50 THE ENGLISH FLOWER GARDEN. 



affords .a most beautiful contrast, a cool watery 

 sheet of leaves, with bright warm flowers, yellow 

 and orange, dancing over the leaves, like meteors 

 over a marsh." But we cannot, of course, pass in 

 review all the flowers of the Spring, though we 

 must urge a claim for such old-fashioned plants 

 as Solomon's seal with its palm-like leaves, and 

 the crown-imperial with its circlet of orange-bells. 



To beds of anemone, ranunculus, and tulips 

 we have already referred, and we need not again 

 recur to ordinary Spring .bedding. 



But of course there should always be a bank of 

 violets, over which the soft winds will play, steal- 

 ing and giving odour; and no less, of course, a 

 bed of lilies of the valley planted alone, so that 

 their roots may spread to any distance with their 

 sweet white bells peering here and there from 

 "their pavilion of tender green." 



The herbaceous borders of early summer 

 become gayer still, though the individual plants 

 are perhaps less interesting. We have now, with 

 numberless others, the snowflake, the hairy red 

 poppy, the valerian, mulleins of various sorts, the 



