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Real Hanging Baskets 
OWADAYS basket-making is a verv 
popular recreation, and attractive 
forms for many purposes are being made 
in great numbers. Many designs for use 
in picking or displaying flowers are to be 
seen, but comparatively few of the makers 
seem to realize how readily these baskets 
may be made to serve as hanging baskets 
for growing plants. 
In every home there are many places 
where such baskets can be hung to advan¬ 
tage inside the house or about the porch. 
It is only necessary to weave the basket 
about a flower pot of any size desired. 
The basket may be made so that the pot 
can be removed or so that it is permanently 
in place as one prefers. When done it is 
only necessary to fill with one or more 
growing plants and it is ready to hang up. 
Large baskets holding shallow pots six 
or eight inches in diameter are particularly 
desirable for porches and verandas. They 
may be filled with asparagus fern or other 
foliage plants to get a very decorative 
efifect. 
Watering is easily done, either in the 
usual way or by plunging the pot into 
water until the soil is saturated. 
A Baker’s Dozen of Old English 
Pitchers 
I N this group of a baker’s dozen of Old 
English pitchers one sees pieces of 
attractive Staffordshire ware. For in¬ 
stance, the low, pink and white cream 
pitcher at the extreme left in the fore¬ 
ground shows a farmer in the act of sow¬ 
ing the seed on the newly turned soil; and 
ploughman and horses are easily discerned 
in the background. This is the only one 
of the baker's dozen of pitchers which has 
feet; the charmingly designed shell-like 
feet giving an especial point of beauty to 
this pink piece of Staffordshire. The 
sugar-bowl which matches this pitcher can 
be seen in the interesting collection of old 
china in the Metropolitan Museum of Fine 
Arts in New York City, having been do¬ 
nated to it by a lover of antiques. 
The next pitcher to the right in the first 
line is a pale blue-and-white one, oc¬ 
tagonal. This is a picturesque view piece 
with “a lover and his lass" in the fore¬ 
ground. The figures of io are impressed 
in its bottom. The two dark pitchers fol¬ 
lowing are luster ones, the first, a brown 
one with a handsome royal blue lower 
band, which really makes the whole lower 
part of the pitcher. On this band are a 
rosebud with leaves, and set by itself a 
figure of a woman in green drapery of 
Grecian style, standing by an urn with 
red flowers, with yellow in the composi¬ 
tion also. The other luster one, which is 
also brown, has a gold border in delicate 
tracery, and on the main part of the piece, 
on both sides, a pagoda and temple with 
cypress trees is wrought out in conven¬ 
tional design on this decagonally formed 
pitcher. 
The pitcher at the extreme right in the 
Properly hung, the woven basket is excellent for grow¬ 
ing ferns 
second row is one which has a hunting 
scene in dark pink on white, and this piece 
as well as the first two has a correspond¬ 
ing sugar-bowl. Coming back toward the 
left is an octagonal Mulberry pitcher, 
with cypress trees and temple with two 
different styles of urns in the foreground. 
An X is impressed in the bottom of this 
Staffordshire bit. 
Then comes a charmingly shaped, low, 
blue- and-white one, with a sylvan scene. 
Little Boy Blue with his horn and dog is 
depicted in the foreground, while in the 
distance through the fields a towered 
homestead is seen. A fine border is a fea¬ 
ture of this piece and on the bottom of it 
a blue X is printed. 
The next, a Mulberry one and octagonal, 
has a very deep border characterizing 
it, and the scene is of the pagoda variety. 
The last of the second line at the left is 
a fine china pitcher with gilt sprigs on the 
white surface. 1 f “little pitchers have big 
ears,” they have as well large elements of 
beauty in design and colorings, and are of 
value as antiques, as seen in the collection 
before us. 
On the back row beginning at the left 
we find pitchers of a larger growth. The 
first one is another of the pale blue-and- 
white variety, again octagonal with pagoda 
and cypress trees for its design. On the 
bottom of the piece is printed in blue the 
word Davenport, and in a blue ellipse, 
which is surmounted by a crown and 
“Ironstone,” is the word Friburg. A 
handsome, large pitcher in hexagonal form 
follows, bearing a beautiful design, con¬ 
sisting of a red earthernware pitcher, hold¬ 
ing roses and a purplish tulip, with 
touches of yellow and green among the 
flowers. At the base of the slender-necked 
pitcher is a quiver full of arrows. Two 
birds with colors of the parrakeet com¬ 
plete the elaborate central design, while a 
moss-rose bud and leaf are found directly 
under the spout of the piece. The border, 
combining almost the same floral selec¬ 
tions as those just described as being in 
the main group of flowers, is repeated in 
a half inch decoration at the top of the 
pitcher inside. On the bottom is found 
the mark of two glazed pink luster X’s. 
( 42 ) 
