1886. Method of Covering a Bank of Earth With Grass

1886.    Method of Covering a Bank of Earth With Grass. To cover a steep bank quickly with grass the following method is recommended by a German Horticultural Association: For each square rod to be planted, take 1/2 pound lawn grass seed, and mix it intimately and thoroughly with about 6 solid feet of good dry garden earth and loam. This is placed in a tub, and to it liquid manure, diluted with about 2/3 of water, is added and well stirred in, so as to bring the whole to the consistency of mortar. The slope is to be cleaned off and made perfectly smooth, and then well watered, after which the paste just mentioned is to be applied with a trowel, and made as even and thin as possible. Should it crack by exposure to the air, it is to be again watered and smoothed up day by day, until the grass makes its appearance, which will be in 1 or 2 weeks, and the whole declivity will soon be covered by a close carpet of green.

1887. Substitute for Glass for Hot-Houses

1887.    Substitute for Glass for Hot-Houses. Apply, with a common painter's brush, boiled oil, or Canadian balsam, diluted with oil of turpentine, to the surface of white muslin previously stretched out and fastened in the position it is intended to occupy.

1888. To Preserve Potatoes and Other Roots

1888.  To Preserve Potatoes and Other Roots. These are preserved in different ways, according to the object in view. Tuberous roots, as those of the dahlia, paeonia, tuberose, etc., intended to be planted in the succeeding spring, are preserved through the winter in dry earth, in a temperature rather under than above what is natural to them. So may the bilbous roots of commerce, as hyacinths, tulips, onions, etc.; but, for convenience, these are kept either loose, in cool dry shelves or lofts, or the finer sorts in papers, till the season of planting. Roots of all kinds may be preserved in an ice-house till the return of the natural crop. After stuffing the interstices with straw, and covering the surface of the ice with the same material, place on it boxes, casks, baskets, etc., and fill them with turnips, carrots, beet roots, and, in particular, potatoes. By the cold of the place, vegetation is so much suspended that all these articles may be thus kept fresh and uninjured till they give place to another crop in its natural season.

1889. To Dry Roots

1889.    To Dry Roots. They should be rubbed in water to get rid of the dirt and also some of the mucous substance that would otherwise render them mouldy; the larger are then to be cut, split, or peeled, but in most aromatic roots, the odor residing in the bark, they must not be peeled; they are then to be spread on sieves or hurdles, and dried in a heat of about 120° Fahr., either on the top of an oven, in a stove, or a steam closet, taking care to shake them occasionally, to change the surface exposed to the air. Thick and juicy roots, as rhubarb, briony, peony, water-lily, etc., are cut in slices, strung upon a thread, and hung in a heat of about 90° to 100°. Squills are scaled, threaded, and dried around the pipe of a stove, or in a hot closet. Rhubarb should be washed, to separate that mucous principle which would otherwise render it black and soft when powdered. Potatoes are cut in slices and dried.