JANUARY 11, 190O. 



The Weekly Florists^ Review. 



155 



Flowering Shrubs. 



There is nothing more beautiful at 

 this time of the year than what are 

 generally called "Spring blossoms," 

 and considering how easily they are 

 forced the wonder is that we don't see 

 and use more of them. Anythiug out 

 of season is attractive, and these flow- 

 ers are very much appreciated in se- 

 lect circles. 



There's nothing specially new in the 

 material but there promises to be in 

 decorations exclusively of tbeni. Just 

 suppose that instead of your avenue 

 of palms or arbor of greens for a wed- 

 ding decoration you had an avenue of 

 peach trees all a mass of bloom, or a 

 canopy of apple blossoms. Why of 

 course you can have such things if you 

 want to and prepare for it. Many 

 flowering shrubs, such as Cydonia jap- 

 onica, Forsythia viridissima. several 

 varieties of lilac, double flowering 

 cherry and almond, weigelias, deutzias. 

 mock orange, spireas such as S. Van 

 Houttei and S. prunifolia. etc., are 

 yearly forced for the New York market 

 and just now some of it. especially 

 Japan quince and forsythia. makes a 

 pretty and interesting window display. 

 Most of this kind of stock is easily 

 forced. You can usually tell flowering 

 wood by size of the bud. Cut the 

 branches in good lengths, tie them 

 compactly together at the bottom, put 

 them in a deep jar or tub of water and 

 put them in your greenhouse. They 

 will soon come in flower, and always 

 try a variety; they will pay you some- 

 way. People want such stock, it is a 

 change from what is mauled about in 

 the market. As to the uses such 

 blossoms can be put to they are too 

 numerous to mention. You can use 

 ' them in all manner of decorations. 

 Some of the prettiest tables we have 

 even done or seen were decorated with 

 high colored quince, but you must have 

 a light blue, a milk white, pink or 

 green vase for it, and very little or 

 no green and that of a very graceful 

 kind such as Asparagus tenuissimus, 

 Y'ou must not arrange this kind of ma- 

 terial stiffly or bunchy if you want 

 good results; a studied— careless— fall- 

 ing-over appearance is best, and care 

 should be taken to have it in water. 

 Suppose you are flxing up for a re- 



ception, ball, wedding or any festive 

 occasion, nothing will give more satis- 

 faction than a mass of such blossoms, 

 but be careful, have the colors sepa- 

 rate and a distance from each other 

 and have them high up where dresses 

 will not become entangled. It is an 

 easy matter to fix up a natural look- 

 ing arch of them and let the people 

 walk under them, as almost everybody 

 loves to think of spring and its myri- 

 ads of smiling flowers. 



You can get up a mighty good effect 

 in flowering apple trees liy getting a 

 tree from the nureery, plant it in a 

 green jardiniere, get a few Leucothoe 

 branches, green the top as if they 

 were growing, then tie on your forced 

 Japan quince. You can make up a 

 pretty tree of almost anything in this 

 way and the tendency in decorative 

 ideas will run that way, only we must 

 be careful to copy nature as much as 

 possible. If we wish to manufacture 

 rose trees for instance we should get 

 standard roses and use rose foliage; 



there's nothing more beautiful than a 

 well made up standard rose tree of 

 Meteors, Morgans or some such rose. 

 These things have often been attempt- 

 ed and have been mostly failures l)e- 

 cause we try to convince people that 

 roses grow on bay trees, or that smilax 

 is the right foliage, or some such weak- 

 ness, shutting our eyes to the fact that 

 if florists want to be artistic they must 

 either imitate nature or improve her 

 models. 



There is more or less nonsense in 

 the oft repeated assertions that we 

 cannot improve what Nature teaches, 

 for we have to do it every day in some 

 elements, but all the same she's a 

 good teacher and you won't go far 

 wrong if you study her closely. A 

 great deal of trouble arises in the case 

 of flower and foreign foliage; truly 

 there are many kinds of foliage we 

 cannot use, but if we cannot, we 

 ought to be more careful as to substi- 

 tutes; bad or inappropriate foliage will 

 cheapen, nay, entirely destroy the 

 effect of the choicest flower, and it's 

 generally safer to use very little or 

 none at all where it is unavoidable. 



But let us return to flowering shrubs 

 just for a moment. We were just 

 thinking that if a "Southern Lassie" 

 were to come north to marry just now, 

 it would be a pleasing and appropriate 

 feature to have her wear or carry mag- 

 nolia blooms. The tables could be 

 decorated handsomely with them and 

 altogether they could be made a 

 beautiful adjunct to the spreading 

 palms they usually demand t<s make 

 them think of the "Sunny South." 

 Imported Magnolias are easy to force; 

 try a few for Easter anyhow. 

 Prepare for Eaister. 

 And just now that .we mention 

 Easter let us tell you that it is not too 



Entrance to Hodgson's. 

 NEW YORK STORES AT CHRISTMAS. 



