fin 



more probably a matter of climate. But, inas- 

 much as I have succeeded in wooing the coquet- 

 tish Lilium auratum so that she smiles instead 

 of frowns, I shall continue to persevere with 

 Horsfieldi, which is worth any pains to obtain 

 in the perfect full-blown flower. 



To think it has taken all these years to ren- 

 der a daffodil " fashionable " ! As if a live flow- 

 er were a ribbon, subject to the caprice of a 

 milliner! Yet, what may we not expect when 

 lovely woman stoops to blond her tresses, and 

 vandal florists figuratively plunge a flower into 

 the dye-pot ? Scarcely a case where beauty is 

 truth, truth beauty. Perhaps, some day, ma- 

 genta may become the mode, and a magenta 

 gown call for its accompanying flower of the 

 same shade a chance to let a zinnia scream. 

 The camellia, described in the dictionary as 

 "a genus of beautiful plants," fortunately has 

 had its day banished with the wax flowers in 

 Wardian cases, let us hope, never to return ; 

 too bloodless and too cold even for a chancel ; 

 a flower absolutely without a soul. In the in- 

 dex expurgatorius should be included the calla 

 lily, which still does lugubrious duty at funerals. 

 Talmage's wish that, when he dies, his grave may 

 be strewed with a handful of violets, a water-lily, 

 a sprig of arbutus, a cluster of asters, rather than 



