182 PRACTICAL FLORICULTURE. 



beauty of the products of the garden or conservatory ; and 

 we wonder how any person of taste, who possesses the 

 means, should ever fail to have flowers on his table when 

 entertaining friends. Considering the effect, flowers on the 

 table, like plants in the garden, are certainly the cheapest 

 of ornaments. There are those who would have nothing 

 upon their table but what they can eat or drink ; like a 

 gentleman who once employed the writer of this to lay 

 out a new garden, and objected to having roses planted by 

 the fences, saying very earnestly " Ah, yes ! I suppose 

 they are very pretty, but then, you see, we couldn't get 

 anything to eat from them. Guess we won't have any of 

 them things." Luckily for the well-being of poor human- 

 ity such desperately practical men are not very numer- 

 ous. An epergne filled with flowers forms the most ef- 

 fective of table bouquets. For a large dinner table this 

 bouquet holder ought to be from two to three feet in 

 height, with three, four, or five branches, and if the table 

 is very lai'ge, a smaller epergne at each end will add to 

 the effect. For a less pretentious table an epergne twelve 

 to eighteen inches in height may be used to equal advant- 

 age. The superiority of an epergne consists in its raising 

 the flowers to a height sufficient to gain their full effect, 

 whereas forms of flowers built from a lower vase lose 

 much by the interference of surrounding dishes. With a 

 handsome epergne and the flowers arranged in nearly semi- 

 circular outline, pointed with two or more handsome 

 flower-spikes, and diversified with here and there a fine 

 fern leaf and other sprays of lively green, with a few fine 

 rose-buds and spikelets of heath, acacia, or similarly form- 

 ed flowers, projecting from the main body to give ease and 

 grace, and with a profusion of bright green or variegated 

 foliage and flowers in drooping sprays around, the best re- 

 sults may be attained. For such a bouquet a fair propor- 

 tion of large flowers is indispensable, and an excess of 

 projecting points is to be avoided as confusing. Table 



