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House & Garden 
CHARLES of LONDON 
718 FIFTH AVENUE 
NEW YORK 
OBJECTS OF7ART 
ENGLISH PERIOD FURNITURE 
OLD ENGLISH INTERIORS 
TAPESTRIES 
London—27-29 Brook Street W. 
Alighted lamp is-the 
most conspicuous object 
in a room; it should 
be a thing qf beauty 
in complete harmony 
•with its surroundings. 
fVgMSfsV distinctive Chinese lamp is sure to become 
the center of decorative interest in any inte- 
rePre&S rior, and is particularly pleasing and perfectly 
appropriate in period rooms. 
In considering the lighting of your home in a decorative 
sense, a visit to the Farmer collection of distinctive lamps 
will afford a most gratifying solution of your problem. 
E D W A R D I . FARMER 
CHINESE ARTS AND DECORATIONS 
Five West Fifty-sixth Street, NEW YORK 
The Map as a Wall Decoration 
(Continued from page 64) 
trive adaptations from the precedents of 
the past, or if difficulties of technique 
interpose a serious obstacle, it is a com¬ 
paratively simple matter to resort to 
reproductions and find numerous sub¬ 
jects fit for decorative enlargement in 
such volumes as Lelewel’s “Geographic 
du Moyen Age”, Coote’s “Remarkable 
Maps of the XV, XVI and XVII Cen¬ 
turies”, or Marcell’s Maps of the XIV 
and XV Centuries, to say nothing of 
numerous American Colonial publica¬ 
tions. The idea of the map’s decorative 
value is the main thing to grasp; the 
means of realization will suggest them¬ 
selves. And surely the idea is worth 
serious attention in the light of modem 
example supplied by architects of such 
strong decorative sense as Winter Rose 
of London, W. Lawrence Bottomley or 
William Delano of Delano & Aldrich, 
or, again, in the light of those striking 
achievements by Jules Guerin in the 
Pennsylvania Station in New York. 
The War Garden Department 
(Continued from page 48) 
This is not a long or difficult task. 
Count out twenty-five or fifty seeds, 
according to size, of each variety you 
expect to plant, carefully label each, and 
test them for vitality. This may be done 
by placing them in moist cotton, between 
two pieces of blotting paper kept moist, 
or on pieces of old sponge kept on a 
saucer of water. Or if you have a con¬ 
siderable number of things to test, a sim¬ 
ple way is just to take a very shallow 
flat, fill it with humus about 1" deep, 
mark off rows, press the seed down 
into them, and cover with newspapers 
or shreds of sphagnum moss. The flat 
should, of course, be kept moist and in 
a very warm place, to produce quick 
germination. The seeds then can be 
watched easily and each one taken out 
as it sprouts. 
Getting the Hotbeds Ready 
Part of the routine work for this time 
of the year is to see to preparing the 
hotbed for starting seeds or growing 
early spring crops. Of course, if you 
have a frame that is heated by pipes or 
through an open window from the heat¬ 
ing plant in the house cellar, your prob¬ 
lem is simplified. But the majority of 
hotbeds are still heated with the old 
manure method which is, after all, very 
reliable and pretty satisfactory in spite 
of some of its inherent drawbacks in 
the way of work. The manure for heat¬ 
ing the frame should be especially 
adapted to the purpose. Ordinary barn¬ 
yard manure, such as you would buy 
for your garden, will not do. The heat 
is supplied by the fermentation of the 
manure, and old, well rotted manure 
that is “spent” is not capable of giving 
off this heat. Get horse manure with 
some straw in it from a livery stable or 
from a farm where the animals are be¬ 
ing worked and fed a generous grain 
ration. It should be comparatively 
fresh, as indicated by the heat and 
steam, when it is taken out, and some 
straw mixed through it will be an ad¬ 
vantage; but long, coarse bedding and 
corn stalks are undesirable. When this 
manure is delivered to your place—one 
good two-horse load will do for sev¬ 
eral frames—have it stacked up in a 
compact, round heap under cover. If 
you have leaves that you saved from 
last year’s raking, or can get leaf mold 
from the woods, mix these through it— 
about one part to three of manure— 
while it is being stacked, unless there is 
already a generous portion of fine bed¬ 
ding. Within a few days, if the ma¬ 
nure is of the right kind, the pile will 
begin to heat as indicated by the steam 
that will issue from its apex. You 
should then have it turned over and re¬ 
stacked, the outer layers being put in 
the center of the new heap. It may be 
necessary to repeat this two or three 
times to get the whole heap heated and 
steaming through and through. It is 
then in a condition to go into the 
frames. Last year’s manure and soil 
should be removed and the hot manure 
packed in a layer 18” or more in depth, 
firmly tramped down. The soil is re¬ 
placed on top of this to the depth of 4" 
or so, the sash replaced, and the whole 
left for several days until the ther¬ 
mometer goes down to 80°. It will then 
be ready for seed sowing. 
Ordinarily it pays to order all your 
seeds and garden supplies early, because 
it saves valuable time later. This year 
it will be important to place all orders 
earlier than usual, not only for this rea¬ 
son, but also because you can then 
make sure that you get what you want. 
Go over your list carefully now, and 
order everything you will need for your 
garden this season. 
Just to make sure that you have 
omitted nothing, make up your list as 
follows: 
Fertilizers and everything else to put 
on or in the ground such as lime, 
humus, sheep manure and so forth. All 
of these things are bulky and most of 
them in very short supply. Order early 
with instructions for early delivery. 
Tools and repairs. Even express ship¬ 
ments are uncertain these days; don’t 
take any chances of not having your 
tools ready when you are ready to use 
them. Tools have gone up in price; 
but they will pay this year as well or 
better than ever before because food 
products and labor have gone up in 
proportion. 
Above all, attend to any repairs you 
may have to make, now. Go carefully 
over all your tools and order at once any 
new parts that may be needed. With 
a shortage of raw materials, and orders 
for new machines keeping them rushed 
to the limit, the manufacturers naturally 
find less chance to give prompt repair 
service than formerly. 
Seeds, shrubs, small fruits and fruit 
trees, that can either be sent by mail or 
as perishable goods by express, will 
come through more promptly; but it is 
only the part of wisdom to order even 
these things, now, for delivery when the 
weather is suitable. 
Starting Early Vegetables 
With the longer days and brighter 
sunshine which we will begin to get 
from now on, some of the vegetables 
which require more heat than it is con¬ 
venient to give through the short dark 
days of winter may be started now for 
a spring crop under glass. These in¬ 
clude tomatoes, cucumbers, melons, 
beans and cauliflower. Although all of 
these things are planted much more 
closely in the greenhouse or tire frames 
than out of doors, both time and space 
are economized by starting them in pots 
—with the exception of beans—and get¬ 
ting them to good size before setting 
them where they will mature. For that 
reason the chance for growing them 
should be anticipated, and the pots 
started four to six weeks before there 
will be room to set them out. In the 
same way, every opportunity for using 
space in the frames should be figured 
out in advance, and the cooler things, 
such as lettuce, radishes and beets, 
which may have been grown in the 
greenhouse during the winter months, 
may be continued in the frames until 
the outdoor crops come on. 
