Part 13

Mention has been made of a few of our pot and medicinal plants. Here is a larger list for those who are interested in plants of this kind: balm, sweet basil, caraway, catnip, camomile, coriander, dill, pennyroyal, peppermint, saffron, tansy, and wormwood. Our grandmothers had unlimited faith in the medicinal qualities of some of these plants, and many a mother will be glad to know that she has a stock of some of them stored away for winter use when colds and coughs are prevalent among children or grown people. Some of the old home remedies are far preferable to those we are accustomed to using, as they are harmless, if they do no good, which is something that cannot be said of most drugs that are taken into the system.

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Don't wait for the currant-worm to show itself on your bushes. You can safely count on its coming. Act on the defensive in advance by spraying your plants thoroughly with an infusion of Nicoticide, keeping in mind the fact that it is easier to prevent an insect from establishing itself on your plants than it is to get rid of it when it has secured a foothold there. In spraying, be sure that the infusion gets to all parts of the bush. Throw it up well among the branches. Simply spraying it over the plant isn't what is needed. It must reach the under side of the foliage, and all parts where insects and other enemies might hide away and escape contact with the infusion used.

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When the small-fruit plants in your garden show evidence of having outlived their usefulness, don't try to renew them, but dig them up and plant new ones. You cannot make a satisfactory plant out of one that has begun to show age. It is a good plan to set a few new plants each season. If this is done there need be no gap in the fruit-supply, as there will always be some coming on to take the places of those whose days of usefulness are over. Too often we neglect our gardens until they are in such a debilitated condition that we get but slight returns from them, and then we set to work to make them all over, and in this way we fail to get as much out of them as we ought to. By planting something each season we keep them up to bearing-point, and have no "off seasons."

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I wonder how many housewives who may read this little book have ever dried sweet-corn for winter use. Not many, I think. But if they were to do so one season I am quite confident that thereafter they would not willingly be without a generous supply of it, for it will be found far more delicious than the ordinary canned article. In drying it, some cook it for a few minutes, and then cut it from the cob and spread it out on plates to dry. Others do not think it worth while to cook it, but cut it from the cob as soon as gathered, and dry it by first putting it in the oven for a few minutes before exposing it to the sun to dry. The little time in the oven is equivalent to the partial cooking spoken of. Turn it on the plates on which it is spread every day, and do not consider it dry enough to store away until it appears to have parted with all its moisture. Then put it into paper bags or glass jars, and set away in a cool, dark place to remain until you desire to use it. Soak it for two or three hours before putting it on the stove to cook. When properly cooked it will be tender and have a more delicious flavor than canned corn. The generous use of butter and cream will make it a dish that is fit to set before a king.

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Those who happen to live in places where it is not possible to have cellars, because of low ground, can have places in which to store vegetables for winter use that are really preferable to the ordinary cellar, by constructing what might be called above-ground pits, for want of a better name. Build up a wall four or five feet high, and bank up about it with so much earth that frost cannot penetrate it. Cover with a roof that will keep out cold and rain. Have a doorway opening into it from an entry built after the fashion of the little storm-vestibules we put over the front doors of our dwellings in winter. In other words, an entry into which we can step and close one door behind us before we open the one that lets us into the place where our vegetables are. Such a room can be constructed with but little expense. Because of its being above ground it will be drier than a cellar, and in the majority of cases it will be more convenient to get at. It should be boarded up with a good quality of matched boarding, and its walls should be lined with two or three thicknesses of sheathing paper put on in such a manner as to show no cracks or openings.

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The best place for a vegetable-garden is where the soil is naturally well drained and where there is a slope to the south. Such a slope enables it to get the full benefit of sunshine, and sunshine, it will be found, is an important factor in successful gardening. If such an exposure is out of the question, aim to make conditions as favorable as possible. A closely boarded fence on the north side of a garden affords excellent protection from cold winds early in the season, and helps greatly in keeping away frost in fall, when many plants are maturing.

Mention is made in the above paragraph of good drainage. This is quite important. If the soil of a garden is not well drained, many kinds of vegetables cannot be grown in it, and few will attain to even a partial degree of success. Therefore see to it that by ditching, or the use of tile, all surplus water is properly disposed of. Much good can be done to a heavy soil by adding to it sharp, coarse sand, old mortar--anything that will have a tendency to counteract the heaviness resulting from undue retention of water or a naturally too close character of soil. If sand is obtainable, and your garden is one in which clay predominates, use it in generous quantities. You will find it as beneficial as manure. Spread it over the surface before plowing or spading, and work it in thoroughly. A few seasons' application will bring about a very marked change for the better in any garden whose soil cannot be made fine and mellow without the addition of some disintegrating matter. Good drainage must be secured in order to grow good vegetables, and the use of tile will be found a most effective remedy for the evil of a soil unduly retentive of moisture.

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In almost all localities there will be families who have no garden, but who would make liberal use of vegetables if they were easily procurable. There is a chance for boys and girls to earn an "honest penny." If it is found that there is likely to be more in the home garden than the family can make use of, canvass the neighborhood for customers for the probable surplus. It will be found an easy matter to dispose of it. I know several amateur child gardeners who secure enough in this way to pay for all the seed they need. Some of them have regular customers each season, and gardening begins to look to them like a profitable occupation. I don't know that they will become professional gardeners, but they will be learning something as well as earning something while they are fitting themselves for whatever occupation in life they may decide on, and what they learn in the garden will be of benefit in after-life in more ways than one.

