164 MORE POT-POURRI 



flowers. Many kinds of Hellebores were coming into 

 bloom, some of which I had never seen before. The 

 warm, damp winters are very favourable to January- 

 flowering plants, and we can scarcely expect to copy 

 them in Surrey. The rather rare and interesting 

 Daphne blagayana was growing to a great size, and cov- 

 ered with flowers, at Glasnevin. Mr. Robinson describes 

 it as a 'beautiful, dwarf Alpine shrub of easy growth.' 

 I have not found it at all easy ; in fact, two out of the 

 three plants I had have died, and the third looks rather 

 ill. But I think I tried to grow it too much in the sun; 

 it also wants pegging down every year after flowering. 



In a country house in Ireland, I saw last year for the 

 first time the reproductions, sanctioned by the Berlin 

 Government, of Botticelli's illustrations of Dante. I 

 never knew before that such things existed, or that out- 

 line book -illustration of that kind was so old. The 

 original drawings had belonged to Lord Ashburnham's 

 collection, and we in England allowed them to be bought 

 at his sale by the German Government for 25,0001. an 

 unfortunate result of the law, which never allowed the 

 authorities either of the Print room in the British Mu- 

 seum or of the National Gallery to keep any money in 

 hand. These drawings are curious rather than very 

 beautiful, and many of them are unfinished. In the 

 illustrations of Hell and Purgatory, Botticelli glories in 

 detail ; but the ' Paradiso' is left almost entirely to the 

 imagination. Dante and Beatrix surrounded by a circle, 

 he himself appearing often blinded by the rays of light, 

 the whole surrounded by more circles ; this is all he 

 seems to have dared attempt. 



In this same house, I was able to turn from these 

 lineal illustrations of the fifteenth century, with their 

 delicate, though meagre, draughtsmanship, to the latest 

 and richest of modern illustrations, the finest colour- 



