TENDER BEDDING PLANTS 319 



Hieover was a well-known representative of the Bronze section, 

 and Crystal Palace Gem of the Yellow-leaved, while Flower of 

 Spring held an assured place among the White-edges. 



In recalling the varieties which were most largely grown for 

 the beauty of their flowers, the names of Vesuvius, Henry Jacoby, 

 John Gibbons, and Master Christine come back to us. They 

 were the popular varieties of our boyhood, and on them we prac- 

 tised the art of making cuttings for the first time. They were 

 planted in beds, and they formed the most important constituent 

 in ribbon borders. We may remind readers that a typical old- 

 time "ribbon border 11 consisted of a row of scarlet Zonal Gera- 

 niums, a row of yellow Calceolarias, and a row of blue Lobelias. 

 Do many readers, owners of beautiful herbaceous borders, smile 

 at so crude a combination? If so, let the smile be one not 

 wholly of contempt, but one containing a flavour of sympathy and 

 indulgence. At the worst, our forefathers were making towards 

 beauty. They were brightening their home surroundings with 

 objects of cheerful innocence at a period when the bulk of the 

 nation was enamoured of coarse and brutal sports. Their influence 

 was assuredly not wholly pernicious. They won many converts to 

 the pleasure and benefits of flower-growing who may have had 

 no higher ideal previously than the prize-ring. They aroused a 

 love of flowers in simple minds which could never have been 

 influenced by the canons of high art. We may, indeed, say of 

 the old-style flower gardening that it was well calculated, by its 

 bright simplicity, to attract the elementary natures which invariably 

 preponderate in a commercial nation, just as simple and obvious 

 melodies win countless people to a love of music. 



In due course cultured flower-lovers got tired of ribbon borders, 

 but they did not give up gardening because they had grown weary 

 of brilliant Geraniums. They asked for something more artistic. 

 They took a step forward. They widened their borders, and filled 

 them with beautiful flowering shrubs and herbaceous plants. The 



