Every Boy's Book: A Complete Encyclopaedia of Sports and Amusements Part 115

In January, if the weather will permit, manure the ground, and dig the manure in. Plant out some strong early cabbage in warm situations: plant early kinds of Windsor beans. Sow peas, early Warwick, in drills two feet and a-half asunder; sow a first early crop of spinach; sow early radishes, and cover them with straw two inches thick, then uncover every mild day, and cover again in the evening. Plant in the flower border the various bulbs, such as snowdrops, crocuses, daffodils, jonquils, &c., and also their offsets. Plant also the hardy herbaceous plants, such as asters, golden rods, campanulas, Canterbury bells, &c. Keep gravel walks clean.

FEBRUARY.

Peas, beans, spinach, lettuce, carrots, parsnips, beet, &c., may now be sown; and in hotbeds cuc.u.mbers, small salading, melons, lettuce, &c.

Give air to plants under frames in the natural ground. Dig and prepare the compartments of beds and borders; sow many sorts of hardy annual flower seeds; the tender sorts in hotbeds, such as larkspurs, candy-tuft, yellow lupines, pansies, virgin stock, sweet scabious mignonette, ten-weeks stock, &c. And for edgings of border, plant box, thrift, daisies, parsley, strawberries, &c.

MARCH.

Still continue to prepare an appropriate ground by digging and manuring, sow again peas, beans, &c., if necessary, and especially a bed of turnips. Now is the time also to sow small herbs, as thyme, savory; you may also now plant various slips or cuttings of rosemary, rue, wormwood, and lavender. These should be the outward shoots produced last year, five or six inches long, and should be planted in a shady border, six inches apart. Now also may be sown nasturtiums, which may be sown in patches, dibbed in six inches apart, or in drills, near a rail or running fence. Potatoes may also be now planted in open weather. In planting them, take care to get the best sorts, and pick out some of the finest of a moderately large size, and then divide the tubers into two or three parts, leaving an eye or two to each; plant the pieces in rows about eighteen inches from each other, and about four inches deep. Now also is the time for pruning the various fruit trees, planting fresh sets of raspberries, strawberries, &c. In the flower garden the tender annuals are to be sown in hotbeds, such as c.o.c.ks...o...b.. balsam, china-aster, tobacco, convolvulus, &c. Ranunculuses, anemones, and the hardy annuals, may be sown in the open ground, and transplanting of all kinds of plants, shrubs, &c., may now be performed.

APRIL.

This is a transplanting month, particularly for cabbages and cauliflowers, all which should be now taken and put out for summer use.

Celery should also now be p.r.i.c.ked out. Continue to plant, if necessary, pot herbs and sweet herbs, such as rooted slips of balm, penny royal, and camomile. It is a good time also to plant out slips of mint from the roots; other crops of peas may also now be sown, as also a late crop of beans. Now also you may sow gourds and pumpkins in a frame. All pruning must be finished. Insects must be looked after on fruit trees. Vines may be laid down in layers; wall-fruit thinned; strawberry beds weeded, and kept very clean; new-budded and new-grafted trees well examined to see if the clay keeps close to the grafts. In the flower garden or borders some of the tender annuals may now be p.r.i.c.ked out, and some of the others sown in the frame, such as Prince's feather, capsic.u.m, love-apples, Indian corn, gourds, sweet balsam, marvel of Peru; stocks, and the hardy annuals, may now be sown in the open ground, as Adonis poppy, sweet peas, catch-fly, annual sunflower, larkspur, lupines, Venus's looking-gla.s.s. The best way to sow sweet peas is in pots, and protect them well from the birds, who will otherwise not leave one.

Inarching may now be performed on evergreens and other plants, which you may wish to propagate this way.

MAY.

