a _tour de valse_. The gentleman seats his lady upon a chair in the
middle of the room, and presents her with a small mirror. The leader
then selects a gentleman from the circle, and conducts him behind her
chair. The lady looks in the mirror, and if she decline the partner
offered, by turning the mirror over or shaking her head, the leader
continues to offer partners until the lady accepts. The gentlemen
refused return to their seats, or select partners and join in the
_valse_.
_Le Cavalier Trompé_ is another favorite figure. Five or six couples
perform a _tour de valse_. They afterward place themselves in ranks
of two, one couple behind the other. The lady of the first gentleman
leaves him, and seeks a gentleman of another column. While this is
going on, the first gentleman must not look behind him. The first
lady and the gentleman whom she has selected separate and advance on
tiptoe on each side of the column, in order to deceive the gentleman
at the head, and endeavor to join each other for a waltz. If the first
gentleman is fortunate enough to seize his lady, he leads off in a
waltz. If not, he must remain at his post until he is able to take a
lady. The last gentleman remaining dances with the last lady.
_Les Chaînes Continues_ is another good figure. The first four couples
perform a _tour de valse_. Each gentleman chooses a lady, and each lady
a gentleman. The gentlemen place themselves in line, and the ladies
form a line opposite. The first gentleman on the left gives his right
hand to the right hand of his lady, and turns entirely around with
her. He gives his left hand to the left hand of the next lady, while
his lady does the same with the next gentleman. The gentleman and lady
again meet, and turn with right hands, and then turn with left hands
the third lady and gentleman, and so on to the last couple. As soon
as the leader and his lady reach the fourth couple, the second couple
should start, so that there may be a continuous chain between the
ladies and gentlemen. When all have regained their original places in
line, they terminate the figure by a _tour de valse_.
A very pretty figure, and easily furnished, is called _Les Drapeaux_.
Five or six duplicate sets of small flags of national or fancy devices
must be in readiness. The leader takes a flag of each pattern, and his
lady the duplicates; they perform a _tour de valse_. The conductor then
presents his flags to five or six ladies, and his lady presents the
corresponding flags to as many gentlemen. The gentlemen then seek the
ladies having the duplicates, and with them perform a _tour de valse_,
waving the flags as they dance. Repeated by all the couples.
Another of the favorite combinations is _Les Rubans_. Six ribbons, each
about a yard in length, and of various colors, are attached to one end
of a stick about twenty-four inches in length; also a duplicate set of
ribbons, attached to another stick, must be in readiness. The first
couple perform a _tour de valse_, and then separate. The gentleman
takes one set of ribbons, and stops successively in front of the ladies
whom he desires to select to take part in the figure. Each of these
ladies rises, and takes hold of the loose end of a ribbon. The first
lady takes the other set of ribbons, bringing forward six gentlemen
in the same manner. The first couple conduct the ladies and gentlemen
toward each other, and each gentleman dances with the lady holding
the ribbon duplicate of his own. The first gentleman dances with his
partner. The figure is repeated by the other couples in their order.
To give a German, a lady should have all the furniture removed from her
parlors, a crash spread over the carpet, and a set of folding-chairs
introduced for the couples to sit in. The great trouble of this
proceeding is what has led to the giving of Germans, in large cities,
at private balls or in public places. It is considered that all taking
part in a German are formally introduced, and upon no condition
whatever must a lady, so long as she remains in the German, refuse to
dance with any gentleman whom she may chance to receive as a partner.
Every American must learn that he should speak to every one whom he
meets in a friend’s house, if necessary, without an introduction, as
the friend’s house _is_ an introduction. So in the German, the very
fact that _guests are there_ is an introduction.
In taking a review of the German we may as well say that, in a country
house, the making of the favors is a very pretty amusement. The ribbons
are easily bought at the village store. The same gold-paper and tinsel
which furnishes forth the private theatricals will do for the orders
and insignia, and the prettiest bouquets come from the garden. These
hastily-improvised home Germans are very amusing and very pretty.
