every lady of the family.
She referred to the earlier flowers of summer especially--the crocus,
snow-drop, lily of the valley, tulips. Next to these came the annuals;
with little trouble these could be had for months. The wild flowers of
the prairies were spoken of, and she suggested that we should obtain
seed of the flowers and raise such as we wish. The paper was a good one
and was well received. Mr. Baller, a florist of Bloomington, said that
of late the demand for plants had fallen off. The reason given was that
there was an increased general knowledge among the people. At the
present, the chief demands are for hot-house, cut flowers, and
monthlies. The reason given for the falling off of the demand for plants
was the fact that plants were more easily raised since the introduction
of base-burners. This, he thought, could be still further increased by
having a double sash, and the building of bay windows on the south and
east of the houses. He reported, however, that there was still a good
market for hot-house flowers among the rich for decorating purposes,
funerals, etc.

THE PRAIRIE FARMER will, from time to time, consider other
papers and discussions at this meeting, for there was much more of
interest said and done than can be condensed into a simple running
report. We advise farmers to send one dollar to the Secretary and
receive therefor a copy of the Transactions when issued.

A SHORT SERMON ON A LONG TEXT.

The text will be found in Leviticus 16: 21-22-23; but whether its
application can be found is uncertain. Horticulturists are prone to find
scape-goats to carry their sins of omission and commission; and they
load these--a great burden--upon them, and send them off to be lost in
the wilderness. Providence is most usually chosen by them for this
purpose. Most of their mistakes and failures--sins, let us call
them--are ascribed to Providence; and He is expected to carry the
burden. But I strongly urge they remain our own after all.

I am led to these conclusions by the fact that among the many failures
in fruit culture there are some splendid successes; and that these
successes occur with those, as a rule, who are guiltless of these sins;
and that just in proportion to the magnitude of the guilt is the success
insured. In other words--that almost invariably are our failures to be
attributed to our own want of skill and our neglect--most generally the
latter. Here and there we note cases of marked