e they are the
universal hardy pink, alike of the gardens of great estates and the
brick-edged cottage border.

These are the carnations of Mrs. Marchant's garden that filled you with
such admiration, and also awoke the spirit of emulation. Lavinia
Cortright was correct in associating them with the lavish bloom of the
gardens of Hampton Court, for if anything could make me permanently
unpatriotic (which is impossible), it would be the roses and picotee
pinks of the dear old stupid (human middle-class, and cold
bedroom-wise), but florally adorable mother country!

The method by which you may possess yourself of these crowning flowers
of the garden, for _coro_nations is one of the words from which
_car_nation is supposed but to be derived, is as follows:--

Be sure of your seed. Not long ago it was necessary to import it direct,
but not now. You may buy from the oldest of American seed houses fifty
varieties of carnations and picotees, in separate packets, for three
dollars, or twenty-five sorts for one dollar and seventy-five cents, or
twelve (enough for a novice) for one dollar, the same being undoubtedly
English or Holland grown, while a good English house asks five
shillings, or a dollar and a quarter, for a single packet of mixed
varieties!

Moral--it is not necessary that "made in England" should be stamped upon
flower seeds to prove them of English origin!

If you can spare hotbed room, the seeds may be sown in April, like the
early Margarets, and transplanted into some inconspicuous part of the
vegetable garden, where the soil is deep and firm and there is a free
circulation of air (not between tall peas and sweet corn), as for the
first summer these pinks have no ornamental value, other than the
pleasurable spectacle made by a healthy plant of any kind, by virtue of
its future promise. Before frost or not later than the second week in
October the pinks should be put in long, narrow boxes or pots
sufficiently large to hold all the roots comfortably, but with little
space to spare, watered, and partly shaded, until they have recovered
themselves, when they should be set in the lightest part of the cold
pit. During the winter months they should have only enough water to keep
the earth from going to dust, and as much light and air as possible
without absolutely freezing hard, after the manner of treating lemon
verbenas, geraniums, and wall-flowers.

By the middle of April they may be planted in the bed where t