THE WINTER GARDEN 



WE are not about to write of hot-house flowers. 

 They live a summer life in the midst of, but away 

 from, the winter. More estimable are the flowers 

 that brave the assaults of frost and snow, and the 

 still more trying east wind, and present us with 

 beauty in the midst of desolation. The winter 

 blossom is as precious as it is rare. The daisy that 

 opens now at our feet, or the catkin that swings on 

 the bough, secures complete attention, which summer 

 congeners usually fail to obtain. In the garden we 

 can with care ensure, immediately after Christmas, 

 a display of bloom that astonishes those who live in 

 the belief that flowers belong only to the summer. 

 It is a keen pleasure to take the uninitiated to our 

 long border where the genus Helleborus is invited to 

 flourish. Chief of them all is niger, with pure white 

 blossoms of astonishing size and delicacy, and a great 

 bundle of yellow stamens to lift it out of its order 

 and justify the name of Christmas-rose. But there 

 are others, each with its own note of beauty, each 

 marked in flower and stem and leaf with delicate 

 distinction. H. angustifolius droops its head more, 

 and has the back of its petals purple, and we have 

 usually to tilt up the flower in order to see that the 

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