38 THE FLOEAL WORLD AND GAEDEN GUIDE. 



always be carefully avoided, and the outline or contour kept as 

 near as possible to what they are when growing. A vase of cut 

 flowers can hardly be arranged too light and elegant. A few fern 

 fronds, small branches of asparagus, leaves of variegated grasses, 

 and sprays of Selaginellas, and slender creeping plants, should be 

 placed first in your vase ; then a few bold flowers of clear decided 

 colours added. By using only one or two blooms of each kind, a 

 great variety can be obtained. The great object in all cut flower 

 arrangements should be to avoid heavy confused masses of flower 

 and foliage. It requires a great deal of study and practice before 

 you can be proficient in this. Ladies, with their nimble fingers aud 

 quick fancies, are always the best hands at floral decorations in the 

 dwelling. It is a department in which they are always at home. 

 This is as it should be. For shallow vases aud table glasses, wet 

 sand is the best thing you can use for keeping the flowers fresh ; 

 wet moss is also very good when the arrangements are only for a 

 short time. Water should be as seldom used in flower-vases as 

 possible, it is always so apt to spill. Of course, in glass vases, 

 trumpet and finger glasses, it must be used, for sand would have a 

 bad appearance seen through the glass, but in shallow vases, 

 or where you can hide the glass with fern fronds or sprays, sand 

 should be used saturated with water. 



Flowers are always more natural-looking dressed with their 

 own foliage. The Lily of the Valley, for instance, never looks so 

 nice as when dressed with its own bright green leaves ; and when 

 roses are used, tbe aid of their foliage is almost indispensable ; the 

 only other greenery I care for seeing in connection with roses are 

 ferns, and sometimes a few sprays of wild grasses. 



If the cut flower arrangement is intended for gaslight, yellow is 

 best kept out altogether. The colours that tell by gaslight are green, 

 white, light blue, bluish pink, scarlet and crimson of every shade. 

 With a good arrangement of those telling colours, backed with fern 

 fronds, and rose tree leaves, and draped with sprays of Linaria, 

 small-leaved Ivy, Sdaginella hortensis, Periwinkles, or any other 

 slender trailing plant, aud a few grasses added for lightness, a very 

 handsome vase of flowers can be made up for the drawing-room or 

 dining-room. 



Vases arranged with fruits and flowers form the usual decora- 

 tions of dinner-tables in conjunction with pot plants of Palms, 

 Cycads, Dracaenas, Ferns, Caladiams, Crotons, and other fine foliage 

 plants. Table decorations should always be light, airy, and grace- 

 ful. If the specimen plants used are large and the cut-flower 

 arrangement heavy, the whole thing is a nuisance rather than an 

 ornament, obstructing the view and interfering with the freedom of 

 movement. When decorating the table, then, use neat handy speci- 

 men plants, placing the largest in the centre, and have your vases 

 and trumpet glasses lightly and elegantly got up. 



Roses are the great favourites for all purposes where cut flowers 

 are employed, and during the summer there is no stint of that lovely 

 queen of flowers. In the autumn, winter, and spring, the prin- 

 cipal flowers used are Orchids, Azaleas, Camellias, Spring flower ing 