The laws of the German are, however, so strict, and so tiresome
occasionally, that a good many parties have abjured it, and now dance
some of its figures without a leader, and as sporadic attempts. A
leader for the German needs many of the same qualities as the leader
of an army. He must have a comprehensive glance, a quick ear and
eye, and a very great belief in himself. He must have the talent of
command, and make himself seen and felt. He must be full of resource
and quick-witted. With all these qualities he must have tact. It is no
easy matter to get two hundred dancers into all sorts of combinations,
to get them out of it, to offend nobody, but to produce that elegant
kaleidoscope which we call “the German.”
The term _tour de valse_ is used technically, meaning that the couple
or couples performing it will execute the round dance designated by
the leader once around the room. Should the room be small, they make
a second tour. After the introductory _tour de valse_, care must be
taken by those who perform it not to select ladies and gentlemen from
each other, but from among those who are seated. When the leader claps
his hands to warn those who are prolonging the _valse_, they must
immediately cease dancing.
The religious objection to dancing having almost died out, we recommend
all parents to have their children taught to dance. It is a necessary
thing toward physical culture. It is the most embarrassing thing
for a man later in life to find himself without the grace which
dancing brings. Nothing contributes so much to Home Amusement as the
informal dance. Nothing can be more innocent. If, in after-life, this
accomplishment leads to late hours and to reckless love of pleasure, we
must remember that all good things can be abused.
XIII.
GARDENS AND FLOWER-STANDS.
The making of gardens is decidedly and judiciously conceded to be a
Home Amusement, and it is a pity that the new fashion of bedding-out
plants, which is so beautiful in our public parks and in the pleasure
grounds of the rich, should have seemed to so utterly do away with a
taste for the old-fashioned gardens of early English poetry--of Miss
Mitford, of every sweet New England dame of the early days, who had
her garden, with its “pretty posies,” and its bed of sweet marjoram,
lavender, and sage. It is, however, a hopeful sign to see in remote
country towns some effort to keep up the old-fashioned idea of a pretty
flower-plot, and there are always women who have the gift of making
flowers “blow” and grow in a quiet way.
Yet science can help to bring the old-fashioned garden to perfection,
as well as to make those artificial beds of many-leaved coleus,
and steadier groups. Every garden design, every project of garden
furnishing, and every item of garden work, should be governed by this
consideration, that it is hard work to fight against Nature, and there
is seldom thus a conquest worth obtaining. Aim modestly to gain a
victory over the easily-cultivated native flowers at first, and you
will secure enjoyment.
Fortunately, if gardening is pursued with earnestness, every soil and
every climate will be found to produce some flowers in rare beauty
and in unexpected luxuriance. Geometric plans, if well carried out,
are very pretty, and the amateur gardener should learn to mass her
geraniums, petunias, and pansies, her gladioli, roses, marigolds, and
poppies, so as to give a good and really splendid result of color.
Nature takes care to send us delicate, pale yellows and lilacs in
Spring in her sweet daffy-down-dilly, and the elegant _fleurs-de-lis_;
and the peonies come on mildly with pink and white before they dash
into red. Then come the Turkish carpets of the portulaca, and so on
until midsummer blazes with poppies, gladioli, and all the gorgeous
zinnias. These may all be found in the commonest garden, without
mentioning the larkspur, the mignonette, the petunia and the sweet-pea,
and a thousand other charming common flowers. The delightful flowers
which sow themselves, and those hardy bulbs, the crocus, tulip, lily
of the valley, snowdrop, and hyacinth, should not be neglected. A
quantity of white-lily bulbs stowed away in the garden reward one
year after year with their elegant flowers and fragrance at no cost
whatever. Pansies, daisies, and polyanthus keep from season to season,
and carnation pinks need to be two years old before they will blossom,
while the chrysanthemums make the garden gay in October.
Now for borders to the garden beds. Common grass is the best and
easiest, as the gardener’s boy can cut it with a sickle each week
and keep it from spreading. Or the little, cheap mosses make a
pretty border, as does the periwinkle, which looks so like myrtle.
To attempt a border of the gorgeous coleus requires a hothouse and
an accomplished gardener. In the common large country garden rows of
hollyhocks, as against a stone wall, or marking out the long walks,
are most ornamental. Dahlias also are very good in groups. Phlox,
that much-abused plant, is also pretty in masses. Asters too, of many
varieties, delight the eye, and are easy of culture. In trying to raise
shrubs, why not take the American wild pink, or azalea, the laurel and
the rhododendron, and, by studying up their habits, capture them?