Lettuces will now want tying up. Peas will require sticking. Do not tie your lettuces up too tightly, and when you stick your peas put in the stick in a slanting direction. Clear and thin carrots and parsnips, leaving the largest plants at least four inches from each other; thin also onions; plant out cauliflowers. Sow brocoli seeds for the crop to come in on the following winter and early spring. Sow and plant savoys; top the broad beans that are now in blossom, which will make the pods set sooner and swell faster. Plant the various kinds of French beans, such as the white speckled, in drills about three feet apart, and sow them thin. p.r.i.c.k out and plant celery; continue to sow radishes and small salading for daily use. Water new planted crops, and now let more than common care be taken to destroy weeds amongst crops of every kind; and now is the time for using your Dutch hoe freely among the rows of peas, beans, and spinach; but do not leave your weeds about in the drills or borders; clear all carefully away, and keep the garden clean and neat.

JUNE.

Look after your melons, pumpkins, gourds, and cuc.u.mbers, in frames; let them be well supplied with fresh air and water. To save cauliflower seed, mark some of the best and earliest plants, with the largest and whitest and closest flower heads, which should not be cut, but left to run to seed. Peas may still be sown, and French beans also, as may cabbage and colewort seed. Gather mint, balm, and other aromatic herbs, towards the end of this month, for drying. Examine any new planted trees, see that they are not too dry, and that they are well secured.

Water should be given to those that show any symptoms of flagging; water them well, but not frequently. Take care that your strawberry beds are also well watered. Hang up nets before early cherry-trees against walls, and over small trees, to protect them from the birds. Most of the tender annuals may be now finally planted out, and now is the time to take up the roots of tulips, crown imperials, jonquils, &c., and to take away the offsets. Continue to support with sticks all the tall growing flowering plants. Cut box-edgings, and regulate your flower borders, keeping your plants well watered if the weather should be very dry.

JULY.

You may now sow a batch of turnips for winter or autumn use, and also some carrot seed to raise young carrots for use later in the autumn.

Celery may be transplanted, winter spinach may be sown, lettuces may be planted out, coleworts may be sown. Gather your cuc.u.mbers as they appear, and gather all sorts of seeds as they ripen in dry weather, pulling up the stems with the seed where it can be done. Bring out the c.o.c.ks...o...b.., double balsams, and all other curious annuals kept till this time in frames. Transplant annuals into the borders. Lay carnations and sweetwilliams; propagate pinks by pipings; transplant perennial plants.

Take up bulbous roots, cut box-edgings, regulate your flower borders.

Plant cuttings and slips of succulent plants; s.h.i.+ft geraniums and other plants into larger pots, if necessary.

AUGUST.

Cauliflower seed must be sown between the 18th and the 24th. Celery should now be transplanted into trenches, and lettuce planted out. In the end of the month the dry flower stems of aromatic plants, such as hyssop, sage, lavender, should be cut down. Now look well out for various seeds as they ripen, which gather by cutting or pulling off the seed-stalks, then place them in the full sun against a hedge or wall to get them thoroughly dry. All flowers should now be carefully attended, and watered when necessary. The pink pipings should now be planted out in beds, and the seeds of many bulbous flowers, such as tulips, hyacinths, lilies, may be sown to obtain new varieties. Flower borders should occasionally be gone over with a sharp hoe, after which they should be raked over neatly, and all weeds and litter cleared away.

SEPTEMBER.

Lettuces may now be planted in frames, or in very warm borders, for winter use. Brocoli, cabbage and savoy plants may also be planted out, and young plants p.r.i.c.ked out into nursery beds. Celery should be earthed up, and you should tie up the leaves of endive to blanch the plants white. The spinach sown in August should be thinned and cleared out, and small salading should be sown once a-week or fortnight. Gather ripe seeds as before, and see that the birds do not devour them. Now is a good time to plant the strong runner plants into separate beds, and at about fifteen inches asunder either way. Towards the end of the month hyacinth and tulip roots may be planted, as well as any other bulbous root. Anemone and ranunculus seed may be sown, and perennial plants transplanted. Continue to keep the flower borders always very clean, and begin digging vacant beds and borders for future planting.

OCTOBER.

Now the apples and pears begin to ripen. Seeds are still to be looked for and preserved, vacant s.p.a.ces of ground are to be dug up and manured.