Don't neglect to save everything that can be made use of for fertilizing purposes. In many a home the "suds" of washing-day are disposed of as worthless. If applied to growing things in the garden they will often prove as beneficial as the application of a fertilizer that costs quite a little sum of money. Especially is this the case if the season happens to be a dry one. If there does not seem to be a need of more moisture in the soil on wash-day, save the soapy water against a time of need. It will be sure to "come handy" during the season.

Some families are so unfortunate as to have no cellar. Few vegetables can be kept well, or for a great length of time, in ordinary rooms, unless something is done to modify the conditions usually existing there. If a large box is filled with dry sand, potatoes, parsnips, salsify, beets, and carrots can be buried in it and made to retain their freshness for an indefinite period. Of course this storage-box should be kept as far as possible from artificial heat, and no dampness should be allowed to come in contact with it, as sand absorbs moisture almost as readily as a sponge, and the satisfactory keeping of the vegetables named depends upon dryness more than anything else. The lower the temperature of the place in which vegetables are stored the better, provided it never gets below the freezing-point. Where boxes of sand are used, slight freezings are not likely to seriously injure vegetables, as the sand extracts the frost so gradually that but little harm is done. But hard freezing must be guarded against or premature decay will result.

It is an excellent plan to bury some of the vegetables named above in a dry place in the garden, for use in spring. They will be found as fresh and crisp as when put into the ground, if covered deep enough to protect them from frost.

XII

HEALTH IN THE GARDEN. A CHAPTER EXPRESSLY FOR WOMEN READERS

The writer of this book often finds women who seem "all run down," without being able to tell of any positive physical ailment. Inquiry generally develops the fact that they have overworked; that they have been confined to the house the greater part of the time, busy with household matters, and that in caring for others they have neglected to care for themselves. Though I am not an M.D. I take the liberty of prescribing for patients of this class. My prescription is a course of treatment in the garden. I insist on their getting out of doors, where the air is pure, and the sunshine bright and warm, and Nature is waiting to give her pleasant companionship to whoever signifies a desire to make her acquaintance.

There is health in the garden. But because one has to dig for it some persons prefer to keep on enjoying their old miserableness day after day and year after year. These are the incurables--the "chronic" cases that one cannot expect to do much with or for. But those who are willing to exert themselves in an effort to get back the tone that life has lost to a considerable extent will find that work in the garden is a better tonic than our doctors have a record of in their pharmacopoeia.

The earth fairly tingles with life in spring, and by putting ourselves in contact with it we absorb some of this vitality. We breathe in the wine of a new life, and we thrill with a thousand sensations that can come only from putting ourselves in close touch with Nature. You can tell a woman who needs a change from indoors to outdoors that she ought to take more exercise, but if you advise walking the chances are that she won't walk much. That kind of exercise doesn't appeal to her, and to make whatever kind of exercise she takes effective it must be something that affords her pleasure--something that she enjoys more than she does doing things from a "sense of duty," or simply because she has been told to do it. What is needed is some form of exercise that has an object in it--a definite object, rather than the more or less abstract one of "regaining health."

Give her a few packages of seeds and arouse in her the enthusiasm to have a garden and she will get the very best kind of exercise out of her attempt to carry out the plan, and the "definite object"--in other words, the garden--that she has in mind will keep her so delightfully busy that she will forget all about the health-features of the undertaking until it dawns upon her with startling suddenness some fine day that she "has got her health back." How or when it came she cannot tell you. All she knows is that she feels like a new woman. After that there will be no necessity to repeat the prescription, for one year's half-way successful work in the garden fixes "the garden habit" for all time. Nothing else can afford so much pleasure and exercise in happy combination as gardening, or exert a greater fascination over the person who allows herself to come under its influence.

I cannot begin to tell you what wonderful and delightful things I have learned in the garden. It is like having the Book of Nature opened before you and being taught its lore by the book's own author. You see magical things taking place about you every day, and every day there are more of them, to set you thinking and wondering. You may work until you are tired, but you do not realize physical wear and tear because your mind has something else that it considers of greater importance to busy itself over. Only after the work of the day is done will you become conscious of physical weariness, and then it is that you find out what the luxury of rest is; to fully appreciate rest we must first understand what it is to be really tired.

Lassitude, ennui--these do not give us a knowledge of genuine tiredness, therefore we are not in a condition to receive the full benefit of that rest which means a reaction of the physical system until we have done some kind of work that makes reaction necessary in order to establish a normal equilibrium. The rest that comes after getting really tired is so full of delightful sensations that we admit to ourselves that it is richly worth the price we have to pay for it.

There is a subtle charm about garden work from its very beginning. The seed we sow has a mystery wrapped up in it. The processes of germination are as fascinating as a fairytale. The development of the tiny seedling is a source of constant wonder to us. We watch for the first bud with eager impatience, and it has to be on the alert if it succeeds in opening without our being on hand to observe the performance. Spring begins the story, summer carries it forward, and autumn seems to complete it, but there is always the promise of the retelling of the story another year to keep us interested from the end of one season to the coming of another. Garden work is a sort of thousand and one days' entertainment, in which the interest is continually kept up--always something to look forward to--always something new.

The woman who grows weary over the monotony of household duties, but cannot put them entirely aside, will find relaxation in the garden. The change will rest her. And the woman who has no household duties to claim her attention needs something to get interested in. Both will find the necessary stimulus in growing flowers.

But in order to do this it must not be "played at." Set about it because you mean to accomplish something. A week after you have begun in earnest you will find yourself looking forward impatiently to the hour that takes you out of doors. You will forget about the gloves that you probably provided yourself with at the outset. You won't be bothered with veils. Tan will have no terrors for you. You will look upon dirt as something pleasing because you begin to see the possibilities in it. You will go back to the house with an appetite that makes plain bread and butter delicious.