The best soil for the rhododendron is a peat containing much sand and
much vegetable fiber. Any clean, pulverized product of vegetable decay
will like them. It is their native food. The laurel is capricious,
and resents the act of transplantation; but they will flourish if
planted thick enough. They love company, and thrive in it. The best
way to treat them is to study their quality, and to give them the same
conditions which made them grow so luxuriantly on the hill-side.
But if even these plants resist you, every lady loves a rosarium, and
it will go hard with her but she has a rose garden somewhere. The
gardeners now sell one hundred rose roots for a dollar, at Rochester,
and if planted out and attended to they give a million of dollars in
pleasure back again.
Some ladies understand budding, and this is a very interesting process.
In this way an army of sweetbriers can be covered with yellow Marshal
Neills and royal Jacqueminots. To propagate by layers is, however, the
easiest way, if, indeed, one does not prefer to buy them all started.
For garden roses we need vigorous growers that are sure to flower
freely, and will contribute to the gayety of the garden. One of the
best--the old-fashioned damask--if set out well, will blossom for
thirty years. A very effective garden of roses is produced by roses
pegged down. A deep, rather rich, loamy soil is to be prepared, the
position selected being rather open. When the plants are about a foot
high peg down the strongest growths. The rose prefers a firm soil.
Those who desire to have firm blooms the second season must cut off a
few inches of the flowering wood as soon as the first bloom is over,
and give the beds a thorough soaking of manure or sewage-water every
third or fourth day. But in this, as in every sort of cultivation of
an especial flower, one should buy an especial treatise on the subject.
Every lady gardener is troubled by insect pests--the horrid green
canker-worm, the little green louse, the potato-bug; these are
everywhere. One fights them with all sorts of powders and all sorts of
syringes. One very simple cure is not generally known. It is to plant
a lettuce beside your rose; the vermin prefers the lettuce. It is the
same principle which induced the rich owner of a wine-cellar to put
a barrel of whisky beside his best Madeira; the whisky went, but the
Madeira stayed. Dirty flower-pots, filled with dry moss, put in the
neighborhood, will catch large numbers of these gentry, for vermin are
fond of dirt. Dusting with powdered lime, or sulphurized tobacco-dust,
will kill the insects which destroy the asters. Lettuces also save the
asters, and a bed of green lettuce is not an ugly “bedding-out” plant.
No manure is so good as that common rotted vegetation of the forest.
Bring a pailful home from every drive, and it will make your flowers
grow. Nothing, also, so good as this for that lovely flower, the pansy,
which thus recalls its early start in the forest, The pansy does not
require much water, but in very hot, dry weather the beds should be
sprinkled at night with a watering-pot.
But these few directions may seem impertinent, as every lady has now
the most ample means of reading up about her garden. The cultivation
of a few flowers in the house--window gardening--is by far the more
essentially a Home Amusement. And, as almost everybody has once bought
a lot of greenhouse plants but to see them fade before her eyes, we
recommend to all to either raise a slip from the root or to start very
young plants in a dark room. Thus accustomed to the atmosphere of the
house they are to live in, they do sometimes live.
The hardier roses, the calla-lily, all the geraniums (useful dear
creatures), the violets and the pinks, grow well in the house. Hanging
pots of calceolarias and healthy primroses are also possible. Some
ladies can raise azaleas at home, but they are difficult. Then there
is the kangaroo-vine, and the Jerusalem, and all the other very hardy
vines. If a large ivy-vine can he induced to grow over a picture-frame,
it is a beautiful friend in midwinter.
Then come the delightful hanging baskets, the Wardian fern-cases,
the ornamental stands of pot-plants, and the indoor box of earth for
planting rice and grass seed, the wild flowers, which now have become
exotics, and all the pretty fancies of throwing seed over a wet sponge.
Anything green in winter looks lovely. Nothing more charming than the
branches of nasturtion growing in water can be imagined. They grow
and flower all winter, and the blue convolvulus flourishes well in a
hanging basket; so do the common morning-glory and the scarlet bean,
both delightful, airy visitors at Christmas.
A wire-work ox-muzzle, filled with moss, makes an admirable basket.
