JO THE ALPINE FLORA 



"He himself has written, '1 felt that it is not by 

 violating the form of a plant that one succeeds in making 

 it reveal all that it should tell from a decorative point of 

 view. The further 1 advanced in the deep study of 

 alpine flora, the more was 1 convinced that it is impossible 

 to produce anything of beauty, to deliver any new 

 message, except by getting as close as may be to Nature, 

 in order to catch the silhouette of the plant in its most 

 characteristic aspect'; and again later 'I could well wish 

 that this book might be a mine of precious documents 

 for most artists engaged in landscape work, in mural 

 painting, ceramics, embroidery and other industrial arts'. 



"M. Robert has done better than his words: he has 

 given a good example of self-revelation. He proves the 

 immense importance in art of the individual sentiment of 

 the creator/' 



Of the arrangement of rockwork, that is, of the details 

 of construction as opposed to the general plan, M. Cor- 

 revon has written in another and smaller book, entitled 

 les Plantes alpines et de rocailles; and we English are, 

 perhaps, wearied of such minutiae, when even commercial 

 catalogues presume to teach by a scratchy sketch an art 

 that cost Mr. Robinson pages to explain, and which can 

 only be learned in a school of personal, often of bitter 

 experience. Flat pockets for surface-rooters, open ones 

 for those that increase by offsets, long, narrow ones for 

 running stolonifers, etc., may be good general principles, 

 but to be applied with intelligence, since many other 

 factors are involved, e. g. the aspect and soil of the 

 garden, the average rainfall and sunshine of the district. 

 All depends upon a first-hand knowledge of place and 

 plant, which alone can secure a harmony between the 



