Chapter I: Front Matter

VICK’S
ILLUSTRATED MONTHLY
MAGAZINE.

DEVOTED TO THE PROFITABLE CULTURE OF FLOWERS AND VEGETABLES.

Vick Publishing Co.
Fifty Cents Per Year.

ROCHESTER, N. Y., MARCH, 1894.

Volume 17, No. 5.
New Series.

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COUGHS AND COLDS

are only the beginning. Lungs are weakened next, the body becomes emaciated, and then the dreaded Consumption Germ appears.

_Scott’s Emulsion_

the Cream of Cod-liver Oil and Hypophosphites, overcomes Coughs and Colds, strengthens the Lungs, and supplies vital energy. Physicians, the world over, endorse it.

BABIES AND CHILDREN

and Weak Mothers respond readily to the nourishing powers of Scott’s Emulsion. They like the taste of it, too.

Don’t be Deceived by Substitutes!

Prepared by Scott & Bowne, Chemists, New-York City. Druggists sell it.

* * * * *

ORGANS $27.50 up

PIANOS, $175 up

_FREE:_

Our large 24-page Catalogue, profusely illustrated, full of information on the proper construction of Pianos and Organs. We ship on test trial, ask no cash in advance, sell on instalments, give greater value for the money than any other manufacturer. Send for this book at once to

BEETHOVEN ORGAN CO.,

WASHINGTON, N. J. P. O. Box 280

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☞ SAVE MONEY

$90 Top Buggy $52.50
$65 Top Buggy 36.75
$75 Spring Wagon 42.25
$40 Road Wagon 24.75
$130 4-Pass Surrey 77.50
$15 Texas Saddle 8.25
$15 Cowboy Saddle 25.00

Single Harness $3.75, $5.25 and $10, same as sell for $7, $10 and $18, Double Team Harness $12, $17, $20, same as sell for $20, $30, $35. We ship anywhere to anyone at WHOLESALE PRICES with privilege to examine without asking one cent in advance. Buy from manufacturers, save middlemen’s profits. World’s Fair medals awarded. Write at once for catalogue and testimonials free. CASH BUYERS’ UNION, 158 W. Van Buren St., B3, Chicago, Ill.

* * * * *

Death to High Prices!

Buy Direct from the Factory

and save agents’ and canvassers’ commissions. Hereafter we shall sell the Majestic direct to the consumer at factory cost. The Majestic is recognized as the best machine for family use, and has always been sold by our agents for $60. For a limited time we shall sell it for $22 and furnish all attachments free of charge. Shipped on approval anywhere. Send for a sample of its work and catalogue.

THE TILTON S. M. CO., 275 Wabash Av., Chicago, Ill.

* * * * *

Few men have ever really known,
And few would ever guess
What our country means by marking
All her chattels with U.S.

We see it on our bonds and bills,
And on our postal cars,
It decorates our Capitol
Shadowed by Stripes and Stars.

In all our barracks, posts and forts,
It plays a leading part
And the jolly sailor loves it
And enshrines it in his heart.

It may stand for United States
Or yet for Uncle Sam,
But there’s still another meaning
To this simple monogram.

Now, have you guessed the message
Which these mystic letters bear?
Or recognized the untold good
They’re spreading everywhere?

Echo the joyful tidings
And let the people know
That the U.S. of our nation means
We Use Sapolio.

* * * * *

AGENTS $10 a day at home selling LIGHTNING PLATER and plating Jewelry, Watches, Tableware, Bicycles, etc. Plates finest jewelry good as new, and on all kinds of metal with gold, silver or nickel. No experience. Anyone can plate the first effort. Goods need plating at every house. Outfits complete. Different sizes, all warranted. Wholesale to agents $5 up. Big profits, good seller. Circulars free.

H. F. Delno & Co. Dept. No. 6, Columbus, O.

* * * * *

HALM’S ANTI-RHEUMATIC AND ANTI-CATARRHAL CHEWING GUM

Cures and Prevents Rheumatism, Indigestion, Dyspepsia, Heartburn, Catarrh and Asthma. Useful in Malaria and Fevers, Cleanses the Teeth and Promotes the Appetite. Sweetens the Breath, Cures Tobacco Habit. Endorsed by the Medical Faculty. Send for 10, 15 or 25 cent package. Be convinced.

SILVER, STAMPS OR POSTAL NOTE.

Geo. R. Halm, 140 W. 29th St., New York

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Montbretias for Spring Planting.

An order of plants belonging to the Iris family, are natives of Africa, and their general appearance is that of the gladiolus, 18 inches high. Bloom profusely from July to October, throwing out spike after spike of beautiful blossoms. Hardy south of the Ohio; North, lift in fall and keep in dry sand.

=Crocosmiflora.= This is a hybrid variety, having scarlet flowers about one and one half inch in length, borne numerously in a long panicle standing well up above the foliage, considered hardy.

=Pottsii.= Flowers bright yellow, flashed on the outside with brick-red; very ornamental and hardy.

=Rosea.= Flowers rose colored. =Mixed.= All colors.

_Named varieties 5c. each; 6 for 25c.; 12 for 40c. Mixed 5c. each 6 for 20c.; 12. for 35c._

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POPULAR SELECTED COLLECTIONS.

To all who want good sensible Collections for the Flower and Vegetable Garden we can recommend either of the following. _All of the seeds contained in them are our regular sized packages, and first class in every respect._ They give to our customers a good assortment, best adapted to produce a continued succession of the most useful kinds throughout the year.

Several thousand of our Collections are sold annually, and to the same people, which shows that they are perfectly satisfactory.

FLOWER SEEDS.

No. 1—Twenty Varieties Choice Annuals, $1.00.

No. 2—Forty Varieties Choice Annuals, $2.00.

No. 3—“Beauteous” Collection of 60 Varieties of the Finest
Annuals, Biennials and Perennials, $3.00.

No. 4—“Perfection” Collection of 100 Varieties of the Finest
Annuals, Biennials and Perennials, $5.00.