It should be painted dark green, and hang over a box of growing
flowers, so that it can drip when watered and hurt nothing. Put in
the ivy-leaved geranium to drop over its edges; fuchsia, variegated
geranium, bright blue lobelia, and the healthful dracænas, begonias,
and sedums also make a very pretty combination. The gardeners give you
wooden baskets filled with flowers, and ivy, and ferns, but it is Home
Amusement to make these baskets yourself.
Fern-cases are delightful as winter friends. Wardian cases can be
made very cheaply, and their perpetual condensation and shower is
a very pretty study in physics. A large case, in which large-sized
ferns can be accommodated, is best. As regards cultivation, the first
thing that demands attention is the drainage of the case; for, if that
is defective, neither ferns nor any other plants can be cultivated
successfully. In order to secure good drainage the case should be
fitted with a false bottom, into which the water may drain through
perforated zinc or iron, on which the rock-work and little bank for
the ferns should be placed. The false bottom, being a little kind of
tank or drainer, should be perfectly water-tight, so as to protect the
carpet, and should have a tap fixed in one corner of it, by means of
which the surplus water should be drained off.
To be able to give free ventilation to the plants every morning is
another essential point, as a stagnant atmosphere is as injurious to
plants as it is to young children. Over the perforated tray of the
case a good layer of broken pottery should be laid, and this should be
covered with cocoanut fiber, on which the rock-work should be laid.
The space in which it is intended that the ferns are to grow should
then be filled in; and nothing is better than peat, rotten turf, and
sharp grit sand as a soil for ferns. In the parts of the case intended
for the planting of rather strong-growing ferns a larger proportion
of rotten turf should be mixed with the peat than in those intended
for less robust varieties. The _adiantum pedatum_ (maidenhair),
_capillus veneris_, _pteris tessulata_, _eretica_, _albo lineata_,
_polypodium vulgare_, _acrophorus chairophyllus_, _hispidus anemia
adiantifolia_, _asplenium striatum_, _bulbiferum_, with _trichomanes_
and _lelazinellas_, are all useful, pretty ferns for these cases. If
the fern-case be large, it might be advisable to have an arch reaching
from end to end.
But any intelligent gardener will tell more in an hour than we
could do in a week on the subject of ferns. Many ladies delight in
selecting these lovely aristocrats of the forest themselves. They
find no difficulty in arranging a little family of native ferns in an
improvised Ward’s case; and this pursuit, as a reason for a woodland
ramble and a subsequent fit of industry on the back piazza, is one
which has no end as a Home Amusement.
Plant-stands for halls are very favorite decorations nowadays; but, of
course, the plants must be hardy, as they will be subject to sudden
changes of temperature. One lady made a fine effect by cultivating
young pine-trees, spruces, and firs in the large stone jars of her
hall. Cocoanut palms or India-rubber plants are the favorite exotics.
Hardy ferns group in well for these hall plant-stands. In the bottom
of each jar should be placed some broken pottery, for drainage, placed
so that the moisture will drain down through the fragments without the
soil choking the jar. Over the potsherds a little cocoanut moss should
be placed, and then a mixture of leaf-mold, rotten turf and peat,
and glass-maker’s sand, to keep the whole porous. On the surface of
the pots and between them should be put wood moss, as in the case of
stands for sitting-rooms. A common seed-pan, filled with _selaginalla
denticulata_ dropped into a small vase, has a fine effect; long sprays
grow out over the sides of the vase and drop down eight to ten inches.
In an ordinary apartment, where the window-sills are not wide enough
to hold flower-pots, the plan of wire stands is an admirable one for
the window gardener. A piece of oil-cloth under the stand catches
all the drippings, and a servant-girl with a wiping-towel can clean
up all the _débris_. Soft-wooded plants and those with soft leaves
should be arranged as near the window as possible; and if rearranged
and turned against the light often, so much the better. Hard-leaved
plants, like ivy and the India-rubber plant, may be put anywhere away
from the light. But most plants need light before anything. The _yucca
quadricolor_, so much used in the decorative house-jars or vases,
becomes beautifully tinted with crimson if it has enough light. Now,
if a lady has not room for many rustic _jardinières_ and ornamental
flower-stands in her room, she can have zinc-pans and pots, neatly
enameled and painted, set on the floor, in which her larger plants
may be put out, This is a very good idea for grouping; for she thus
produces in her _tout ensemble_ some of the wild confusion and grace of
Nature.
