398 



Garden and Forest. 



[Number 345. 



more generally employed than it now is ; for, in addition to 

 the merits I have named, it is extremely simple and incon- 

 spicuous in effect, and this, as your correspondent explains, is 

 a prime merit in vessels whose chief rule should be to con- 

 tribute to the beauty of their contents rather than attract atten- 

 tion on their own account. 



I think, also, that the judgment against "all colored glass " 

 should be relaxed in favor of dark green glass, at least. No 

 vessels could be more appropriate for receiving flowers of 

 almost every kind than the bowls and vases of old green 

 glass — somewhat mottled in tone, and, therefore, less me- 

 chanical in effect than more perfectly manufactured modern 

 glass — which may sometimes be picked up in antiquary shops 

 abroad. And failing these, modern products of English or 

 Bohemian origin may easily be had. In England especially 

 green glasses have in recent years been produced, of such 

 excellent color and in so good a variety of sizes and shapes, 

 that an assortment of them is almost indispensable to any one 

 who has many flowers to arrange indoors, and desires to show 

 them to the best advantage. 



As for the " pure neutral gray," which in opaque pottery is 

 commended as preferable to any other color, opinions may 

 differ. Such a tint does not harmonize with blossoms of all 

 colors, or, at least, it does not show them all to the best possi- 

 ble advantage. And, again, it may not associate well with the 

 background against which the vase is to be placed, or the 

 other objects among which it is to stand. And this brings me 

 to what I consider the most serious omission in the article re- 

 ferred to. Its writer does not point out that a vase should be 

 selected with reference to its proposed environment no less 

 than to the character of its contents. A due degree of incon- 

 spicuousness is always to be desired ; but a gray vase, set, for 

 instance, against a crimson curtain, would be more conspicu- 

 ous than a red one analogous to the curtain in tone ; and thus 

 there may easily be cases when a red, a blue, a yellow, or 

 even an orange-colored vessel is preferable to one of the 

 quietest neutral tint. Imagine a great clump of orange- 

 colored Butterfly-weed in a Japanese bowl of rather lighter 

 tone, set against a yellow curtain, and you will understand 

 that such an arrangement might well seem more harmonious 

 and simple than if the vessel had been of a neutral gray. 

 Opaque green vases, even of quite a bright tint, are often the 

 most harmonious that could be selected, especially if much 

 foliage is used with the flowers. And, in short, it may be said 

 that the required quietness of effect, the required effacement 

 of the vessel as such in favor of its contents, may best be se- 

 cured, very often, by repeating, in some sort, the color of the 

 blossoms it holds and the dominant color-note in its proposed 

 environment. 



Again, is not the dictum that a vase "should be without 

 ornamentation of any kind and of a single and uniform tint of 

 color " a trifle too sweeping ? Conspicuous ornamentation, 

 greatly diversified colors, should, of course, be shunned, but 

 one would hardly wish to banish all variety in color, or all use 

 of patterned vessels after having seen a finely shaped vase of 

 Japanese or of old Delft blue-and-white filled with white roses 

 or lilacs or narcissus, or (this time an harmonious contrast, 

 not a concord, being sought) with bold-colored tulips or daf- 

 fodils, and placed against a blue and white curtain, or on a 

 dinner-table where the plates and dishes are likewise of blue- 

 and-white ware. Surely the eye would be pleased, not of- 

 fended, by such an arrangement ; the beauty and character of 

 the flowers would be enhanced, not hurt. And the test of what 

 is right in matters of taste is the satisfaction of the cultivated 

 eye rather than a close adherence to canons which, however 

 correct in a general sense, must always admit of exceptions 

 while art and beauty are living and perpetually varying things. 



With regard to form, I should like to plead for greater free- 

 dom of choice. It is not needful that all tall vessels should be 

 broadly flaring at the top. The plain cylindrical form to which 

 objection is made has a true beauty of its own ; the oriental 

 races appreciate this fact and do not confine themselves to 

 cylinders of bamboo " which from its irregular surface loses 

 the stiffness of the cylindrical form." This very stiffness may 

 be desirable in a flower-holder, either as justifying the per- 

 pendicular lines of certain vigorous flower-stems, or as form- 

 ing a pleasing contrast to others of a less rigid sort. *Nor is it 

 evident that "all forms which bulge below . . . must be re- 

 jected." There are no more beautiful oriental vases than 

 some of those in which a spherical lower portion bears a tall, 

 narrow cylindrical upper portion ; and these shapes in pottery 

 or in glass are particularly good for the display of two or three 

 blossoms of large size and fine form — for instance, of two or 

 three well-developed hot-house roses. 