Fruit trees may now be transplanted, and currant and gooseberry-trees may be planted. Recollect that the currant-trees may be cut close down to the fruit buds, but the gooseberry only half way down the last year's wood. Cut out irregular growths and suckers, and keep them trained to a single stem below. Strawberry beds should this month have their winter dressing of manure, and all the runners cleared away close to the head of the main plants. Raspberry plants may be pruned, the old stems cut away, and the last year's suckers' stems selected for the next year's bearings, and each of them shortened one-third in height. In the flower-garden the borders should be nicely dressed, and all kinds of plants may be transplanted, or their roots divided, and bulbs not yet planted may be put into the earth. Plant all kinds of shrubs and evergreen trees.

NOVEMBER.

Now is the time for digging up potatoes, and taking up carrots, parsnips, onions, &c., and storing them for winter use. Winter spinach should be weeded, and the red beet-root dug up. Onions may be p.r.i.c.ked out to come in early in the spring. Trees may be pruned; all sorts of fruit trees and bulbous roots planted. Now tender plants should be removed to the pit or greenhouse.

DECEMBER.

Peas may be sown in a warm sheltered spot to come in early in the spring, as may Windsor and broad beans. Celery should be well earthed up, and all vacant ground manured, dug, or trenched. Secure the roots of newly planted trees from the frost by laying dungy litter round them, and the same may be done to the spots in which hyacinths, tulips, anemones, and ranunculuses are planted. Small young tender seedling flower plants also require care at this season. The borders may now be finally cleared and laid nice and smooth, the remainder of pot plants removed to the greenhouse or pit, which should be closed during the night, and only opened in fine mild weather; as the frost comes on place mats above the gla.s.s during the night, which should be removed in the morning. All leaves from trees, &c., should be collected in a pit for manure, free from sticks or stones, and the whole garden put into order for the frost.

MIMICRY AND VENTRILOQUISM.

"How can I become a ventriloquist?" is the frequent thought of a boy; and he is told, probably, that it is an exceptional faculty, and cannot possibly be acquired. This is not so; perseverance and practice are alone necessary to produce those wonderful results which never fail to captivate the public, if the student has a fair musical ear, and a talent for imitation which few boys are without. The deceptive nature of the sounds are the result of certain natural principles, which are called in to aid the experimenter. Those who have seen any professors of the ventriloquial art now living must have been struck by the apparent ease with which the effects are produced. This is not only the result of practice, but the careful attention to certain acoustic principles which regulate the direction of sounds. A sudden change in the direction of sound is oftentimes very perplexing to the ear, even when the eye can a.s.sist the other organs. The change of direction of the sound of a peal of bells, which is often interrupted by intervening buildings, is a familiar instance of this, their sound appearing to come from different places as the hearer changes his position. We can easily imagine that when the hearer is still, and the source of the sound moves, the deception becomes much greater, if skilfully applied to the purpose.

The first great secret is to take a full and deep inspiration, so that the lungs may be well filled, to be used as a Highlander uses the windbag of his bagpipes, as required. If we remember that the larynx, which is the cavity in the throat behind the tongue, is capable of considerable flexibility, as well as the trachea or windpipe, we have good materials for ventriloquial effect; thus the mouth and tongue have really, but not apparently, a great deal to do with the modifications of the a.s.sumed voice. A clever ventriloquist recommends the mouth to be kept closed, and the tongue rolled back, so as to regulate, as it were, the sound which is formed in the larynx. This may be done by strengthening the abdominal muscles; and it is probably from this being so frequently done, that the name of "belly-speaking" arose. The highest perfection of ventriloquism is speaking with the lips closed, and apparently without an effort of any kind. Some old and some modern professors had this marvellous power in perfection.

It has been recently observed that by constant practice the veil of the palate can be so exercised that it can be raised or depressed at will, so as to dilate or contract the inner nostrils. The effect of this contraction is the same as Mr. Hardy's rolled tongue; it m.u.f.fles, as it were, the sound, renders it weak and dull, as if coming from a distance.

