HORTICULTURE 



VoL XXXI 



MARCH 20, 1920 



No. 12 



THE TALK OF THE TRADE 



I was much interested in what Geo. 

 Watson said to me the other day and 

 I think his remarics well worth passing 

 on. So here they are: 



"The artistic arrangement of flow- 

 ers is a fine art. No amount of telling 

 or trying will make an artist out of 

 one, unless the gift be inborn. The 

 great and only Battles had the gift 

 when he began some thirty years ago 

 to set the pace in Philadelphia, but it 

 took the world a good while to real- 

 ize it, and even now some of them do 

 not know just what made him rich and 

 famous. One of his favorite quota- 

 tions in the olden days was. "You 

 can't make a silk purse out of a sow's 

 ear," and that is as true today as it 

 was then. It's like music and poetry — 

 so well defined by Alexander Pope: 



— Music resembles poetry; in each 



Are nameless graces which no 

 methods teach, 



And which a master-hand alone 

 can reach. 



Window dressing comes under the 

 same heading. It isn't the place nor 

 the materials. It's the artist. Where 

 would Michell's retail following be to- 

 day without a Philip P'reud to put 

 poetry into every business bid in store 

 window or flower show. Philip may 

 have been born with many other nat- 

 ural gifts, but the artistic sense and 

 the ability to express it made him a 

 marked man distinguished and valu- 

 able among men equally able in every 

 other direction. 



Continued adverse weather has been 

 a source of considerable worry to 

 Washington florists with the near ad- 

 vent of a comparatively early Easter. 

 That city has escaped the terrific 

 storms that spread over the north 

 and west, hut it has had its share of 

 cloudy weather with a larger number 

 of rain and snow stoiins tlian u.^ual. 



"The date is a little against us," 

 said David G. Grillbortzer. of the 

 Washington Floral Company, speaking 

 of Baster coming on April 4. Mr. 

 Grillbortzer is vice president of the 

 American Carnation Society and a 

 member of the executive committee of 

 the Florists' Club of W^ashington, and 

 has large holdings in Alexandria. Va. 



"The delay in getting the Japanese 

 bulbs to the United States set the 



growers back a great deal," he con- 

 tinued. "They had to speed up pro- 

 duction, but I feel confident that un- 

 less we have an unprecedented amount 

 of adverse weather, most of the Wash- 

 ington growers will be right 'on crop.' 

 The plants this year will be much bet- 

 ter than during the past two years. 

 Last year we had to depend on bulbs 

 that had been kept In cold storage, 

 it having been impossible to import 

 any because of the embargo against 

 the use of shipping space for that pur- 

 pose. In Alexandria we have between 

 .•i.OOO and 6,000 pots bearing from three 

 to fifteen flowers each. 



"Hydrangea plants are looking ex- 

 cellent. We will have about 1,500 

 pots. The wholesale price in this 

 market will probably be about $3 up. 

 It is impossible at this time to pre- 

 dict the price of carnations. 1 believe 

 that there will be enough to go around, 

 but orders should be placed early to 

 secure a choice of stock." 



Orchids have sold well during the 

 past season. It is true that at the 

 present time prices are practically 

 normal, but midwinter when the flow- 

 ers were in great demand, the prices 

 obtained were tar ahead of those ever 

 before known. In New York about 

 Christmas time it was not unusual for 

 choice flowers to bring five dollars at 

 wholesale. Altogether the commercial 

 growers of orchids have had a good 

 season, and unless conditions become 

 unexpectedly bad returns from orchid 

 growing should continue good. 



It seems rather strange to find more 

 than a page of solidly set advertise- 

 ments in an English garden paper, 

 placed by gardeners and helpers who 

 want positions. The situation in Eng- 

 land must be very different from what 

 it is in this country, where gardeners 

 and garden help of all kinds is very 

 hard to obtain. It is true that higher 

 wages are being paid across the water 

 than ever before, but regardless of that 

 fact, the gardeners as a class seem 



i- a pliotnernpli iniidp l>,v E. H. WiUnn of .Azumii-KaKami. It is tile orru-inal pink 

 Ktiniiiif .\/.Hlfu, and Ih over one liiindrfd ,\fars i>UI. ."^ee Pace 'ili*. 