VEGETABLE SEEDS.

No. 5—Twenty-three Varieties, for Small Garden, $1.00.

No. 6—Forty-six Varieties. All Leading Vegetables. $2.00.

No. 7—“Giant” Collection ($4.00 worth) of Finest Varieties of
Vegetables for Family Garden, $3.00.

No. 8—“Mammoth” Collection ($6.50 worth) of Finest Varieties of
Vegetables for Family Garden, $5.00.

* * * * *

FLORAL GUIDE, 1894, The PIONEER CATALOGUE of Vegetables and Flowers.

Contains 112 pages 8 × 10½ inches, with descriptions that describe, not mislead; instructions that instruct, not exaggerate.

The cover is charming in harmonious blending of water color prints in green and white, with a gold background,—a dream of beauty. 32 pages of Novelties printed in 8 different colors. All the leading novelties and the best of the old varieties. These hard times you cannot afford to run any risk. Buy =Honest Goods= where you will receive =Full Measure=. It is not necessary to advertise that Vick’s seeds grow, this is known the world over, and also that the harvest pays. A very little spent for proper seed will save grocer’s and doctor’s bills. Many concede Vick’s Floral Guide the handsomest catalogue for 1894. If you love a fine garden send address now, with 10 cents, which may be deducted from first order.

$360.00 CASH PRIZES FOR POTATOES.

JAMES VICK’S SONS, Rochester. N. Y.

VICK’S MAGAZINE.

Vol. 17. ROCHESTER, N. Y., MARCH, 1894. No. 5.

MARCH

_Shifting winds and lowering sky—March._
_Bleak and bare the brown fields lie—March._
_Winter’s spectre now is laid,_
_Yet Spring lingers, half afraid._

_Haste, oh Spring, your tasks are set, March!_
_You are late, do you forget? March!_
_Long before this time last year,_
_Bluebird and his mate were here._

—_J. Torrey Connor._

MABEL RAY’S LESSON.

BY ROSE SEELYE-MILLER.

Times had been hard, harder than common this past year, and it seemed to Mabel Ray as though there was little bright to look forward to, and less to encourage her in trying to do right, trying to be the Christian she wanted to be some years ago. She had married Harry Ray three years previous; he was a thriving young merchant, but the past year it had seemed to the young wife as if he had grown taciturn and almost fretful if she wanted money for any little thing which she deemed necessary. Only this morning he had refused her money for the fur cape that she really needed so much, especially if they were going to her folks for New Year’s day. She had always had what she wanted when at home, and if Harry begrudged her the necessities of life, why, she almost believed she had better go back to that home, for she was an only daughter and was idolized by her parents. She sat and thought, and thought, of her wrongs until the tears came, and then, after having a good cry, she went into the conservatory and began picking flowers for the church decoration in which site was to take part. There was to be a concert and recitations and such entertainments, and the funds were to go to help the needy ones in the parish. For there were many who needed, many men were out of work, and their families were destitute indeed. Mabel was always ready for work of this kind, it relieved the tedium of the days when Harry was at the store, and then, be it known to you, although Mabel would have blushed had she realized it herself, she liked the notices in the city personals about the charming and philanthropic Mrs. Ray who took such a prominent part in every good work.

Her time was her own; there were no little ones for her to care for; her household was managed by a competent housekeeper who looked well to the domestic arrangements; so, altogether, Mrs. Ray rather needed something to give her an idea of usefulness. She was selfish, I am sorry to say, but when you think that she was an only child, reared in luxury, with everything she desired procured for her, it is no wonder that she learned to think that what she wanted was the first thing to be considered.

Harry Ray really loved his wife, but he was bearing a heavy burden of financial care, and then, besides, he did not possess the means that Mabel’s father had. He would do anything, sacrifice anything for her, but she seemed thoughtless about his sacrifices, and did not realize that perhaps she too had a duty to perform.

She came home from decorating the church that afternoon in better spirits, but was almost vexed when Harry assured her it would be impossible for him to attend the Charity function with her that evening. “Wrap yourself up well, Mabel,” Harry said thoughtfully, “and let the coachman await you.” He looked almost wistfully at her bright young beauty and longed for a word of sympathy and help from her, but none came. He looked worn and worried, and a thoughtful wife would have noticed this long before, but Mabel had not been taught to notice others in that way.

So Harry went to his work in his office, and Mabel, dressed richly, went to the Charity function, where she expected to sing. The evening passed pleasantly to Mabel, for she loved a brilliant scene and the compliments she always received.

The next day she was one of a committee to dispense the various gifts among the poor. She rose early for her, and with several others she visited such haunts of misery as she had never dreamed of. Poverty had always been a rather pleasant thing in her mind where people were always holding some sort of meetings to relieve it, and where kind hearted women were taking chicken broth or cups of jelly to others who lay in bed; she never really thought that perhaps it would be pleasanter to make one’s own chicken broth or furnish one’s own jelly, or that perhaps the one who lay in bed might do something besides just simply lie there; she did not realize the tragedy of many of those lives where poverty binds and sickness holds with chains invincible beyond all human aiding.

There was more wretchedness depicted in the squalid homes she visited than she had ever dreamed of, there was not only poverty but there was dirt, and there was suffering, and she began to wonder if there were not other things needed by the poor besides chicken broth and jelly; she thought soap would not be misplaced, and that clothes would find lodgement, she was sure flowers would be welcomed by some, and she went home with her heart really aroused from its selfish stupor. Harry did not come home to tea, and it was so late before he did come that being very wearied she retired, and soon fell asleep. But here, even, she was not free, she seemed to be in the midst of a white-robed throng who went about ministering to the needs of others, and when she spoke to them they only said “Even Christ pleased not Himself,” and winged their way on their errands of mercy, and then she seemed transported to the sunny fields where flowers bloomed and birds sang their sweetest carols; there were certain ones gathering the flowers and when she spoke to them they said “Even Christ pleased not Himself.”

