286 THE ENGLISH FLOWER GARDEN. 



purples, and a colder white would combine them pleasantly with low- 

 growing plants with cool-coloured leaves. 



" SILVERY-LEAVED PLANTS are valuable as edgings and carpets 

 to purple flowers, and bear the same kind of relation to them as the 

 warm-coloured foliage of some plants does to their strong red flowers, 

 as in the case of the Cardinal Flower and double crimson Sweet 

 William. The bright clear blue of Forget-me-not goes best with fresh 

 pale green, and pink flowers are beautiful with pale foliage striped 

 with creamy white, such as the variegated forms of Jacob's-ladder or 

 Iris pseudacorus. A useful carpeting plant, Acsena pulchella, assumes 

 in spring a rich bronze between brown and green which is valuable 

 with Wallflowers of the brown and orange colours. These few 

 examples, out of many that will come under the notice of any careful 

 observer, are enough to indicate what should be looked for in the way 

 of accompanying foliage such foliage, if well chosen and well placed, 

 may have the same value to the flowering plant that a worthy and 

 appropriate setting has to a jewel. 



" IN SUNNY PLACES warm colours should preponderate ; the yellow 

 colour of sunlight brings them together and adds to their glowing effect. 



"A SHADY BORDER, on the other hand, seems best suited for 

 the cooler and more delicate colours. A beautiful scheme of cool 

 colouring might be arranged for a retired spot, out of sight of other 

 brightly coloured flowers, such as a border near the shady side of any 

 shrubbery or wood that would afford a good background of dark 

 foliage. Here would be the best opportunity for using blue, cool 

 white, palest yellow, and fresh green. A few typical plants are the 

 great Larkspurs, Monkshoods, and Columbines, Anemones (such as 

 japonica, sylvestris, apennina, Hepatica, and the single and double 

 forms of nemorosa), white Lilies, Trilliums, Pyrolas, Habenarias, 

 Primroses, white and yellow, double and single, Daffodils, white 

 Cyclamen, Ferns and mossy Saxifrages, Lily-of-the- Valley, and 

 Woodruff. The most appropriate background to such flowers would 

 be shrubs and trees, giving an effect of rich sombre masses of dusky 

 shadow rather than a positive green colour, such as Bay Phillyrea, 

 Box, Yew, and Evergreen Oak. Such a harmony of cool colouring, 

 in a quiet shady place, would present a delightful piece of gardening. 



" BEDDED-OUT PLANTS, in such parts of a garden as may require 

 them, may be arranged on the same general principle of related, rather 

 than of violently opposed, masses of colour. As an example, a fine 

 effect was obtained with half-hardy annuals, mostly kinds of Marigold, 

 Chrysanthemum, and Nasturtium, of all shades of yellow, orange, and 

 brown. This was in a finely designed formal garden before the prin- 

 cipal front of one of the stateliest of the great houses of England. It 

 was a fine lesson in temperance, this employment of a simple scheme 



