THE PI.ANT WORLD 161 



good judgment. We have not stopped to consider where next year's 

 flowers are coming from, or whether we did not owe it to others to let 

 them have the same pleasure of seeing them which we ourselves have 

 had. Love for flowers, like love for other things, must be trained. 

 "Still waters run deep," and, as a rule, those whose love for rare flowers 

 is deepest have the least to say regarding their whereabouts. If they 

 know where some rare fern or delicate orchid grows, they do not fill 

 their vases with the treasures, but jealously guard the secret, for they 

 know that if its haunts were made public extermination would soon 

 follow. 



True love for plants and their flowers will come only when we have 

 learned to know them in their native haunts and with their natural sur- 

 roundings. Under such conditions only do they manifest their greatest 

 charms. 



A bunch of arbutus denuded of all but two or three leaves, crowded 

 into a vase, or even spread out in a shallow dish, can never give the 

 pleasure that the same pink buds afford peeping from their cover of moss 

 and brown leaves, adding fragrance to the freshness of the spring air. 



Maidenhair ferns give as shortlived pleasure as any plant which 

 people persist in tearing from its native wood. The slender black stems 

 and pale green crescent resent being torn from the cool damp shade of 

 rocky wood and ravine to be placed in a hot dry room. 



We often see people coming from the woods or meadows with whole 

 armfuls of azaleas, laurel, ferns, lilies or even the showy lady's-slipper. 

 They have picked every one in sight, and having overcome and subdued 

 all the visible floral world, are sighing for more to conquer. These 

 same people returning the following season remark with astonishment, 

 " Strange, there were lots of them here last year." Nothing however 

 could be more reasonable. Little they think that, while delighting a few, 

 they are often robbing many of the greater pleasure which these same 

 flowers would have afforded in their natural conditions. True there are 

 many who are unable to go where some of our most beautiful flowers 

 grow ; but two or three blossoms would give them as much pleasure as 

 an armful, especially if they were accompanied with a description of the 

 spot where they were found. 



It is safe to say that the wholesale gatherer would as a rule be unable 

 to accurately describe the surroundings or even the flower itself. He 

 would probably say, " O, there were lots of them ; it was just white with 

 them and I picked all I could find." He would not have noticed the 

 delicate pink buds unfolding from the sheathing leaves of pale green ; 

 nor would he have thought of the wonderful construction of that inflated 

 lip, into which the busy bees were diving, performing for the plant a 

 task which this youth has rendered fruitless. 



