his next resource is the green-houses, cabinets, or chamber-stages, which he supplies by contract; and when he removes them from thence in their last stage of beauty, he sends them to a rout, where one night, in general, kills or half kills alike the best and worst of plants, and for which he gets the plant returned and half its price. In this way it is, that a public dealer can always afford to keep up a finer display of plants in a town green-house than any private gentleman whatever with a country villa. Some families who have no green-house, keep up a stock of plants in their rooms by purchasing at the nurseries, and at Covent-garden market; but this is done at greater expense than by contracting with a nurseryman, because the family can make no use of the plants when out of flower. When this mode is confined to annuals, such as mignionette, wall-flowers, sweet-peas, &c., or to bulbous roots, it does very well, as these, when they have done flowering, are of no use to any one.-Green-house Companion, Second Edition, p. 244, to which we refer for some excellent directions for the management of town green-houses.

Management of Plants in Chambers.

The management of plants in such situations can only be understood to apply to the short time in which they are kept there. This time should be as brief as possible, if it be intended that the plants should live and thrive afterwards. The only true way to have a fine display on the chamber-stage, is, never to bring the plants there till they are just coming into flower, and to remove them when the flowers first show indications of decay, unless the plant appears to be growing sickly before, which with heaths, geraniums, and camellias, is very often the case. During the time they are kept in the chamber, the surface of the pot should either be covered with fine, fresh moss or coarse sand, to lessen the evaporation from the moist earth of the pot, and to prevent the earth from caking

with the heat of the chamber: the water which passes through the bottom of the pot into the saucer should be instantly extracted with a sponge, to prevent evaporation, and none should be spilt on the leaves or the stage. As much air should be admitted, by opening the windows, as is consistent with the use of the room, and the stage should, in the daytime at least, be kept as near the windows as possible. It is not essential that the sun should shine on the plants, so as they have abundance of reflected light. It is almost needless to observe, that they should, before being brought there, be tied up, or otherwise arranged with the greatest neatness; and that, while in the chamber, all decayed or injured parts should be removed, and any dirt or dust carefully wiped off with a moistened sponge. When the plants are taken back to the green-house, a little extra heat and moisture will, in general, recover them.

Plants at routs require little management while there, but must be tastefully arranged individually by rods and threads, and well syringed, and also watered at the root. The soil should be covered with moss, and the pot either cleaned and painted in any appropriate body-colour, or chalked, or covered with coloured paper. An earthen brown, with black and grey lines, is among the most suitable colours, whether for the temporary painting, chalking, or papering. Where the plants are only to remain one night, they need not be set in saucers, but only on paper or small carpets of the size of the bottom of the pot; but where they are to decorate the apartments for two or three days in succession, they should be set in saucers on a little gravel, and over the gravel, the saucer filled brimful with moss or fine green turf. This looks well, and the space occupied by the gravel admits of giving the plants daily a little water, which greatly refreshes them in this state of trial. The arrangement of the plants in the rooms is various, and depends on the kind of

rout or entertainment. In common cases, they are placed in recesses and on side-tables, and near glasses which may reflect them; and a few choice specimens are scattered over the floor as single objects. But in more select entertainments, a proportionate attention is paid to their arrangement. During dinner, a few pots of fruit-bearing shrubs, or trees with their fruit ripe, are ranged along the centre of the table, from which, during the dessert, the fruit is gathered by the company. Sometimes a row of orange trees, or standard peach-trees, or cherries, or all of them, in fruit, surround the table of the guests; one plant being placed exactly behind each chair, leaving room for the servants to approach between. Sometimes only one tall, handsome tree is placed behind the master, and another behind the mistress; and sometimes only a few pots of lesser articles are placed on the side-board, or here and there round the room.

The drawing-room is sometimes laid out like an orange-grove, by distributing tall orange trees all over it in regular quincunx, so that the heads of the trees may be higher than those of the company: seats are also neatly made over the pots and boxes, to conceal them, and serve the purpose of chairs. One or two cages with nightingales and canary-birds are distributed among the branches; and where there is a want of real fruit, that is supplied by art. Sometimes also art supplies the entire tree, which, during artificial illumination, is hardly recognised as a work of art, and a very few real trees and flowers interspersed with these made ones, will keep up the odour and the illusion to nature. Sometimes large picture galleries are laid out in imitation of parks in the ancient or modern style, with avenues, or with groups and scattered trees. At masqued routs, caves and grottos are formed under conical stages, and covered with moss and pots of trees, in imitation of wooded hills. In short, there is no end to the arrangement of plants at routs: and the reader is not to suppose F f

that only real plants with roots are necessary for this purpose; for, provided a few of these be judiciously introduced, all the rest can be effected by branches of box, laurustinus, laurel, juniper, holly, &c., decorated with artificial flowers and fruits, and fitted to stems or trunks to answer either as trees or shrubs; and besides these, whole pine and fir trees, the spruce especially, can be cut over, and thus admirable groves formed in a short time. Artificial supplies of odour of the rose, the orange, or the jasmine, are readily procured. Much romantic splendour may be produced, in this way, with little expense of greenhouse plants.

Next to the common domestic flower-stage, and a handsome plant placed here and there in spare places in the lobby, hall, staircase, &c., are a few choice specimens of tall plants in fruit or flower, distributed in the drawing-room: the orange, the camellia, the acacia, and tree heaths, are well adapted for this purpose.-Green house Companion, Second Edition, p. 246.

Sea-Fowl.

M. Chateaubriand, speaking of sea-fowl, says they have places of rendezvous where you would imagine that they were deliberating in common on the affairs of their republic; it is, in general, a rock in the midst of the waves. We used often to sit in the island of St. Pierre', on the coast opposite an islet, called by the natives the Pigeon-House, on account of its form, and because they repair to it in spring for the purpose of seeking eggs. We passed whole days and nights in studying the manners of the inhabitants of this rock: the nights are full of the secrets of Providence.

At the entrance of the gulf of St. Laurence, on the coast of Newfoundland.

The multitude of birds that assemble at the PigeonHouse is so great, that we could frequently distinguish their cries amid the roaring of the most furious tempests. All these birds have extraordinary voices, resembling the sounds that issue from the sea: if the ocean has its Flora, it has likewise its Philomela, When the curlew whistles at sunset on the point of some rock, accompanied by the hollow roaring of the billows, which forms the bass to the concert, it produces one of the most melancholy harmonies that can possibly be conceived: never did the wife of Ceïx breathe forth such lamentations on the shores that witnessed her misfortunes. The best understanding prevailed in the republic of our birds. Immediately after the birth of a citizen, his mother precipitated him into the waves, like those barbarous nations who plunged their children into rivers to inure them to the fatigues of life. Couriers were incessantly despatched from this Tyre, with numerous attendants, who, by the command of Providence, dispersed over all the seas for the relief of the mariner. Some, stationed at the distance of forty or fifty leagues from an unknown land, serve as a certain indication to the pilot, who discovers them like corks floating on the waves; others settle on a reef, and in the night, these vigilant sentinels raise their doleful voices to warn the navigator to stand off; while others again, by the whiteness of their plumage, form real beacons upon the black surface of the rocks. It is for the same reason, we presume, that the beneficence of the Almighty has bestowed on the foam of the waves a phosphoric property, and has rendered it more luminous among breakers, in proportion to the violence of the tempest. How many vessels would perish amid the darkness, were it not for these miraculous beacons, kindled by Providence upon the rocks!

All the accidents of the seas, all the changes of calm and storm, are predicted by birds. The thrush