THE 



PL ORAL WORLD 



GARDEN GUIDE. 



June, 18G5. 

 LESS COLOUR AND MORE BEAUTY. 



EADEES of horticultural journals must 

 \be much amused sometimes at the various 

 aspects of the conflict which has been 

 carried ou for many years past between 

 the partisans of the old fashioned herba- 

 ceous border plants and the partisans of the 

 new race of " bedding plants." In one page 

 of a journal they see all the bedders denounced 

 ^ as " rubbish," in the next page, perhaps, there 

 ) are elaborate essays on combinations of colour, 

 ^or working out tasteful designs, and on the ar- 

 rangement of particular varieties, the whole so 

 spiced with enthusiasm as to lead to the conclu- 

 / sion that the writer is in favour of a complete abolition 

 of herbaceous plants, and would have none but " bed- 

 ders " grown, whether in the garden of the duke or of the ploughman. 

 Sometimes the representatives of the two classes come to high words, 

 and if we fail to gain information by listening to their respective 

 arguments, we are pretty sure to learn that there is as much room 

 for the display of ill-feeling and the development of ridiculous preju- 

 dices in horticulture as in all other pursuits. The wise man is never in 

 haste to join either party to a dispute ; he knows that in the majority 

 of cases each lias some amount of truth on his side, that it is indeed the 

 exaggeration of the importance of one truth, and the depreciation of 

 the importance, or perhaps the denial of another, that forms the founda- 

 tion of disputes in most cases, and impartial observation of the course 

 of the conflict will usually show that the truths to be finally accepted, 



VOL. VIII. — SO. VI. a 



