Flowers and Gardens 



principle the more effectively, the later 

 blossoms of a plant are nearly always 

 made strikingly feeble and imperfect, so 

 that we may most distinctly feel that the 

 day of its glory is past. 



And even those plants which have 

 goodly fruit, or which develop new beauty 

 in decay, must be banished from our 

 sight for some time after their bloom is 

 spent. We see this very conspicuously 

 in our fruit trees ; and even the Horse- 

 Chestnut, though perhaps more uniformly 

 beautiful than any other flowering tree we 

 know, must wait after the white blaze of 

 its flower-cones is extinguished before it 

 may show its prickly balls of fruit, or the 

 broad majesty of its hand-like foliage. 



And for plants which are said to bloom 

 at all seasons the law is generally the 

 same. Their beauty is at the best but 

 at one brief period ; for the remainder 

 of the year they sink into comparative 

 insignificance. Take, for instance, the 

 " never-bloomless " Furze. There is per- 

 haps no time, especially in the winter 

 months, in which it would be impossible 

 to discover at least some few of those 

 bright yellow blossoms shining forth amid 

 the darkness of its spacious branches. 

 But the time of its full magnificence is 



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