A climbing rose should go scattering itself over an imperceptible wire
trellis. A geranium should steadily blossom beneath. A group of yucca,
agave, dracæna, Jerusalem cherry, should form a distinct and effective
grouping below. And then beautiful trailing plants should drop from
hanging baskets, and from every “coigne of vantage.” Ivy grows well
in the shade, and may be employed for trailing around sofas, couches,
_tête-à-tête_ chairs, and picture-frames. Ladies sometimes tie a
bottle of water behind a picture-frame, and allow the long shoots of
nasturtion to grow out as if from the wall. The effect is startling.
Mirrors are often cunningly placed behind a flowering plant which is
growing in a hanging basket against the wall, thus doubling the effect.
As the days grow shorter, and the winter threatens to come upon us
apace, we are always tempted to bring in from the garden the flowers
that we think will last. Just before the fatal frosts, roots of
mignonette should be planted in pots and put in a dark closet for a few
days, where the plant takes root and accommodates itself to its change
of base. It will make a room sweet all winter.
A lady can make all sorts of ornamental flower-pot coverings, and
herself arrange pretty leather and paper standard covers for the ugly
but useful flower-pot of commerce; or she can buy at most country
potteries some very artistic flower-pots--also useful. And to put
red, green, and blue glass tubes for hyacinths among these gives her
window a very pretty effect. The very study of color in these minor
matters adds much to her window garden. It is lucky for all lovers of
beauty that beauty is now cheap. Art is putting her slender foot down
everywhere; and it is almost possible, in a remote country village, to
get the delicate classic shapes in cheap pottery which the cultivated
Greeks imagined three thousand years ago.
For internal decoration by means of cut flowers, it seems almost absurd
to attempt to delineate the proper thing to do; for, if a lady has
taste, she will know without being told. But some few hints may not
appear impertinent.
For the breakfast-table and dinner-table fresh flowers are almost
indispensable. The pretty, cheap, and useful combinations of glass
and silver, of china and pottery, which are made to hold flowers, are
innumerable. Select a high vase, and fill it every day with fresh
grasses, a few daisies, or some graceful ferns combined with white
lilies, and you have always a superb center-piece.
For the summer, a large lump of ice covered with flowers, in a silver
or glass dish, is delightfully refreshing. It also keeps away the
flies. In grand party decorations ice is now freely used, and if
some way can be devised to get the refuse water out of the way, it
will be always a good thing for a country party or at a grand _fête_
at Newport. For great blocks of ice covered with vines and flowers,
lighted from behind, have a splendid effect. They cool the air and keep
all the flowers fresh. Flowers, when cut, demand coolness; and the
effect of the white crystal column is always beautiful.
Some ladies have a large tub put in the corner of the room, and the
pyramid of ice placed in that. Then the tub can be masked by moss,
branches of trees, evergreen, or any floral device, and the ice is
draped with garlands. At a _fête_ at Newport, in 1879, this ice
decoration was much admired. At a ball given by the Prince of Wales
to the Czarina of Russia in the large conservatory of the Royal
Horticultural Society of South Kensington, ten tons of ice were used to
build an ornamental rockery. This was draped with drooping ferns and
graceful vines, and was surrounded with crimson baize and lighted from
behind.
Nothing is so pretty for the breakfast- or dinner-table as a tall,
slender vase which carries the floral decoration high up above the
articles of food. Nor is a garden necessary for this species of
decoration. Wild flowers, ferns, grasses, and all the beautiful
furniture of forest and field, make these vases doubly elegant.
In the rose season--in the sweet days of June--most country gardens
overflow with the always regal flower; and this is a table ornament of
the highest. The great, broad, low baskets are best for these full,
rich queens of color and fragrance. Mass your roses for the middle
of the table, and have specimen glasses for some of the more rare
varieties. The rose is a cleanly flower, and can be put anywhere near
food. But if an unlucky visitor has the rose-cold, then it must be put
far away; for the subtile, pungent odor of a rose makes the sufferer
sneeze fearfully. There are some families in which roses are thus
tabooed.