On the other hand, if the nostrils are dilated to any extent, the sound gradually becomes apparently closer and closer, because it is more distinct.

The uncertainty of the direction of sound greatly aids the ventriloquist. If a man and a woman are placed at either end of a tolerably large room, and each imitates with tolerable success the voice of the other, the confusion between the eye and the ear is so great that it becomes next to impossible to know which it was that spoke. It is thus necessary that the ventriloquist should either by word or gesture direct the attention of his hearers to the spot from whence they expect the sound to proceed. Really, in practice, there is little difference between the sound of a m.u.f.fled voice, whether it is outside the door, above the ceiling, or down in the cellar. It is possible to acquire such a knowledge of the modifications of sound by distance, obstructions, or other causes, as to imitate them with wonderful accuracy. The late Mr.

Love used to carry on a dialogue with a person in a box, and by a masterly modulation of his voice he gave it a m.u.f.fled tone when he sat upon the box, and different degrees of sharpness as he gradually opened the lid.

The best practice is to begin with imitations only of different voices, until some progress is made. Then commence to practise the m.u.f.fled voice until the audience are satisfied that it is done tolerably well, for the operator cannot judge of the effect it is producing save by experience.

The voice may now be changed until the second voice is marked by some distinguis.h.i.+ng characteristic, such as ba.s.s, alto, gruff, or speaking.

Then the distant voice may be tried, to be modulated as before as success is attained.

A well-known ventriloquist used to make some excellent effects by speaking with a closed mouth when drawing an inspiration, instead of the usual method of speaking during the expiration of the breath.

We will suppose a ventriloquist about to give an ill.u.s.tration of his art. He first takes care that none of his audience are between the line of his mouth and the spot from which the sound appears to proceed. Thus the simplest cause of ventriloquial effect is produced by standing with your back to the audience and your face to the door. With closed jaws you direct a m.u.f.fled voice against the door. The sound which reaches the ears of the audience is a voice apparently outside the door, but in reality it is an echo of the artificial voice only. Take a simple example. You knock at the door, and in your natural voice you inquire if anyone is there. a.s.suming the m.u.f.fled tone, you say that "it's a friend," and then inquire his name and business. The answers being given, you slightly open the door and the corner of your lips at the same time, and then the voice loses its m.u.f.fled tone, and appears more distinct as it comes closer. The deception is more difficult to maintain, and the ventriloquist suddenly turns round and shows that the voice is in reality a mere shade.

If we try the ceiling voice, or the familiar "man on the roof," we should use the upper notes, and reserve the lower notes for the "man in the cellar." In either of these illusions the lips should not be opened at all. The modulation of tones should be managed in the larynx, by the action of the tongue only, unless the voice is supposed to come down the chimney into the room. In either case the mouth should be turned to the place from whence the sound is supposed to proceed; and when speaking in his natural tones, the performer should address himself directly to the audience; always using appropriate gestures to signify the ascent or descent of the owner of the fict.i.tious voice.

These two voices are in reality the only true ventriloquial voices. The variation of tone and accent depends more on the organs of imitation than on true ventriloquism, though when both arts are combined the effect is so much enhanced as to become perfectly marvellous. One of the simplest sounds to produce is that of the humming-bee, wasp, or bluebottle fly. The first sound is produced in the chest, the latter by the lips. It is always well to attempt to catch the insect after it has indicated its presence. This enables the sound to be raised in tone, and occasionally m.u.f.fled when the offending suppositious insect is inclosed in the handkerchief.

The imitation of a knife-grinder is easily done, the grinding being produced by a sharp hissing sound through the teeth, and the "buffing"

or polis.h.i.+ng, by gently closing the lips and drawing the breath through them until they vibrate--a not uncommon schoolboy accomplishment. The sawing of wood, the frying of a pancake, the uncorking of a bottle, and the gurgling noise of pouring out the liquid, may all be successfully imitated; but these are much less striking and ingenious than true ventriloquism.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

PUZZLES.

1. THE DIVIDED GARDEN.