BEAUTY OF WILD-FLOWERS 411 



foot. Such wanton waste was without excuse 

 and distressing to witness, being far beyond all 

 possible need. 



Of all flowers, wild-flowers ever please me 

 most, nor, to my mind, can any products of the 

 garden or hot-house, beautiful though they may 

 be, lend themselves as gracefully and readily for 

 decorative purposes. And how few there are of 

 either sex able to arrange flowers to advantage ! 

 Too often are they crammed into some jar or 

 vase altogether unsuitable in colour and form for 

 their reception, and made to present as unnatural 

 an appearance as possible. Wild-flowers demand 

 especial care and taste in their arrangement, for 

 half their beauty lies in the free lightness of 

 their growth ; to crush them is to murder 

 them. Buttercups and stitchwort, cow parsley 

 and ragged robin, corn - cockle or devil's - bit 

 scabious, and moon-daisies, etc., form the most 

 charming combinations of colour when artistically 

 and lightly arranged. Hot-house and garden 

 flowers, when used in over- profusion for decora- 

 tive purposes, are calculated to oppress rather 

 than gratify ; the excess of colour is apt to 

 bewilder, and savours of the heat and glare of 

 the flower-show tent. Flowers should charm 

 and refresh, not irritate and confuse. 



Many of our rarer wild-flowers are rapidly 

 becoming well-nigh extinct, owing to the ruthless 

 treatment which they receive at the hands of 

 excursionists and collectors of botanical specimens, 



