FLOWER BOWLS * OVENWARE * FIRELESS COOKERS * CHURNS LADDERS * PRESERVING SETS * TEA WAGONS * TRAYS * BREAD & MILK SETS 
70 
House & Garden 
* GARDEN BASKETS * COOKING UTENSILS * R EFRIGERATORS 
Fork — Nickel plate. 
60 cents; steel, 35 
cents. 
Trowel — In leather 
sheath, $1.00. 
Trowel—Nickel plate, 
60 cents; steel, 50 
cents. 
Dibbler—25 cents. 
Daisy Grubber—65 cents. 
F ROM the time you prepare 
the ground in your garden, 
until you seal up your last 
jar of preserved fruits and veg¬ 
etables next summer, Lewis & 
Conger’s can supply the very 
articles to make your home 
garden mean most for your 
housekeeping. As you plant, 
as you work in your garden, 
as you supply your own table 
from your own ground, remem¬ 
ber that here are articles that 
will provide better results with 
less effort and at lower cost. 
Handy Basket —Willow in green finish. 
Fitted with trowel, ball of twine, flower 
scissors, pruning shears, spool of wire, 
dibbler. pruning knife, and budding knife. 
Price, complete. $8.50. 
Garden Basket— Willow, in green or oak 
finish, lined with leather. Fitted with 
trowel, fork, pliers, pruning shears, flower 
scissors, pruning knife, two balls of twine, 
spool of wire, package of tacks and brad 
hammer. Price, complete, $10.50. 
]EWIS&Q)NGER 
45th Street and 6th Avenue 
New York 
* TOOLS * ME DICINE CA BINET S * BATH MATS * SUN DIALS 
The Truth About Sweet Peas 
(Continued from page 68) 
the row at the top and slanting slightly 
toward the trench. These holes can 
afterward be filled with soil. Sheep 
manure, cow manure, guano or other 
concentrated plant food can be given to 
the plants in liquid form, for sweet peas 
are tremendous feeders and will soon 
exhaust the soil. A convenient method 
is to mix the manure in a barrel at the 
end of the row and feed directly to the 
roots by making holes as recommended 
for nitrate of soda. 
A cheesecloth shade will make your 
sweet peas last longer by protecting them 
from the hot summer sun. A shade 
which breaks the strength of the sun’s 
rays while admitting enough light to 
prevent the growth becoming soft and 
spindly is well worth while. It will also 
tend to lengthen the stems. 
Green fly and mildew are the principal 
enemies of sweet peas. The flies are 
usually the result of impoverished soil, 
which reduces the resisting power of 
the plants, or of hot weather. The 
plants should be watched carefully, and 
at the first indication of aphis in the 
terminal of the new growth or the under 
side of young foliage, spray thoroughly 
with a strong tobacco solution. The 
prepared solutions are best for this pur¬ 
pose, as they are uniform and reliable. 
Repeat the treatment on three con¬ 
secutive evenings in order to kill the 
young aphis that hatch. 
Mildew is like old Father Time with 
his rusty scythe, for it is sure to come 
around. The weather is the cause of it; 
the plants simply cannot stand extreme 
heat, and they will usually mildew and 
die during continued hot weather. Mil¬ 
dew, however, is often caused by care¬ 
less and indifferent watering. Overhead 
watering is liable to cause it at any time, 
though the danger will be lessened by 
employing a proper irrigating system so 
the water will be somewhat tempered by 
the air before it strikes the plants. 
The Best Type 
The Spencer type of sweet pea is un¬ 
questionably the best. Its blossoms have 
wavy wings, larger in proportion to the 
flower than in the older types. In fact, 
I cannot see even a reasonable excuse 
for anyone growing the old forms. 
Of course, we all prefer to pass judg¬ 
ment on what colors or shades we want 
for ourselves, so trying to pick out sweet 
peas for someone else to grow would be 
just as successful as trying to buy a 
hat for your wife or cigars for your 
husband. But here are a few reliable 
varieties, nevertheless: 
In pink Spencers, Beryl is a brilliant, 
fine color that wears well. Hercules is 
also a good pink, and Minerva Barraby, 
a soft pink, is splendid for dinner deco¬ 
rations under artificial light. Doris 
Usher is another fine pink shading to 
salmon. Charity is my choice for crim¬ 
son, with Verdun a close second. This 
last is much lighter than Charity. Con¬ 
stance Hinton is my best white, and 
Blue Monarch my favorite blue. Nubian, 
a deep chocolate brown, is a grand va¬ 
riety which no garden should be with¬ 
out. Thomas Stevenson is a wonderful 
color, a rich orange scarlet; a similar 
variety is Robert Sydenham, which is 
really an orange salmon and not quite 
so showy as Stevenson. R. F. Felton is 
a beautiful bicolor of lilac with gray 
shadings. Asta Ohm is my best laven¬ 
der, and Clara Curtis my choice among 
the cream colored varieties. 
Keep the Greenhouse Fires Burning 
I T was unquestionably from patriotic 
motives that some of our best Ameri¬ 
cans, with that whole-hearted spirit 
which is so characteristic of them, closed 
up their greenhouses wholly or in part 
when the coal shortage became acute. 
And yet, as with most questions, there 
are two sides to be considered. 
What will be the effect of a severe 
sleet storm on the cold glass of a closed 
greenhouse? How much glass will be 
broken if the snow is allowed to accumu¬ 
late on the roof? A severe storm would 
be ruinous, because of the weight of the 
collected snow. And as for fuel saving, 
more coal would be consumed in manu¬ 
facturing the necessary materials for re¬ 
pair than would have been needed to 
maintain a low but safe temperature in 
the greenhouses. 
Would it not be more sensible and far 
more patriotic to maintain a temperature 
of 45° at night in the greenhouse, thus 
keeping the glass warm and so pro¬ 
tecting it from damage, besides making 
the house available for the growing of 
cool vegetables such as lettuce, cauli¬ 
flower, beets, carrots, spinach, radishes, 
etc. ? That is the way the British Gov¬ 
ernment feels about the matter. Over 
there they look upon the greenhouse as 
a highly important factor in food pro¬ 
duction, and the idea of closing it up, 
however patriotic the motive may seem, 
is viewed with disfavor. We need hard¬ 
ly say that the same reasoning applies 
in America. 
If the coal situation continues to be 
a serious factor, why not resort to wood 
as fuel? A number of estates have been 
using wood for heating greenhouses this 
past winter, and one cannot but admire 
that aggressive American spirit that suc¬ 
ceeds in the face of all difficulties. There 
are a great many greenhouses on private 
estates throughout the country, and if 
all these were converted into glass food 
factories, they could be made to play 
a very important part in food produc¬ 
tion. 
There is still another point for con¬ 
sideration. Unquestionably, greater ef¬ 
fort will be made next summer to bring 
our coal supply up to requirements. It 
is our duty now to make greater effort 
and sacrifices to keep in operation as 
potent a factor as greenhouses can be 
made in the production of food during 
the winter months and in making our 
outdoor gardens earlier, of a better 
standard and more productive. This is 
one factor in the defeat of Germany. 