And then she was transported to the city and into the haunts of misery and she saw a wan-faced woman going into a poor hovel with a blossom in her hand that she had picked from where it had fallen from some fair lady’s bouquet. She placed it carefully in a pitcher with a broken spout and turned the fairest side of the flower toward a sick one lying upon a pallet of straw, and when she looked a halo seemed to surround the flower and a voice said “Even Christ pleased not Himself.” And suddenly she seemed to be in her husband’s office, and there sat Harry, his face was haggard, and there were tense lines about his mouth, and he seemed trying in vain to make the accounts tally in the ledger before him, and ruin and disaster embodied seemed looking in upon him as he worked, and finally he laid down his pen, saying “I can do no more—if it were not for Mabel.”

Then she was in her own beautiful home and everything seemed going on strangely; the flowers in the conservatory had withered and died because they lived to please themselves, and so it seemed with everything in the house; the housekeeper was keeping house to please herself, the cook was not going to serve the dinner because it did not please her to do so, and so it went, and she reached her room and there she found herself in ease and luxury, taking no thought for others, and seeking only how she might please herself; and then there seemed to be the roaring of a fire and she saw the house and all therein consumed, but she saw the woman who had carried the broken flower to the sick child coming to help her, and then Harry took her in his arms, and she knew that these were safe because they had not lived to please themselves.

After awhile she woke and hearing a step upon the stairs she slipped on a warm dressing gown and went out softly to meet Harry. He was surprised and there was that anxious look upon his face that she had seen in her dream. She drew him into the parlor and seated him in an easy chair, and then smoothed the wrinkles from his brow and begged him to tell her of his troubles. So the husband and wife conferred together, and both bearing the burden it grew lighter, and after a time it passed away. Mabel seemed different thereafter, her dream was so realistic that her very heart seemed changed, and upon its tablets were written in indelible letters, “Even Christ pleased not Himself.” She did not care to figure in charity functions where she would be praised of men, but she sought out the needy and tried faithfully to aid them. Her aid was given so unostentatiously, and with such humility and earnest sympathy, that the poor soon learned to love her, and her flowers bloomed not in vain, for they bloomed for the sick and sinning, for the poor and needy, and I trow that in sowing good seeds upon earth she will reap a heavenly harvest that will surprise her. For she has learned the sweetness of the words “Even Christ pleased not Himself.”

CURIOUS ARCHITECTS.

There is no topic in natural history so interesting as the architecture of birds; in the building of their nests they are exceedingly ingenious. We may well learn a lesson from the patience, diligence and perseverance which they display. Just as men are skilled in different mechanical employments, so we find in the bird tribe miners, masons, carpenters, weavers, basket-makers and tailors.

The humming bird constructs its nest of the finest silky down, and of cotton, or if these are not available, some other similar material. The inside is lined in the most delicate manner with soft substances; the outside is covered with moss, usually the color of the bough or twig to which the nest is attached, thus giving it the appearance of an excrescence. The delicacy and ingenuity of workmanship and skill could hardly be excelled by human art.

The humming bird is the “fairy of the feathered race”—the smallest and most beautiful—and they are found almost all over this continent. Most of them, however, dwell in the far South, where flowers are ever in bloom, and summer reigns all the year round. One species alone visits our chill Northern States—the humming bird with the ruby throat. It comes to us in July and is very shy; its stay is very short, for toward the first of September it departs to a warmer climate.

It is only in tropical countries that the several species of humming bird are seen in their abundance and variety. The islands between Florida and the main land of South America literally swarm with them. In the wild and uncultivated parts they inhabit the magnificent forests overhung with rare plants, whose blossoms vie in beauty with the jewel-like brilliancy of these animate gems of the air. In the cultivated portions of the country they abound in the gardens and seem to delight in society.

Lovely and full of nervous energy, these winged gems are constantly in the air, darting from one object to another, and displaying their gorgeous colors in the sunlight. When on a long journey, as during migration, they pass through the air in long undulations, raising themselves to a considerable height and then falling so as to form a curve. When feeding on a flower they keep themselves poised in one position as steadily as if suspended on a bough—making a humming sound with the rapid motion of their wings.

In disposition these little creatures are bold and pugnacious. In defending their nests they will attack birds five times their size and drive them off. When angry, their motions are very violent and their flight as swift as an arrow. Often the eye is incapable of following them, and their shrill, piercing note alone announces their presence.

Among the most dazzling of this brilliant tribe is the bar-tailed humming bird of Brazil. The tail is forked at the base, and consists of five feathers, graduated one above another, at almost equal distances. Their color is of the richest flame; the upper part of the body is golden green, and the under part emerald.

There are more than a hundred kinds of these birds, and all are noted for their surpassing beauty. What a beautiful conception in the author of nature were these exquisite little creatures! It is as if the flowers had taken wings, and life, and intelligence, to share in the sports of animal life.

The nest of the golden-crested wren, a most beautiful bird found in England and other parts of Europe, is a fine example of weaving. It is made of moss and lichen, and lined with feathers; it has a very small entrance at the top and the interior of the nest is also small, bearing no proportion to the size of the structure. The weaving of this nest is a work of great labor and assiduity, and compared with the bulk of the bird, it is of large dimensions.

The nest is suspended from the under surface of a fir branch, thickly clothed with foliage, by which it is almost entirely concealed and partly protected from the rain. Thus, beneath a natural canopy, this little bird rears her brood, whose cradle swings to and fro with every breeze. The eggs are from seven to ten in number, and of a pale brown color.

A naturalist who watched a nest containing eight small birds with a powerful opera glass, observed that the parent birds came to the nest with food every two minutes, or upon an average thirty-six times in an hour; and this continued full sixteen hours a day, which, if equally divided between the brood, each would receive seventy-two feeds, the whole amounting to five hundred and seventy-six!

