60 
House & Garden 
TKe Car Desired 
To every one, we tKink, the fine 
electric is the desired car. 
Perhaps it is because in ^race of line, 
beauty o£ finish, and artistry of inte¬ 
rior fittings the electric is unequalled. 
Perhaps it is the superior cleanliness, 
ease o£ operation and sa£ety o£ the 
electric. 
Or perhaps it is that while some 
type o£ ^as car is within reach o£ 
everybody, the fine electric is essen¬ 
tially the car o£ the discriminating, 
minority. 
This year’s Detroit Electric is the 
supreme achievement o£ years of 
dominance. Every lover of a fine 
car should see it. 
Detroit Electric Car Company 
DETROIT MICHIGAN 
The electric was the pioneer en¬ 
closed car—and it is still the hest. 
Rock Gardening in the Northwest 
{Continued from page 58) 
For the care of a rock garden must 
be a labor of love. It cannot be en¬ 
trusted to an ordinary gardener who 
mows the lawn so many days a month 
at so many cents an hour. Such a man 
has no knowledge or appreciation of 
alpines; his ideas of gardening are apt 
to run to bedding plants set in con¬ 
centric rings and parallel lines. You 
must weed your own rockery, or expect 
to find Arenaria Montana lifted out, 
along with sheep-sorrel and dandelion. 
To the real enthusiast this is pleasure, 
not work. A genuine Portland rock 
gardener may be found at 9:30 or 10 
p. m. stalking slugs with a flashlight and 
a pail of lime, and enjoying it. 
Where the rockery is a part of a 
small garden, and consequently always 
in evidence, it is customary to lengthen 
its period of beauty by planting small, 
summer-blooming annuals to give color 
when the true alpines have passed their 
season of bloom. One of the best of 
these is that very dwarf alyssum known 
as Alyssum minimum, which never gets 
higher than three inches and goes on 
spreading and blooming all summer un¬ 
til a single plant will make a snowy 
circle a foot across. 
One Riverdale garden makes effective 
use in summer of a deep blue lobelia. 
There are fine little poppies (P. alpinum 
and P. nudicaule), which, though called 
perennial, are best planted in succession 
as annuals. The fall-sown plants flower 
in early summer, the spring-sown in 
July and August. The old-fashioned 
portulaca, in its new-fashioned shades, 
preferably the single-flowered sort, is 
charming to fill in with in summer. 
Things like verbenas, petunias, etc., are 
used, but they are rather too large, ex¬ 
cept for bolder planting. Where the 
effect is to be viewed from a distance, 
or where the stones are large and the 
arrangement bold, larger plants are 
good. Valerian, foxgloves, wallflowers 
and California poppies are fine in such 
a place, as are the Wichuraiana and 
pink rambler roses. 
Wherever small plants are used the 
effect is better when they are planted 
in groups. This gives enough of each 
color to hold the eye, and is better 
than the spattered effect of badly mixed 
plants. Good examples of this are the 
prostrate speedwell, Veronica prostrata, 
and the rock roses or lielianthemums. 
The former is so small that its fine 
blue does not show up except in large 
groups. The latter plants furnish the 
best pinks to be had in rock plants, 
not purplish, but clear, soft, pastel 
shades. Planted so that a crevice or 
miniature valley is filled with them, 
they make an exquisite piece of color, 
while the same plants scattered among 
other things will not be half so charm¬ 
ing. The yellow shades in rock roses 
are equally good. 
The selection and arrangement of 
shrubs is important, as the right shrubs, 
well planted, give character and an 
appearance of age to the garden. 
Heathers, especially the very dwarf 
sorts, are always good. Daphne cne- 
orum, the garland flower, is a fine pros¬ 
trate shrub covered in spring with de- [ 
liciously fragrant pink flowers. Rock i 
sprays, or cotoneasters, are used a great 1 
deal. Their red berries in winter are ! 
very attractive, but not more so than 
those of the kinnickinnick, or bear- 
berry, a native creeping shrub that de¬ 
serves wider appreciation. Prostrate 
junipers find a limited use, though they 
are very desirable. There is a fine na¬ 
tive sort in the Cascade Mountains, 
which can be transplanted successfully. 
The State flower, Oregon grape (Ber- 
beris aquifolium), is a beautiful shrub, 
though rather large for the rock gar¬ 
den proper. There is a lower sort 
(Berberis repefts), also found wild 
everywhere, which is better. 
People who are so fortunate as to 
have running water, naturally combine 
rock and water gardening, a delightful 
variation. A stream is not necessary, 
however, for a small artificial lily pool 
with rock borders serves very well to 
vary the scheme. Especially if in shade, 
the numerous species of wild ferns are 
ideal for such situations. 
Securing the Plants 
The beginner in rock gardening is 
met with the problem of where to find 
the right plants. Raising them from 
seed, though a slower process than buy¬ 
ing plants, is much less expensive and 
quite satisfactory, unless one is going 
in for named varieties. On the other 
hand, given a few good plants, any one 
with experience in taking slips can soon 
supply quite an area. American seeds¬ 
men do not seem to pay a great deal 
of attention to rock plants, but a study 
of catalogues for some years back re¬ 
veals an increase of interest in the sub¬ 
ject. In Portland there are one or more 
firms having a good assortment of 
plants, but not of seeds. The favorite 
Portland way of stocking a rockery 
seems to be to get slips and divisions 
from a rock gardening friend; and a 
very good way it is, blessing both the 
garden that gives and the garden that 
receives. 
A Portland garden can be a thing of 
beauty without ever calling upon En¬ 
glish seedsmen or Swiss alpinists. In 
the State of Oregon are a remarkable 
number of native plants suitable for 
rockwork which can be successfully cul¬ 
tivated. And for models in the ar¬ 
rangement and planting of stones, one 
has only to drive up the wonderful 
Columbia River Highway to find cliffs, 
crevices and banks flowering in the 
most beautiful natural profusion. 
Waxing Hardwood Floors 
W AX for polishing hardwood 
floors may be purchased, or it 
may be prepared in the follow- 
lowing manner: 
To a pound of clean beeswax allow 
three pints of turpentine; cut the wax 
into small pieces, place it in a pan set 
in another pan of hot water and allow 
it to melt. Then pour it into the tur¬ 
pentine, stirring vigorously until the 
two are thoroughly blended. Place some 
of the wax on a clean flannel cloth and 
rub it on the floor, treating one board 
at a time and rubbing lengthwise. 
Proceed thus until the whole floor 
has been waxed, and then cover a heavy 
brush with flannel, and with it rub the 
floor until it is perfectly smooth; or 
else polish with a heavily weighted 
brush made for the purpose. A waxed 
floor requires about the same care as 
a varnished one, but it has the advan¬ 
tage that it may be all the more quick¬ 
ly freshened. Varnish must have time 
to dry, but with waxing the work is 
finished when the floor assumes the 
proper polish. It usually happens that 
some parts of the floor are subjected 
to much more wear than others; so 
whenever possible small rugs should be 
placed at these points. 
When the polish has worn off in spots, 
it is necessary only to warm the wax, 
apply a little with the flannel to the 
bare places and then polish in the usual 
way. If these small spots are carefully 
attended to, the floor will not be like¬ 
ly to require a complete polishing often- 
er than once or twice a year. 
Valentine Bollerer. 
