November, 1916 
25 
Drawing by Thomas Hunt « 
THE EARTH CHILDREN 
BLISS CARMAN 
The soft wind fans their hearts to flame; 
The autumn folds them in her swoon ; 
Amid the fruitage of the earth, 
Beneath the ardor of the moon. 
The singing of the twilight stream 
Is music for their pastoral, 
That echoes through the aisles of dusk 
Where mysteries of Eden fall. 
They catcli the sorcery of light 
That trembles from the evening star, 
And fearlessly they tread a world 
Where beauty and enchantment are. 
WHAT A HOTBED WILL DO 
It Is Virtually a Necessity if You Belong 
to the Have-Your-Own - Garden Cult 
MARY RANKIN CRANSTON 
F OR the family that gives personal atten¬ 
tion to the garden, a hotbed is virtually 
a necessity, its size depending upon the num¬ 
ber in the family and what it is expected to 
do. A small one will grow only seedlings 
for transplanting, but one of large size will 
produce the out-of-season vegetables which 
otherwise would be expensive luxuries. A 
hotbed 3' x 6', covered with a single sash, 
will grow all the seedlings required in the 
garden of the average family of five per¬ 
sons: eggplants, tomatoes, peppers, celery, 
cabbage, cauliflower and other plants that 
will be ready to set out in the open ground 
as soon as danger of frost is over, come 
within its scope. A 6' x 6' hotbed, with 
two sashes, will also have room for lima 
beans, cucumbers and melons. 
The seed may be set either in berry boxes, 
three or four to a box, or in inverted pieces 
of sod, placed in the hotbed. When danger 
of frost is over, the bottoms of the berry 
boxes are cut out and the sides, with the 
plants contained, set in their permanent 
places in the garden. If sod is used, a 
square containing three or four seedlings is 
placed in each hill, care being taken not to 
disturb the roots of the growing plants. 
These vegetables may thus appear on the 
table long before those grown from seed 
planted in the open ground. Lettuce and 
radishes can be grown to maturity nearly 
all the year ’round with a hotbed’s help. 
For Real Production 
A still larger hotbed, measuring 48' long 
and covered with sixteen sashes, for in¬ 
stance, will give peas, beans, Swiss chard 
and strawberries far ahead of the season. 
Dwarf peas, beans and chard may be planted 
1' apart, the peas in 12' rows, the beans 4' 
and the chard in 2' rows. This will give 
five rows, or 60', of peas; five rows, or 20', 
of beans; five rows, or 10', of chard. The 
remaining 29', with strawberries 1' apart 
each way, will contain 145 plants. If given 
hill culture and plenty of manure, these 
plants will produce very large, fine berries 
sufficiently in advance of the season for 
them to be delicacies, thoroughly appreci¬ 
ated by those who are fortunate enough 
to partake of them. Part of this hotbed 
could always contain strawberries, and the 
vegetable section could supply the table 
with extra late as well as extra early veg¬ 
etables of the choicest sorts. 
Pin-money can be earned raising both 
vegetable and flower seedlings, for such 
plants as asters, pansies, coleus, heliotrope 
and geraniums are always as salable as 
vegetables, the amount realized being lim¬ 
ited only by the size of the hotbed. Sweet 
violets and little one-year rose plants do 
very well under glass. August is the time 
to root the rose cuttings, which bloom in 
the spring, if forced. Potted and sold in 
bloom they are quite profitable. Every¬ 
body wants geraniums and pansies in the 
spring, especially red and pink geraniums 
and the ever-popular rose geranium. These 
are easy to grow from cuttings and bring 
good prices when properly handled. 
A permanent hotbed of English violets 
is an excellent investment, for these plants 
bloom profusely twice a year, in spring and 
fall. As the plants multiply rapidly, the 
violet grower beginning with a one-sash 
(Continued on page 58) 