The woodpeckers are carpenters; they not only bore holes in trees in search of food, but they also chisel out deep holes in which to deposit their eggs and rear their young. They generally build their nest in May, selecting an old apple tree in the orchard; the boring is first done by the male, who pecks out a circular hole; as the work progresses, he is occasionally relieved by the female. They both work with great diligence, and as the hole deepens they carry out the chips, sometimes taking them some distance to prevent discovery or suspicion. The nest usually requires a week to build, and when the female is quite satisfied she deposits her eggs, generally six in number and of a pure white color.

A bird called the grosbeak builds a nest shaped like an inverted bottle with a long neck, through which it passes up to a snug little chamber above. The nest is skillfully constructed of soft vegetable substances, sewed together in a wonderful manner, and suspended from a twig of a bush.

The social weaver is found in the south of Africa. Hundreds of these birds, in one community, join to form a structure of interwoven grass containing various apartments, all covered by a sloping roof impenetrable to the heaviest rain, and increased year after year as the population of the little community may require.

A traveler, returned from a journey through South Africa, writes: “A tree with an enormous nest of these birds was quite near where our party camped for the night. I dispatched a few men with a wagon to bring it to the camp that I might open the hive and examine the nest in its minutest parts. When it arrived I cut it to pieces with a hatchet, and saw that the chief portion of the structure consisted of grass, without any mixture, but so compact and firmly woven together as to be impenetrable to the rain. This is a canopy under which each bird builds its particular nest; the canopy projects a little, which serves to let the water run off when it rains. The nest contained three hundred and twenty nests, and it was calculated that the number of birds would exceed six hundred in this one nest alone.”

The bottle-nested sparrow is a basket maker; it is found in India and is a very intelligent bird. It resembles our native sparrow in some particulars, but its color is brown and yellow. It associates in large communities and builds its nests on palm trees. It is formed in a very ingenious way, by long grasses woven together into the shape of a bottle, and it is then suspended at the extremity of a branch, in order to secure the eggs and young birds from numerous enemies, such as serpents, monkeys and other animals which infest that part of the world.

These nests excel in the neatness and delicacy of their workmanship. They contain several apartments intended for different purposes; in one the female deposits her eggs; in another is stored the food which the male gathers for his mate during her maternal duties, and a third is the sleeping apartment for the male bird.

The sand martin is a most curious member of the swallow tribe. It appears in the spring a week or two before the common swallow, and it is fond of skimming swiftly over the surface of the water. This bird makes a hole in a sand bank, sometimes two feet deep, at the extremity of which it constructs a loose nest of fine grass and feathers, in which it rears its young brood. The beak of the sand martin is like a sharp little awl, very hard, and tapering, suddenly to a point.

The tailor bird is not the least interesting of the bird family; it has a curious bill which it uses like a needle, and it forms its nest by sewing the materials together instead of weaving.

“The tailor bird,” says Darwin, “will not build its nest to the extremity of a tender twig, but makes one more advance to safety by fixing it to the leaf itself. It picks up a dead leaf and sews it to the side of a living one, its slender bill serving as a needle, and its thread some fine fibers; the lining consists of feathers, gossamer and down; its eggs are white; the color of the bird light yellow; its length three inches; its weight three-sixteenths of an ounce; so that the materials of the nest and the weight of the bird are not likely to draw down a habitation so slightly suspended.”

The different methods of nest building evidently result from the peculiarities of the birds themselves combined with their surroundings. Will these styles of architecture be changed or further developed?

HENRY COYLE.

VICK’S FLOWERS.

What radiance do I see?
What color-wave outflows,
Making the wilderness rejoice
And blossom like the rose?

From sea to sea it pours,
From east to western strands,
Softening the stern Atlantic shores,
Brightening Pacific sands.

The South-land grows more sweet;
By broad blue Northern lakes,
Fair as auroral flushes fleet
The fragrant flower-tide breaks.

Our fertile vales make room
For this benignant grace;
The prairie’s wealth of native bloom
Gladly to this gives place.

O, lovely enterprise,
Refining where it goes,
Making the wilderness rejoice
And blossom as the rose!

—VIRGINIA WESTWOOD.

* * * * *

“Only the Scars Remain,”

Says HENRY HUDSON, of the James Smith Woolen Machinery Co., Philadelphia, Pa., who certifies as follows:

“Among the many testimonials which I see in regard to certain medicines performing cures, cleansing the blood, etc., none impress me more than =my own case=. Twenty years ago, at the age of 18 years, I had swellings come on my legs, which broke and became =running sores=. Our family physician could do me no good, and it was feared that the bones would be affected. At last, my good old

Mother urged me

to try =Ayer’s= Sarsaparilla. I took three bottles, the sores healed, and I have not been troubled since. =Only the Scars remain, and the memory of the past, to remind me of the good Ayer’s Sarsaparilla has done me.= I now weigh two hundred and twenty pounds, and am in the best of health. I have been on the road for the past twelve years, have noticed =Ayer’s= Sarsaparilla advertised in all parts of the United States, and always take pleasure in telling what good it did for me.”

Ayer’s Sarsaparilla

Prepared by Dr. J. C. Ayer & Co., Lowell, Mass.

Cures others, will cure you.

LINES TO A SKUNK CABBAGE.

Oh, life grotesque! How, whence did spring
The thought that gave thee blossoming?
How comes thy strange offensive bloom
Near knolls that give sweet violets room?
Sweet violets, which fill the air
With perfumed incense of a prayer
That, floating to the world above
Calls blessings from the soul of Love.
But thou, mephitic bloom! thou hast
A thought in thee of ages past,
When songs of love were all unknown,
Ere earth had into beauty grown,
Ere rippling brook and soughing pine
Had turned her prose hills into rhyme;
When all was dark, and cold, and bare,
Thou hadst, perhaps, a mission there;
And that is why, ’neath spring-time snows
Thy curious spathe so early grows.
Hast thou no mission now, strange flower,
Happier to make spring’s early hour?
Hark! from thy close-wrapped heart doth come
The working bee’s glad, soundful hum,
Where loads of pollen he doth find
His waxen honey cells to bind.
So, thou hast place in fields of use,
And vain are now words of abuse—
Giving the best thy heart doth hold
To help the workers of the world.
And giving thus, with patient grace,
Doth baser qualities efface,
And in a better, higher sphere
Thine inner beauty doth appear,
And thy developed soul shall be
Violet-sweet eternally.

