For the benefit of those who can not command the usual appliances for hot-beds, I will say that they can be made so as to answer a good purpose very cheaply. Take a nice sunny spot that is covered with a sod, if to be had. Dig off the sod in squares and pile them carefully on the north side and the ends of the pit, to form the sides of the bed, with a proper slope. The soil thrown out from the bottom may be banked up against the sods as a protection. After the bed is finished, the whole may be covered with boards, to turn the water off. These answer in the place of glass frames. As the main use for a hot-bed is to secure bottom heat, very good results can be obtained in these cheaply constructed affairs. After the seeds are up, and when the weather will permit, the boards must be removed to give light and air--but replaced at night and before a rain. Of course, where large quantities of plants are to be grown, of tender as well as hardy sorts, it would be better and safer to go to the expense of board frames and glass for covering. DON'T DO IT. Of course, all the peach trees, and many of the other stone fruits, and most of the blackberry and raspberry plants, will show discoloration of wood when the spring opens--so much so that many will pronounce them destroyed, and will proceed to cut them away. Don't do it. Peaches have often been thus injured, and by judicious handling saved to bear crops for years afterward. But they will need to be thoroughly cut back. Trees of six or seven years old I have cut down so as to divest them of nearly all their heads, when those heads seemed badly killed, and had them throw out new heads, that made large growth and bore good crops the following season. Cut them back judiciously, and feed them well, but don't destroy them. And so with the berry plants. Wait and see, before you destroy. PEARS FROM RUSSIA. No one who reads Prof. Budd's articles on Russian Pears, can fail to be interested and struck with the prospect of future successful pear culture in the United States. It is highly probable that Russia is yet to give us a class of that fruit that will withstand the rigors of our climate. But how is this to be accomplished? Individual enterprise can, and doubtless will, accomplish much in that direction; but the object seems to me to be of sufficient importance to justify State or National action. The great State of Illinois might possibly add millions to her resources by giving material aid in the furtherance of this purpose--and a liberal expenditure by the General Government, through the Department of Agriculture, or the American Pomological Society, would be more usefully applied than many other large sums annually voted. At all events, another season of fruitage ought not to be allowed to pass without some concerted action for the purpose of testing the question.