Photographing Wild Flowers 247 



photography, one must be possessed of a little 

 sense of the artistic, for the flowers should be 

 grouped in such a manner as to show to the 

 best advantage and not thrown together without 

 thought as to their arrangement. 



There are two ways in which flowers can be 

 photographed : cut and growing. The latter is 

 useful in showing their manner of growth, and 

 the former in presenting the blossom on a larger 

 scale and more in detail. 



In photographing cut flowers the greatest diffi- 

 culty with which we have to contend lies in the 

 fact that they so easily wilt. Especially is this 

 true of those plants that grow in water or in 

 very damp soil. 



I once spent nearly an entire week and dozens 

 of plates in the attempt to get a good picture 

 of one of our common flowering water plants. 

 Specimen after specimen I carried home to no 

 avail. It seemed to be impossible to do any- 

 thing with it, for the flowers invariably wilted and 

 dropped off, and the leaves curled up within ten 

 minutes after it was removed from the soil. Plac- 

 ing it in water or in dampened sand, or, in fact, the 

 use of any of the methods by which flowers are 

 revived, appeared to have not the least beneficial 

 effect. 



I was almost in despair of accomplishing any- 

 thing with this species until one day I chanced 