—BETH MAX.

These lines were suggested by a spathe of the skunk cabbage sent me by my brother, W. S. Ripley, of Wakefield, Mass., who mentioned in his letter to me when the specimen was sent that he stopped “to watch the bees go in at the aperture on one side of the spathe, and listened to their loud humming inside, as they laid on their load of pollen.” In Thoreau’s “Early Spring in Massachusetts,” page 172, in writing of this plant he says: “All along under that bank I heard the hum of honey bees in the air, attracted by this flower. Especially the hum of one within a spathe sounds deep and loud.”

THE NEW FRENCH CANNAS.

I do not know of any class of plants that have attracted so much attention or have been so much admired during the past season as the new large flowering French cannas. And for effectiveness on lawns in large beds or masses, or as single specimens in the mixed border, nothing can be more tropical and impressive. They are really plants for everybody as they are entirely free from insect pests, and require but little care and attention to grow them to perfection. They succeed well in all kinds of weather, wet or dry, and are not injured in the least by the severe storms of wind and rain that we so often experience during the summer season.

They bloom without intermission from June until they are destroyed by frost; the spikes of large flowers somewhat resemble gladiolus but are really more effective and showy as their brilliant colors show so grandly against their tropical foliage. Most, if not all, of the varieties grow on an average about three feet in height, and the flowers range in color from deep crimson to pure yellow, including all the intermediate shades, many being so beautifully marked that they are frequently compared to orchid flowers.

To grow these cannas to perfection as well as to enable them to properly develop themselves, they should be given a very deep heavily enriched soil, and as soon as hot, dry weather sets in mulched to the depth of at least two inches with good stable manure, and if the opportunity offers, water copiously during seasons of drought. With this treatment a single tuber will make a clump three or four feet in diameter in a single season; this will give one some idea of the immense amount of foliage and flowers a single specimen will produce.

The plants should not be planted outside until the weather becomes warm and settled, which in this vicinity is about the tenth of May, and as soon as the foliage has been destroyed by the frost it should be cut off, and the tubers dug and stored underneath the greenhouse stage, or in some other situation, where a temperature of 55° is maintained, until the time arrives for planting them outside again.

Or the plants can be lifted on the approach of cold weather, divided, potted up, and grown on for decorative purposes in either the greenhouse or window garden. This is a very safe way to winter over the large flowering cannas or any other variety of which one’s stock is limited.

When grown as pot plants for winter decoration the cannas should be given a compost consisting of two-thirds turfy loam, one-third well decayed manure and a good sprinkling of bone dust, mix well and use the compost rough. The plants should be given as light and sunny a situation as possible and a temperature of 55° to 60°. They should also be freely watered both overhead and at the roots, and as soon as the pots become well filled with roots a little liquid ammonia can be given occasionally or else they must be shifted into larger pots.

Propagation is effected by a careful division of the clumps, and where the plants are to be kept in a state of rest the operation should be performed when they are being planted out in May. In dividing leave two or three eyes or shoots to each plant.

Of the many varieties now listed in catalogues the following are the most desirable and distinct:

Alphonse Bouvier is the grandest deep red variety known, both truss and flowers being very large, and the plant makes a most luxuriant growth of deep red foliage. In color the flowers are of a rich velvety red.

Capt. P. de Suzzini has handsome light green foliage and is the most beautiful of all the spotted varieties. Its flowers are of a rich shade of canary yellow beautifully spotted and dashed with red.

Francois Crozy has bright green foliage and very large flowers which are of a bright orange bordered with a narrow edge of gold—a very rare and desirable color in cannas.

Madame Crozy grows about three and a half feet in height and has broad bright green foliage. The flowers, which are produced in massive spikes, are of a bright crimson scarlet beautifully bordered with gold. The plant commences to bloom when about one foot in height.

Nellie Bowden, in all respects this is identical with Madame Crozy except in the color of its flowers which are of a rich golden yellow. One of the most distinct and beautiful of cannas.

Paul Marquant has dark green foliage and very large handsome flowers of a bright salmon scarlet. A very showy variety.

Star of 1891 is so well and favorably known as to require no description. It is the best of all for pot culture, as it is of dwarf growth and very free-flowering. The flowers are of a bright orange scarlet occasionally edged with yellow.

_Floral Park, N. Y._

CHAS. E. PARNELL.

THE DIFFERENCE.

It makes all the difference between nice thrifty plants or scraggly looking ones whether we read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest a floral magazine. In walking on the street, the appearance of the windows or front yards tells you whether the postman leaves a floral weekly or monthly. Six weeks ago I saw a row of empty pots right in the sun, and often an old man was poking up the soil with his penknife to see if his bulbs had started. You see he didn’t read up about hyacinths, but potted them and put them right in the sun. I can imagine his saying to his wife, “It’s money thrown away to buy bulbs; they probably are too old to grow and I’ve been cheated.” So the poor seedsman gets the blame, and not his own ignorance. Here is a window with leggy looking geraniums in it, just a few leaves on top of the long stems. Now a little reading in a floral magazine would have shown her, after blooming all summer, the place for them is the cellar. Ah! here is a window that shows intelligence. The hyacinths and jonquils are showing their buds, moved to the window from the dark corners where they have been for weeks forming vigorous roots. Here are primroses in bloom, and oxalis, and a scarlet nasturtium makes the room bright on a cloudy day, and in a corner I can see the Palm Latania. She takes the magazines and knows what are good winter plants for amateurs.

