A lady correspondent of the Rural
World gives the following advice to those
who wish to enliven their sitting-rooms
with plants and flowers during winter:
If obliged to confine myself to one
class of plants for window culture, I
would select the flowering begouias. They
bear dry heat and occasional neglect as
well as any, and are not liable to the at
tacks of insects, while the number and
variety of species is large. Next to be
gonias I would place geraniums. Every
one knows how endless is the variety of
shades and forms of these beautiful flow
ers. Then the scented, the ivy-leated,
the trio colored —a charming array. One
can have a gay window without any flow
ers at all. The list of desirable plants is
almost endless. It comprises in addition
to the commonly called green-house plants
many bulbs, and not a few aunuals. I
should never recommend any one to at
tempt roses in a sitting-room, and yet I
know ladies who keep them in constant
bloom. A sunny kitchen window is just
the place for them, the steam from cook
ing furnishing the requisite moisture
without too great heat. Roses, earn a
tions, camellias, daphnes and many other
green house plants are apt not to bo suc
cessful.
If one has only a north window, train
an English ivy up each side and across
the top; set a sword fern in a hanging
basket, and on shelf below set Chinese
primroses. They are bvautifal plants,
with flowers single, double, or fringed,
white, or of shades ranging from palest
pink to deepest crimson, with a faint
woody fragrance, reminding one of shady
ravines, brooks, and moss covered stones.