In a word, while it is sound doctrine that all bizarre shapes 



and all conspicuous decorations and vivid contrasts of color 

 should be avoided in flower-holders, on the other hand all 

 simple shapes which are good in themselves, all single-toned 

 vessels, even of very vivid hues, and many kinds of patterned 

 vessels, where the designs are as unobtrusive as they are in 

 blue-and-white ware, may be put to excellent service for the 

 reception of cut flowers. Indeed, the greater variety we have 

 to choose from the more likely we shall be to do full justice if 

 we have flowers of many sorts to arrange. But good taste 

 must be exercised in choosing which vessel shall be used for 

 each special purpose ; and this means that the color, the size, 

 the habit and the number of the blossoms must in each case 

 be considered, and likewise the particular spot where the filled 

 vessel is to stand. 

 New York. M. G. Van Rensselaer. 



Magnolia glauca. 

 To the Editor of Garden and Forest : 



Sir, — Certain trees, which are at home and common on the 

 lowlands of our Atlantic seaboard, reappear along the western 

 slopes of the southern Alleghenies, and the most notable are 

 Ilex opaca and Liquidambar styraciflua. Frequent in eastern 

 Tennessee, they extend as far north as the banks of the Ka- 

 nahwa and New River, in West Virginia, and perhaps further. 

 It is not surprising, therefore, to have the occurrence of their 

 eastern associate, Magnolia glauca, reported from the same 

 region. Some years ago the late Mr. Leo Lesquereux told me 

 that he had seen it in western Pennsylvania, in Lawrence County, 

 next the Ohio border, and, at my request, wrote the following 

 account of his discovery in a letter dated " Columbus, Ohio, 

 October 21st, 1884." " About Magnolia glauca, seen on the 

 edge of Slippery Rock Creek, above Wurtemberg, I can speak 

 only from impression and remembrance. A group of four 

 or five small trees first caught my view. From the color of 

 the leaves I did not doubt the species was Magnolia glauca. 

 The white under-surface of the leaves is a character easily 

 recognized. But I did not take any specimen with me, for I 

 was then on a tour of geological exploration, with nothing but 

 my note-book'and hammer, and stopping at farm-houses for 

 lodging and entertainment. The spot was rendered more 

 interesting to me by the presence in the vicinity of large blocks 

 of sandstone, covered with a moss, Rhabdoweisia denticulata, 

 generally found on the highest mountain-tops, and there, out 

 of place as well as the Magnolia, which I had never seen be- 

 fore in Pennsylvania. It would be very easy to find the locality. 

 Following the bed of the stream from Wurtemberg, near the 

 mouth of the Slippery Rock Creek, in the Conoquenessing, 

 for about three miles, it would not be possible to miss the 

 trees. The bottom of the creek is rough and there is no road 

 on its banks, at least there was none then, and yet I passed 

 along it twice or thrice." 



Not being able to visit in person the spot here indicated, I 

 conveyed the information, at sundry times after the receipt of 

 the letter, to persons resident in that part of the state likely to 

 have an interest in the matter, one of whom made search for 

 the trees without success. During the present summer the 

 task was undertaken by my friend, Mr. W. T. Bell, florist, of 

 Franklin, Venango County. Mr. Bell, by persistent effort, had 

 rediscovered, in his own county, Frasera Carolinensis, which 

 was collected there by Dr. Garber in 1869, and, hoping the 

 same good luck in this case, journeyed to Slippery Rock for 

 the express purpose. The directions given were carefully 

 followed up, only to end in disappointment. To explain the 

 failure he suggested that Mr. Lesquereux may have been 

 deceived in his observation. But a naturalist so eminent and 

 so familiar with the leaves and leaf-forms of our forest-trees 

 could not have mistaken anything else fora Magnolia. Another 

 suggestion of Mr. Bell is far more probable. A railroad has 

 been built along the stream, since 1884, and the embankment 

 may have buried the "group of four or five small trees." In- 

 stances of the kind are not rare. Fires, cattle and the axe are 

 not the only ravagers of the plant-world. 



In Pennsylvania, Ilex opaca ascends the Susquehanna River 

 to Cold Spring, in the mountains of Dauphin County, while 

 Liquidambar styraciflua is confined to a narrow belt along 

 the Delaware, above and below Philadelphia. Neither of 

 them reappears, as far as known, in the state west of the Alle- 

 ghenies. Magnolia glauca extends inland to a swamp on the 

 summit of a ridge of the South Mountain, near Cornwall, 

 Lebanon County, at an altitude of about five hundred feet. 

 That it will some day be rediscovered west of the Alleghenies 

 is highly probable, and the other two trees may also exist in 

 the same region. 



Lafayette College, Easton, Pa. 



Thomas C. Porter. 