In summer one can pick out the magazine lawns and gardens. Here is one where the man has two shapely maple trees in front, and has pruned his “Jac” rose so that it is loaded with blossoms, and in a circular bed he has put a caladium in the center, and this shows off the gladiolus in every shade around it. But the next front yard is enough to set one’s teeth on edge. Actually, here is a large square bed with a tall candidum lily in each corner and, inside, petunias, zinnias, asters and marigolds in one blaze of color. The whole effect is like a crazy quilt thrown over an old fashioned four-posted bedstead. One sees the roses eaten of worms and bugs, or planted by the sunflowers and looking ashamed at their surroundings; whereas the magazines tell us again and again that roses need to be watched continually and sprayed to keep off the insects, and to plant by themselves. Now for the moral. Let us all show, and lend our florals, and urge the people to subscribe.

ANNA LYMAN.

* * * * *

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A COTTAGE LOT.

When a tradesman can indulge in a suburban home or a summer cottage it will often happen that he will desire to keep a family horse. If he doesn’t want a horse he will often want a cow or chickens. In the accompanying sketch A is a site provided for one or other of these animals, and it is designedly given a prominent position that its architecture may receive treatment in consonance with that of the residence, that it may be in unison with the surroundings, and that it may supplant the useless and ugly pavilions frequently seen.

The approach to the house is direct and convenient for all points, unless the architect is perverse enough to put the coal cellar on the opposite side.

The boundary hedge is of Norway spruce with room enough to grow and room enough to get between it and the fence to clip it. I saw a hedge on paper recently—between two groups of shrubbery—which was not allowed room to stand on end.

There is a small vegetable garden, 13, with a border around it for blackberries, currants, raspberries, strawberries and such like, and at the end, 14, either a few fruit trees or flowering shrubs. The porches, both back and front, are but a single step above the roadway. The rooms may or may not be another step above them, depending somewhat upon the character of the subsoil, etc. I have not arranged any special drying ground, for cedar poles may be set up in the center of any of the round beds, 1 to 8, and clothed with Japanese ivy, Euonymus radicans, climbing hydrangeas and so on, and have wires between them.

Now these beds may be further filled with either bedding plants or select herbaceous plants. I will assume that it is a summer cottage, and I would then plant the ground as follows, which would result in a very different how d’ye do from that usually seen in such places: 1, Begonia Evansiana; 2, Funkia grandiflora; 3, Echinacea purpurea; 4, Aconitum Napellus variegata; 5, Lobelia cardinalis; 6, Sedum Sieboldii; 7, Veronica longifolia subsessilis; 8, six distinct varieties of Phlox paniculata. These beds may be varied greatly, but nothing of unreliable character should ever be planted in them. Number 1, for instance, might have a tub of nelumbium in place of the begonia, not that it is greatly better, but for variety and fancy.

Numbers 9, 9, 9, are shrubbery groups composed of the following summer-flowering material, disposed in such manner that all sides may be seen, and mowed around, and giving the longest possible margins for the space occupied. There are but few trees to bloom after July, they are chiefly Rhus semialata Osbeckii and R. glabra; Dimorphanthus Mandschuricus; Koelreuteria paniculata and Clerodendron trichotomum. None of them are large. Of shrubs there are a number, and it is strange that they are so seldom used effectively. Garden shrubbery looks more devoid of color in August here than English shrubbery in midwinter. This should not be with a list such as the following to draw from and utilize. Just fancy what we have—and the great artists we have—and tell me if it should be.

There are the altheas, lots of them; Buddleia Lindleyana; Calluna vulgaris; Clethras in variety; Callicarpa purpurea; _x_ Clematis in variety; Clerodendron viscosum; Desmodiums; Dabœcia polifolia; Daphne cneorum; Erica vagans; Euonymus Sieboldianus; Hydrangea Hortensia varieties; Hydrangea paniculata grandiflora; Hypericum in varieties; Hibiscus roseus, etc.; Indigofera Dosua; Kerria Japonica; Lespedeza bicolor; Leycesteria formosa; Lagerstrœmia Indica; _x_ Lonicera Halleana; _x_ Periploca græca; Polygonum cuspidatum; Potentilla fruticosa; Rubus odoratus; Rhodotypus Kerrioides; Rhus copallina; Rosa rugosa; R. Wichuriana, and several hybrids; Spiræa salicifolia, S. tomentosa, S. Douglassii, and S. Bumalda if it is pruned after flowering in spring; Tamarix Chinensis; _x_ Tecoma radicans; _x_ Tecoma grandiflora; Vitex agnus-castus; Vitex Negundo incisa, and a large number of sub-frutescent plants of large size, which may be substituted for such of the shrubs as are tender north of Philadelphia. Numbers 10 and 11 are prepared borders which may well be planted with Hydrangeas Hortensia, Thomas Hogg, etc., and interspersed with the pink and white varieties of Lilium speciosum. Numbers 12, 12 are plants of Sciadopitys verticillata.

Climbers are marked x. South of Philadelphia Bignonia capreolata, Magnolia grandiflora and evergreen roses may be grown on walls.

_Trenton, N. J._

JAMES MACPHERSON.

ROSE LEAVES.

My rose bushes are almost as much admired for their beautiful foliage as for their lovely roses. “I never saw such handsome leaves, why they look exactly like wax.” This is an exclamation I am growing quite accustomed to hear from friends, and it is really true; but I think any one who grows roses as house plants may have just as handsome foliage if the proper care is taken of the plants. Once or twice every week (just as is most convenient) I wash every leaf with clean, weak soapsuds, under side as well as upper side. With the small-leaved Polyanthas it is too tiresome to wash each leaflet individually, but the foliage can be sprayed well, and then very carefully and gently a branch of leaves may be wiped at once, and in this manner one can go over quite a number of plants in half an hour. The leaves may be left without wiping, of course, but the foliage is apt to be marred unless it is done, as the soapsuds dries on the leaves in white, unsightly spots. Roses treated in this way will very rarely be troubled with pests of any kind, and such rich waxen green foliage as they will possess is more beautiful than many flowers.

