A FEW WORDS FOR THE HERBACEOUS PLANTS. 



All plants, whether hardy or tender, herbaceous or shrubby, 

 bulbous or tuberous, have their several beauties, which the 

 real lover of flowers readily appreciates, by a standard not 

 artificial, but of nature's own decreeing. To him the modest 

 little Violet is no less an object of admiration than the regal 

 Dahlia, and the tiny Forget-me-not, as endeared as the beau- 

 tiful Rose. Flower succeeds flower, week after week and 

 month after month, ever presenting some new form or pecul- 

 iarity of growth, and though some kinds may be more fan- 

 cied than others for their brilliancy of coloring, their delicious 

 odor, the long time they remain in bloom, the ease with 

 which they are cultivated, their hardiness, or their effect in 

 the arrangement of a parterre, yet each and all are to the true 

 lover of nature ever beautiful. In the language of a peasant 

 poet, — 



" There's many a seeming weed proves sweet, 

 As sweet as garden flowers can be." 



It is not expected that all will look upon a flower with the 

 poet's eye, who sees not only the simple form and color, but 

 whose imagination clothes each with a thousand associations, 

 adding beauty and interest to every object. Yet we cannot 

 feel that they who single out some dozen kinds of plants, 

 upon which they devote all their care, neglecting entirely all 

 others, can know that true delight which springs from a gen- 

 uine love of flowers, whether cultivated or wild, whether 

 found in garden or field, decorating the palace, or embroid- 

 ering the woodside. 



Fashion, which holds such potent sway, rules even in the 

 floral world, and often retards the progress of true taste by 

 the blind devotedness of her followers. Just now she bids us 

 deck our gardens in brilliant masses of scarlet to such an ex- 

 tent as to well merit the inquiry " whether a red cloak is 

 more elegant than an embroidered shawl ? " We must not, 



VOL. XXII. NO. Till. 44 



