Gardening for the Ignorant

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1912. Excerpt: ... CHAPTER XIII GREENHOUSE Who loves a garden, loves a greenhouse too, Unconscious of a less propitious clime, There blooms exotic beauty, warm and snug, While the winds whistle and the snows descend. The spiry Myrtle with unwithering leaf Shines there and flourishes. The Golden Boast Of Portugal and Western India there, The ruddier Orange and the paler Lime, Peep through their polish'd foliage at the storm, And seem to smile at what they need not fear. The Ainomum there with intermingling flowers And cherries hangs her twigs. Geranium boasts Her crimson honours, and the spangled Bean, Ficoides, glitters bright the winter long. All plants, of every leaf that can endure The winter's frown if screen'd from its shrewd bite, Live there and prosper.--Cowper. I CAN find nothing in verse or prose that so well describes one's feelings, on entering a well-filled greenhouse next a room on a cold winter's day. It is so true, the plants seem to smile on what they need not fear, and one goes back to one's writing or reading refreshed by the warm smell of a greenhouse. What Cowper calls Ficoides, must, I think, mean one of the nearly hardy Mesembryanthemums, the seed vessels of which look like young green figs. All the Mesembryanthemums are nearly hardy, and are easy to grow and look well on a high shelf and hanging from their pots; they come from South Africa, but flourish and are quite hardy in the Scilly Islands. As a greenhouse is not essential to a garden, we have not put the little we want to say for those who have one into the monthly chapters. The interest of a greenhouse entirely depends on its having as much variety, the whole year round, as the garden has during the nine months of flower. For those who have no glass, many of the plants can be grown succes...