76 
House & Garden 
The Forebears of Some Garden Flowers 
(Continued jrom page 43) 
T 
C. S. Pillsbury Residence, Minneapolis 
Hewitt & Brown, Architects 
T 
For Moderate Sized Residences 
—Indiana Limestone embodies all the 
essentials of a good building material, 
and may be obtained in the following 
shades: Buff, Gray and Variegated. 
The Buff has a tone of delicate brown 
and ivory; the Gray is a soft, silvery 
shade, while the Variegated, with its 
subtile play of colors, is a singularly 
beautiful blending of Buff and Gray. 
This natural stone is, in itself, so mag¬ 
nificent, that decorative features are sel¬ 
dom desired in the design. 
We would like an opportunity to ac¬ 
quaint you with the economical features 
of Indiana Limestone and shall be 
pleased to send, without obligation to 
you, our booklet giving practical de¬ 
signs of moderate sized residences. 
wise greatly admired group, which has 
so much to recommend it, and from 
which our horticulturists have produced 
so many extraordinary species for our 
gardens. The Florentine iris (I. floren- 
iina) is the species from which we ob¬ 
tain the orris-root of commerce; this 
is also used in medicine for its cathar¬ 
tic and emetic effects, in the manu¬ 
facture of hair and tooth-powders. 
As a genus of plants of the iris fam¬ 
ily, it is an old one, as a number of its 
extinct species have been discovered in 
the Tertiary, the deposits of which are 
in the Basal Eoecene, some 3,000,000 
years old. One of these discoveries 
was made in the Lower Tertiary of 
Spitzenbergen—indeed, all of them 
were made in Europe. These fossil 
irises see their ancestors in such ex¬ 
tinct plants as Irites and Iridium of 
the Lower Tertiary deposits. 
All this lends additional interest to 
iris; and when we now regard any of 
its beautiful flowers in our gardens 
or in nature, we may picture to our¬ 
selves its long line of ancestors, and its 
hundreds of forms that have become, 
from one cause or another, extinct. 
And in the years to come, what may 
not man yet do in the way of pro¬ 
ducing hundreds of glorious iridine 
types of still undreamed of forms, col¬ 
ors and contours? 
THE GENTLE ART OF WATERING 
T HE right amount of water is as 
necessary for the best develop¬ 
ment of plant life as the right 
amount of food, but the right amount 
of either must be followed by a ques¬ 
tion mark; for what is right for one 
thing may be far too much or too little 
for another. Cyclamen will stand with 
its feet in water all day and enjoy it, 
while heliotrope, for example, would 
surely take cold under such treatment. 
A very successful gardener once gave 
the following rule for growing dahlias: 
“Make half of your soil manure and 
give them all the water they can drink,” 
but lilies and Dutch bulbs, on the other 
hand, should have a limited supply of 
both ingredients. The same principles 
hold good in planting seed, both vege¬ 
tables and flowers. Peas rejoice in 
plenty of rain and cool weather, where¬ 
as if a cold, wet spell comes before lima 
beans have germinated they will almost 
surely rot and make re-planting neces¬ 
sary. Corn, okra, pansies and other 
hard-shelled seed will sprout several 
days sooner if soaked for a few hours 
before going into the ground, while 
softer seeds would burst under such 
conditions. 
Summer watering should be done 
after the sun has left the garden, “for,” 
as the old negro said, “de Lo’d alius 
sends de clouds befo’ he sends de rain, 
an’ de Lo’d knows best about his own 
things.” The amount of water to be 
given depends largely upon the retaining 
quality of the soil, porous, sandy ground, 
of course, requiring more than that 
which is well supplied with humus and 
clay. One thorough irrigation, given 
by filling trenches opened on either 
side of the row, will do more real good 
than twice the amount of water 
sprinkled on the surface. Sprinkling 
has its rightful place, however, in fur¬ 
nishing moisture and refreshment to 
the foliage. 
Constant use of the rake and the 
wheel hoe is necessary in order to keep 
the soil open, and whether it has re¬ 
ceived water from the hose or from the 
clouds it should be loosened as soon as 
it is dry enough to be worked and fined 
up with the rake. This prevents cak¬ 
ing, conserves the moisture, and admits 
air to the roots. It also draws the 
moisture from below during dry 
weather and some people claim that it 
produces better results than the cus¬ 
tomary watering. A garden cared for 
in this way will of course be entirely 
free from weeds and it is surprising how 
little time it takes if the work is dona 
regularly every few days. 
The first summer is often a critical 
period for newly set trees and shrubs, 
especially if the season be a dry one. 
Evaporation from the foliage and the 
putting forth of new wood make heavy 
demands on the not yet well established 
roots, so that by August the leaves 
are apt to wilt or shrivel. It is dif¬ 
ficult to reach the roots even by trench 
irrigation, but the danger may be 
greatly lessened, if not entirely avoided 
by sinking short pieces of 3" pipe V/z 
or 2' from the base of the tree. The 
length of the pipe will depend upon 
the depth of the roots to be reached, 
but only 2" or 3" need extend above 
the surface of the ground. Through 
this a generous supply of water may be 
given once a week or as often as 
weather conditions demand, and in the 
case of larger trees three or four such 
pipes may be set in a circle in order 
that the root system, and consequently 
the top, may develop evenly. 
M. N. L. 
ON HOUSE ©* GARDEN’S BOOK SHELF 
tTTie ARISTOCRAT o/~ BUILDING MATERIALS 
A 
Indiana Limestone 
Box 782 
Quarrymen’s Association 
Bedford, Indiana 
& 
A N adequate and reliable hand¬ 
book on “French Furniture Un¬ 
der Louis XVI and the Empire” 
(Frederick A. Stokes Co., New York) 
has now come into an English transla¬ 
tion through the publication of a vol¬ 
ume of that title by Roger de Felice, 
a book that will be read with pleasure 
as well as turned to for information, 
for M. Felice writes in a delectable 
manner. The author explains his treat¬ 
ment of the Louis XVI and Empire 
styles under the covers of this work as 
follows: 
“Empire furniture differs widely 
from that of the Louis XVI period; 
and yet the two styles are derived 
from the same principle applied from 
1760 to the Revolution with a great 
deal of discretion and respect for the 
national taste, and from 1789 to ISIS 
with the most uncompromising rigor. 
This principle is that of the imitation 
of Antiquity. That was not merely a 
particular circumstance, limited to the 
restricted circle of the art of the cab¬ 
inet-maker, but, as it is called, a fact 
of civilization; something like—in a 
different proportion—what the Renais¬ 
sance had been to France in the six¬ 
teenth century. This return to An¬ 
tiquity, in fact, manifested itself in all 
the arts, in literature, and even, a lit¬ 
tle later, in the ways and customs of 
the French people.” 
M. Felice makes clear to us that the 
Empire was not a reaction against the 
Louis XVI style, but its logical out¬ 
come. Those who have read M. 
Felice’s companion book on “French 
Furniture Under Louis XV” will find in 
the present volume indications of the 
scholarship which marks that work 
and will find it equally as interesting. 
Nearly a hundred halftone plates illus¬ 
trate the text and the low price of the 
book places it within the reach of all. 
(Continued on page 78) 
