270 Landscape Gardening 



upon her altars. She smiled, and said the intention was 

 accepted, but not its results, and hinted something about 

 the same labor being performed under the direction of the 

 more tasteful eye of ladies, who should invent and arrange, 

 while the fingers of honest toil wrought the ruder outline 

 only. 



Flora then hinted to us, how much more beautiful flowers 

 were when arranged in the simplest forms, and said, when 

 combined or moulded into shapes or devices, nothing more 

 elaborate or artificial than a vase form is really pleasing. 

 Baskets, moss-covered and flower-woven, she said, were 

 thought elegant enough for Paradise itself. 'There are not 

 only baskets," continued she, "that are beautiful lying 

 down, and showing inside a rich mosaic of flowers - - each 

 basket, large or small, devoted, perhaps, to some one choice 

 flower in its many varieties; but baskets on the tops of 

 mossy pedestals, bearing tasteful emblems interwoven on 

 their sides; and baskets hanging from ceilings, or high 

 festooned arches - - in which case they display in the most 

 graceful and becoming manner, all manner of drooping and 

 twining plants, the latter stealing out of the nest or body of 

 the basket, and waving to and fro in the air they perfume." 

 "Then there is the garland," continued our fair guest; "it 

 is quite amazing, that since the days of those clever and 

 harmonious people, the Greeks, no one seems to know any- 

 thing of the beauty of the garland. Now in fact nothing is 

 more beautiful or becoming than flowers woven into tasteful 

 garlands or chaplets. They form a circle- - that emblem of 

 eternity, so full of dread and mystery to you mortals - - and 

 the size is one that may be carried in the hand or hung up, 

 and it always looks lovely. Believe me, nothing is prettier 

 in my eyes, which, young as they look, have had many 

 thousands of your years of experience, than a fresh, green 

 garland woven with bright roses." 



As she said this, she seized a somewhat common basket 

 that lay near us, and passing her delicate lingers over it, as 

 she plucked a few flowers from the surrounding plants, she 

 held it, a picture of magical verdure and blossoms, aloft in 