It is something quite remarkable here, where the thermometer falls to 40° and 50° below zero, to see roses blooming outside of a conservatory, But mine have been doing beautifully in the bay window all winter, and small as the plants are they have flowered wonderfully well. At night the plants are moved away from the window to a place where they are secure from frost Queen’s Scarlet seems to make a special effort to surpass itself each time some other rose comes into bloom, and every rose it produces is, I think, more beautiful than its predecessor. It is in every way one of the loveliest of roses, and although lacking in the rich fragrance of many others, it yet possesses a delicate sweetness of its own. The first time that American Beauty bloomed for me it bore two exquisite roses, and the little bush was barely eight inches high, one of the shoots which produced a flower being only four inches out of the soil, and the rich, exquisite sweetness of these large, deep pink roses is surely unsurpassed by any other.

Sometimes when the buds seem very slow about unfolding I take a cup of lukewarm water and gently bending each bud give it a few minutes immersion. This certainly hastens their development and in no way injures them. If I could only have one rose Queen’s Scarlet would be my choice; if I could have others American Beauty would certainly be the next one.

MRS. S. H. SNIDER.

* * * * *

CARE OF SEEDS.—The smaller the seeds the less covering required. Fine seeds may be scattered on the moist soil, or at most have a sprinkling of sand over them.

* * * * *

PAYSON’S INDELIBLE INK

Has a Record of Half a Century.

☞ For Marking Personal and Family Linen.

☞ For Marking Clothing of any Fabric.

It has been in constant and regular use in

U. S. Gov’t Hospital, Washington, D. C., 50 years.
U. S. Hotel, Boston, 40 years.
Miss. State Lunatic Hospital, Jackson, Miss., 33 years.
Fifth Avenue Hotel, New York, 31 years.

Received HIGHEST AWARD at WORLD’S FAIR, 1893.

Sample bottle mailed on receipt of 25 cts. if you cannot obtain it at druggists or stationers.

A. L. WILLISTON, Northampton, Mass.

Letter Box.

In this department we shall be pleased to answer any questions relating to Flowers, Vegetables and Plants, or to publish the experiences of our readers. JAMES VICK.

Lady Washington and Other Plants.

I see by your September Magazine that you want the experience
of anyone that has had good success with Lady Washington
geraniums. I had good success with mine. I used as a fertilizer
ground oil cake worked into the soil. It was a year-old plant
and had five bunches of bloom with five pansy-like flowers in
each bloom. They only bloom once a year. I also used the oil
cake on an ivy-leaved geranium and its growth was beyond my
expectations, for in a year’s time it was eighteen feet long.
All plants I have used it on have done exceedingly well.

MRS. N. G.

_Lane, Kansas._

Roses in Kansas.

I would like to know what manure that the farm can furnish to
use for the bed of Monthly roses, also, must they be pruned or
cut back the first year, and what treatment must I give them
in the winter here in Kansas? Must I cut off all branches and
cover the roots or wrap the branches?

MRS. M.

Dig into the bed every spring a heavy dressing of well rotted stable manure. Protect the plants in winter with a covering of leaves or branches of evergreens, prune in spring and when needed at other times, so as to get a good growth of new wood.

Ixia—Spider Lily.

Will you please tell me through your Magazine how to pronounce
ixias.

Also, how to treat the spider lily.

A. E. M.

_Casstown, Ohio._

The division of the word as here given, ix-i-a, sufficiently indicates its pronunciation.

The spider lilies, or Pancratiums, are plants growing naturally in marshes or low moist grounds and require plenty of water in their growing and blooming stage—afterwards give less water favoring a season of comparative rest, but do not allow to go wholly dry.

Plants About a Fish Pond.

I have a nice fish pond that till recently has been outside of
my yard, but finding that the cattle would spoil the banks I
am now taking it into my yard enclosure and wish to make it an
ornament, which it really is. What kinds of plants are suitable
to plant in the water and around it that would make it showy? I
have now the Egyptian lotus growing in it.

W. C. L.

_Pennsville, Pa._

One great point in making the planting should be to secure plants which are hardy, and another to select those appropriate to the situation. Both of these ends can be secured by using the water and bog plants which flourish in that locality. These might be named, but that would not assist in securing them. The practical way is to look up a number of ponds and streams and visit them every month during spring and summer, and see how many interesting plants may be found. Mark their positions, and in autumn visit the places again and remove such as are wanted and plant them in similar situations about the pond. Willows of different kinds and black ash and poplars and alder trees can furnish shade, and several kinds of shrubs can be used to ornament the banks.

Osage Orange Hedge.

Please send instructions for raising Osage orange hedge.

B. B. R.

_Spangle, Wash._

The Osage orange is a native of Texas, and consequently needs warm weather to make its growth. The seed should be planted at the time of corn planting in northern localities. A month previous to sowing place the seed in a dish of water and let it remain covered with water until ready to sow. If kept in water the length of time stated it will germinate in ten or fifteen days after planting. If kept dry and planted in that condition it will start only after six or eight weeks, and very unevenly. When planting time arrives drain off the water and mix the seed with dry sand and sow it thinly in drills in good soil. When the plants are up hoe them and keep them clean or work them with a cultivator, if on a sufficiently large scale. The first season’s growth should make them large enough to set in a hedge. They can remain standing in the seed-bed until spring and then be lifted early to be planted. Cut back the tops and the roots so that each shall be about five inches in length. The ground where the hedge is to stand should be well prepared by deep plowing, and dragging fine and smooth. If plowed up the year before and cultivated with some cleaning crop such as potatoes or carrots it will be all the better fitted. Having stretched a line for the course of the hedge the plants can be dibbled in along it, at a distance of six inches apart, or they can be set in with a spade; another way is to open a trench about six inches deep along the line and set the plants in it, one person placing the plants while another fills in a spadeful of soil against each one; then the soil is firmed with the foot against each plant and afterwards the trench filled. The after culture for the first year is to hoe and keep the ground clean. The spring of the following year before growth starts cut the plants down to within six inches of the old stock. The following year do the same; an annual rise of six inches is sufficient. At the second year’s pruning and afterwards cut the side shoots so that those at the base shall be longest, giving the hedge a broad base narrowing to a line at the top.

