For the few pots and pans and boxes of cuttings and seedlings which you require, it is well worth while to get a small stock of good compost from a nursery gardener; leaf mould, peat, and sand, whether for seedlings or cuttings. Always _sink_ your pot in a second covering. Either have your pots sunk in a box of sand, which you can keep damp, or have small pots sunk in larger ones. A _great-coat_ to prevent evaporation, in some shape, is invaluable. Yours, &c., J.H.E. GARDEN-LORE. Every child who has gardening tools, Should learn by heart these gardening rules. He who owns a gardening spade, Should be able to dig the depth of its blade. He who owns a gardening hoe, Must be sure how he means his strokes to go. But he who owns a gardening fork, May make it do all the other tools' work. Though to shift, or to pot, or annex what you can, A trowel's the tool for child, woman, or man. 'Twas a bird that sits in the medlar-tree, Who sang these gardening saws to me. THE LITTLE GARDENER'S ALPHABET OF PROVERBS. AUTUMN-SOWN annuals flower soonest and strongest. What you sow in the spring, sow often and thin. BULBS bought early are best chosen. If you wish your tulips to wake up gay, They must all be in bed by Lord Mayor's Day. "Cut my leaves this year, and you won't cut my flowers next year," said the Daffodil to Tabitha Tidy. CUT a rose for your neighbour, and it will tell two buds to blossom for you. DON'T let me forget to pray for travellers when I thank Heaven I'm content to stay in my own garden. It is furnished from the ends of the earth. ENOUGH comes out of anybody's old garden in autumn, to stock a new one for somebody else. But you want sympathy on one side and sense on the other, and they are rarer than most perennials. FLOWERS are like gentlemen--"Best everywhere."[5] [Footnote 5: "Clowns are best in their own company, but gentlemen are best everywhere."--_Old Proverb._] GIVE Mother Earth plenty of food, and she'll give you plenty of flowers. HE who can keep what he gets, and multiply what he has got, should always buy the best kinds; and he who can do neither should buy none. IF nothing else accounts for it, ten to one there's a worm in the pot. JOBBING gardeners are sometimes neat, and if they leave their rubbish behind them, the hepaticas may turn up again. KNOWN sorts before new sorts, if your list has limits. LEAVE a bit behind you--for conscience's sake--if it's only _Polypodium Vulgaris_. MISCHIEF shows in the leaves, but lies at the root. NORTH borders are warmest in winter. OLD women's window-plants have guardian angels. PUSSY cats have nine lives and some pot-plants have more; but both do die of neglect. QUAINT, gay, sweet, and good for nosegays, is good enough for my garden. RUBBISH is rubbish when it lies about--compost when it's all of a heap--and food for flowers when it's dug in.