Summer Meeting. 147 



from red to pink, and even an occasional white one. The fragrance, fresh 

 and sweet, fills the house and makes delicious the garden air, so that we 

 believe with Wordsworth, that every flower enjoys the air it breathes. 

 The brightness of the great pink bushes out in tiie sunshine and in con- 

 trast with the all-surrounding green of grass, and shrub, and tree, is 

 softened to another charm by the gentler light within the house. 



Speaking of the help of the green things, especially the grass, In 

 setting off the gay, or subduing the gorgeous coloring of our flowers, 

 brings to mind the remark of a loyal Missouri girl, who declared on 

 her return from California that she wouldn't give our grass for all the 

 flowers that great state could produce ; or, as the eloquent Kansan, John 

 J. Ingalls, put it, "It bears no blazonry of bloom to charm the senses 

 with fragrance or splendor, but its homely hue is more enchanting than 

 the lily or the rose." 



Once this season, between the snowballs and the roses, a bowl of 

 old-fashioned cinnamon pinks and the hardy phlox or Sweet William, 

 with wild violet leaves tucked in to break the solid line of the mass 

 and intensify the delicate tones of pink, this cluster of daintiness and 

 fragrance served us with sweetness and cheerfulness at each meal for 

 a week. It is a fact worth remembering, therefore, that these flowers are 

 not only perennial, returning to the same corner of the garden each year, 

 and each time more profusely, but they also last well when cut to brighten 

 your rooms. 



Of the trees which give us decorative blossoms none is more con- 

 spicuous than the catalpa, with its great, soft bouquets of white. The 

 chestnut is like a creation from the land of magic when hung with its 

 long, creamy fringes. Then there is the horse chestnut, covered with 

 bouquet-like clusters of creamy or pink-tinted blossoms similar to the 

 catalpa, only held more rigid and symmetrical, according to the pattern 

 of the close, trim tree. 



The shrub deutzia, which we have said combined so well with the 

 tall dark poppies, begins to blossom the last of May. The poppies come 

 from seed in the aforesaid bed of bulbous plants. They seed themselves 

 and come up year after year. You can have fame all over town for a 

 glorious shimmer of red poppies. As seen from the street, looking across 

 a stretch of plain lawn, the poppies flash and gleam against the back- 

 ground of the trees, the bushes and the evergreens. 



In the garden where the annuals grow, do not be frightened if you 

 are tardy in planting the seeds. It is as well not to put the seed babies in 

 a cold bed ; they grow faster if the earth blanket is already warmed. This 

 is not the expert's advice, but it is a pleasure to some of us to have 

 flowers without too many strenuous hours. And even in this comfortable 



