CHAPTER XXVI 



SWEET PEAS IN OTHER DECORATIONS 



THE decorative purposes of the Sweet Peas are not con- 

 fined to the exhibits of dinner-table decorations. Their 

 uses are many and varied. Their improved character is 

 largely responsible for the more numerous uses to which 

 these dainty blossoms may now be applied. Not a 

 season passes without our discovering some new method 

 of dealing with the flowers in the work of the floral 

 artist. Although we acknowledge this truth, we must 

 confess that we have little sympathy with the practice 

 of shortening the flower-stalks and using the sprays of 

 blossoms for making a mass of colour in the floral designs 

 that so many professional decorators are prone to use. 

 The natural grace and beauty of the Sweet Pea blossoms 

 are almost entirely destroyed by these means, so much so, 

 in fact, that we fail to trace any real artistic worth in 

 this method of employing the flowers. 



In making the groundwork of such designs as that of 

 a harp, cushion, cross, wreath, scroll, chaplet, crown, 

 and other creations of a similar nature, the flower-stalks 

 are shortened back very considerably by the professional 

 floral artist. The sprays of blossoms, as a rule, are 

 wired and inserted in the moss that covers the design, 

 flower to flower, or rather, spray to spray, so as to form 

 a dense, compact mass of one colour. Surely, the 

 professional florist, and those who seek to emulate his 

 methods, could find some other better and less wasteful 

 method of arranging the Sweet Peas in designs of the 



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