232 THE SCHOOL GARDEN BOOK 



from Japan. In the case of animals, there is always a certain 

 attractiveness in well-executed outlines of birds, rabbits and 

 fishes, and we need not object seriously to jars thus decor- 

 ated, as they will be found useful for a considerable variety 

 of flower displays. 



Next to the possession of a few really simple and artistic 

 flower-jars, the most important point in the utilization of 

 flowers for the enrichment of home life is an appreciation of 

 the beauty of simplicity in their arrangement. A table or 

 shelf should be set aside for the display of the flowers, with a 

 plain background and no massing of bric-a-brac around 

 them. Then into the receptacle do not crowd blossoms in- 

 discriminately, but choose only one kind at a time and, as a 

 rule, only a few of these, giving to each flower an oppor- 

 tunity to speak for itself and to express to the soul of the 

 beholder its special message of beauty. 



Do not feel that the flowers need other greenery than that 

 furnished by their own leaves and stems. The universal 

 custom of mixing smilax or the so-called Asparagus Fern with 

 beautiful flowers, is one that cannot be too strongly con- 

 demned. This is simply a relic of the old-fashioned bouquet, 

 with its barbarous intermixture of all kinds of form and color 

 into a shapeless mass which might appeal to a Hottentot, but 

 certainly should never appeal to an educated American. It 

 was of these bouquets that Sir Edwin Arnold, after some 

 years of residence' in Japan, wrote : 



"Your European florist who masses together his roses 

 and his Maidenhair Ferns and Calla Lilies, surrounding them 

 with a dish of green and an outer overcoat of lace-paper 

 appears to the Japanese lover of flowers lower than a bar- 

 barian. He has lost to the Japanese mind the chief 