Vase in Cemetery.

I have a large reservoir vase twenty-five inches in diameter
for the cemetery. Last summer I had it arranged by one of our
home florists and it did not do nicely at all and was not in
the least satisfactory. Will you please advise me what plants
to use in it this summer? I thought I would put around the edge
to droop, ivy geraniums, double petunias and nasturtiums and
anything else you may suggest. I have a pink ivy geranium and
would like a white one, and thought I would like the petunias
of some different colors, perhaps one variegated and some
other. The nasturtiums I shall raise from seed, and I suppose
I might use a little sweet alyssum and lobelia. What would you
recommend for the center plants? Of course I know it is too
early to start it yet, but I want it all settled so that I can
get it ready as early as possible.

K. A. R.

_Waverly, N. Y._

A vase of plants is not adapted to a cemetery unless there is a gardener in charge of the grounds and who will give the necessary daily care. A garden vase of growing plants needs daily attention in watering and through the hottest weather should be supplied twice a day. It is rare that a cemetery has a gardener in attendance. We, therefore, would discourage the use of vases in cemeteries for they are anything but ornamental unless they have constant care. It is far better to set directly in the ground whatever flowering or ornamental plants one chooses to have. There they will thrive with less attention than elsewhere. Of course if they can have the needed care the vases can be filled with such plants as are usually employed for this purpose, and, no doubt, the vase which our inquirer complains of was well filled. It was unsatisfactory, and probably would be so again another season. The best place for the vase is on the lawn near the dwelling. But if it is to be used in the cemetery then we should try to make the best of it, and select such plants as will do fairly well with the occasional attendance they will get, together with the rain which falls upon them from the clouds.

Such a selection of plants is difficult to make. For a center plant perhaps a small sized American aloe would be as appropriate and appear as well as any that might be tried. Possibly a small India rubber plant might be another good one. For filling in the list is a restricted one. The portulaca would be reliable; the ageratum and the petunia would do fairly well, and the Thunbergia and oxalis might be expected to hold their own. The othonna would no doubt do well set around the edge. Perhaps the green and the variegated vinca would suffer meekly, if it was demanded of them, and try to show how brave they are. We fear the nasturtium and geraniums and alyssum and lobelia would scarcely hold their own. In some seasons which we have known in this region, when showers have been frequent all through the summer, a vase of such plants as are ordinarily used would do well, but such seasons are rare. Usually the plants will suffer for lack of water.

* * * * *

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Carnations in the House.

Every year I get a number of carnation plants and I take the
best of care of them, as good as I know how. At first they look
well, but in a short time they begin to turn yellow at the top
and the yellow keeps going down until it gets to the bottom
and they are dead. Other plants do well with me. What is the
trouble?

MRS. F. P. W.

_Highlandlake, Colo._

Carnations want a cool, moist air, and cannot adapt themselves to the high temperature and dry air of living rooms heated by coal in stoves or furnaces. To raise the plants one should have a conservatory off the living room, or at least an inclosed bay window.

Madeira Vine.

Will you kindly inform me through your “Letter Box” how to
treat a Madeira vine so it will produce blossoms? I have a vine
four years old, has never done very well until this winter, but
the foliage is beautiful and it seems strange that it does not
blossom. I have got it in a tin wash basin hung with strings
in the window, the sun shines on it from early in the morning
until three o’clock in the afternoon. It is trained out each
side of basin with strings and measures three feet across, and
hangs about one foot from the glass. I have trained it back and
forth from the basin to the curtain and it has locked itself
through the lace of the curtain. I want to know what I shall do
with it in the spring. I shall have to take down the curtain,
and will it injure the vine to cut it? I have been told that I
ought to clip this winter’s growth in the spring. I should like
to know why it does not blossom. Please let me know and confer
a favor.

A CONSTANT READER.

_Baldwinsville, N. Y._

The Madeira vine is so easily raised it is not necessary to be particularly careful of a plant which has already fulfilled its mission. The atmospheric and root conditions under house culture are not favorable to the blooming of this plant. If the tubers are placed in a rich, warm soil early in spring the plant will make a great growth and bloom in autumn. When the particular plant in question is to be moved, in the spring, a portion of its top growth can be cut away and then the whole plant slipped out of the pan into the open ground outside.

* * * * *

A FARM OF FOWLS.

In the whole West there’s not to be found another such collection of fancy poultry as that of C. C. Shoemaker, Freeport, Ill. He invites correspondence or a visit. It is said that Mr. Shoemaker’s business has trebled itself every year since he began business.

* * * * *

How He Got the Best of Hard Times.

Mrs. Jones wanted an Organ and as Mr. Jones was one of those good husbands he wanted to please his wife, but in this case with the hard times staring him in the face he did not see how he could spare the money. Anyway he thought he would see what he could do with the dealers and agents in his neighboring town, but after looking over their stock he found the cheapest Organ he could get would cost him $65.00, and it didn’t amount to much at that.

This was more than Mr. Jones could afford and he told his wife so. Although a great disappointment to them both, they decided they would have to give up the idea.

A few days after this, Mr. Jones in looking over Vick’s Magazine saw the advertisement of the “Beethoven Piano and Organ Co.,” of Washington, N. J., stating that they sold a first-class Organ for only $27.50, with stool and book. He sent for their catalogue which they send free to all who write.

Mr. Jones now has the organ in his parlor, for which he paid $27.50, and says it is even better than the agents offered him at $65.00.

He beat the hard times by purchasing direct from the factory, thus saving the profits of the dealers and agents.

The Company offers the same good bargains on Pianos.

Mildew on Cucumber Vines.

Is there anything that will kill mildew on cucumber vines in a
forcing house without injuring the vines?

A. L. B.

Try sulphide of potash. Dissolve one ounce in four gallons of water and syringe the affected plants with it. It will probably destroy the mildew and not injure the plants.

Moles.

Can you tell me in your “Letter Box” how to get rid of moles?
We are very much annoyed by them and find a trap perfectly
worthless.