by obtaining a few Striped 
Petunia seeds. Do not leave the Asters out of your 
collection. I had some beautiful ones this summer. 
For the background I had the Washington, one of the 
largest varieties, next the Imbrique Pampan, and then 
the Dwarf Bouquet. 
For baskets, I think the Tropseolums are excellent, 
T. Peregrinum being my favorite. In making your 
collection for the garden, do not forget to select a few 
with which to brighten your home during the winter. 
Vines are indispensable in this collection. We all 
know the value of Ivies. The Madeira vines are also 
excellent, thriving under adverse treatment. The 
Cobea Scanden is another of my favorites, it grows so 
rapidly and bears such a profusion of large bell-shaped 
flowers. 
I have often heard people speak of the difficulty in 
starting these seeds. I will tell you how I start them. 
Fill a box with light sandy soil; then take the seeds, 
which are large and flat, and press them edgewise into 
the soil; cover the box with glass, and do not water 
them until they start, unless the soil gets very dry. I 
had a Geranium (General Grant) which I raised from 
seed; it grew five feet high, and had numerous 
branches. It continued in bloom all last winter and 
summer. I also had one which I started from a slip 
that was over seven feet high. 
I think if we had a little more botany in our paper 
it would benefit many of our readers. Friends, if you 
want good, reliable instruction about the cultivation of 
flowers, save your pennies until you get one dollar and 
thirty cents, and then send for the The Ladies 
Floral Cabinet, which also contains excellent 
recipes, and many valuable hints for beautifying our 
homes. Mary J. Seward. 
[Written specially for the Ladies’ Floral Cabinet.] 
CHURCH FLOWERS. 
In a back number of the Cabinet, Mitchella Re¬ 
pens, in an article on Church flowers, asks what she 
shall use for green for her bouquets. For the past 
four or five years I have furnished most of the flowers 
for the church in our village, and of course anything 
that is written in regard to bouquet-making is of un¬ 
usual interest to me. Believing that what is worth 
doing at all is worth doing well in bouquet-making as 
much as other things, I have studied and toiled to do 
it well, and while not pretending to have reached per¬ 
fection, yet, whereas once it seemed a disagreeable 
duty, by practice and a more extended knowledge of 
plants and flowers, it is now a labor of love. 
For green, I use Hemlock, Asparagus, and Ground 
Pine, Lycopodium, which in this section—Central 
Massachusetts—grows plentifully in the woods. I 
gather it in handfuls and keep it in the cellar where it 
will keep for weeks without wilting. There is no 
plant that I know of that is so useful for keeping 
flowers from crowding each other and for the borders of 
bouquets as this. 
Kalmia Catifolia. 
By Augusta Larked. 
CHAPTER X. 
Oh, yet we trust that some how good 
Will be the final goal of ill, 
To pangs of nature, sins of will, 
Defects of doubt, and taints of blood.” 
It was a moonless November night with a creeping chill 
in the air, and hoar frost sparkling on the grass borders. 
Stars trembled above the bare tree tops in the clear dark, 
and the wall-clock had just chimed midnight, when a slight, 
girlish figure crept down the great staircase. She slipped 
gliost-like along through the shadows, close to the wall of 
the passage, and noiselessly undid a side door fend let her¬ 
self out into the night. There in the darkness arose the 
sound of a lialf-stifled sob, that seemed to come from a 
breaking heart. She took hold of the porch railing, for 
her knees were weak from recent illness, and seemed to 
totter uuder her. Then suddenly she cast herself down 
and kissed the threshhold, with a heart bursting with sor¬ 
row, while she prayed for the dear sleepers under that roof 
she was leaving forever. 
Poor Yirginie! there was still great confusion in her 
ideas. She did not well know how her sickness had come 
to pass, or how long she had lam unconscious on the floor by 
little Jakes’s bed, before they carried her to her own room in 
the Hall, where she found herself on waking from delirium. 
She shrank with terror from the thought of what she 
had probably revea'ed in her moments of wandering. All 
lier thoughts were flurried. She tried in vain to get hold 
of the right end of things, but only two scenes stood out 
in her memory like points of flame : the interview with 
Bradley in the boat, and the confession Winnie had made 
to her in the pine grove seemed burned into her brain. 
The doctor had enjoined the most perfect quiet, and 
for several days and nights she rested with her eyes 
closed in a dim twilight state, though vaguely conscious of 
all that was going on about her. She remembered that, 
she had spoken harsh, abrupt words to her friend that fatal 
night, but what they were it seemed impossible to recall. 
So she dwelt upon the old, deeply-rooted impression that 
Winnie would change to her, with the dim consciousness 
that she had changed. 
But Winnie was her constant, untiring nurse, hovering 
about her bed at all hours of the day and night. As she 
grew stronger, she strove to repress the impulse to shrink 
away from her touch and her caresses, but the pale lids 
quivered while she pressed back hot, hopeless tears. 
As memory asserted itself, at moments, the past rushed 
back upon her witli a weight of agony she could not bear. 
She tried with all her feeble strength to put it by, and set 
herself toward the resolve to leave the Hall, which had 
once been thwarted. Now she would go if force was given 
her to crawl on hands and knees. 
For some days she had been convalescent, and a faint 
relish for gruel and toast was reviving in her. The doctor 
gave permission for her to get up aud walk about a little, 
and sit well wrapped up in the sunshine. But Virgime 
feigned a weakness she did not feel, and resisted every 
effort to remove her from her own room. Winnie was 
tender and affectionate, but she did not importune her with 
conversation, for the doctor had given strict orders that the 
patient must not be excited. But the sick girl saw an 
unwonted glow of joy and hope in her friend’s face, and felt 
a new magnetic life tingling in the tips of her warm fingers. 
It was at night, with scalding tears welling from her 
eyes, that Yirginie perfected her plans for escape. She 
had no attendance but old Nanna, and was left more and 
more to herself. All through the burning fever, except in 
the hours of delirium, she had been conscious of Bradley 
hovering near her. With her quickened sense she had 
heard him steal to her door to listen to her breathing. The 
low, anxious tones of his voice came to her from the hall 
where he waylaid the doctor, or old Nanna. She knew he 
had shot the birds which were served up in her sick-room, 
