FUTURE GARDENS. 25 



cyphers interlaced. The whole matter has been 

 well summed up by Sir Joseph Hooker, who 

 writes : 



" It is indeed astonishing that the asters, helianthu=, rudbeckias, 

 silphiurns, andfnumberless other fine North American plants, all so 

 easily grown and so handsome, should be entirely neglected in 

 English gardens, and this in favour of carpets, hearthrugs, and 

 ribbons, forming patterns of violent colours, which, though admired 

 for being the fashion on the lawn and borders of our gardens and 

 grounds, would not be tolerated on the floor of a drawing-room or 

 boudoir.' 3 1 



Well, as we can do nothing worse in this 

 direction, we may at last hope for a reaction, in 

 which a new school, with some regard to nature, 

 but without the extravagance of the old " pic- 

 turesque " gardeners, may bring us back to good 

 taste and common sense. 



It is of course absolutely impossible to form 

 even an estimate of the number of bedding-out 

 plants used in our gardens during a single season, 

 to be discarded when the season ends. It must 

 be something enormous. One single florist in 

 the neighbourhood of London sends to market 

 annually more than 80,000 plants of one description 



1 See Note III., on a Poet's Flower-bed. 



