SION 
the beauty of the glossy dark leaves of camellias out of bloom, 
of orange trees, tall palms, and ferns. Conservatories, whatever 
their architectural dignity—and those at Sion have much—demand 
colour ; to obtain which, at all seasons, is surely the raison d’étre 
of a greenhouse. However, though, in the interior, colour may 
sometimes be lacking at Sion, outside, in September, there is 
veritably a feast of it! 
Standing at the extreme end of the terrace, by the door of the 
near conservatory, the angle of which in my drawing unfortunately 
cuts off from view the curved line of the crescent-shaped houses 
and the central dome, one looks across beds of delicately-tinted 
flowers to the opposite and corresponding greenhouse, every 
available inch of which is covered with Virginia creeper, which, in 
September, changes rapidly from a warm green to scarlet, and 
finally to blood-red. It compensates by its glorious hues for the 
gradual weakening, as summer wanes, of the blaze of rose and pink, 
touched here and there with white, and occasionally with a splash 
of pure vermilion—used with much reticence at Sion—but which, 
when present, strikes the final note of a colour-scheme of wonderful 
beauty. 
I may return ere long to the subject of colour in gardens—to 
both the abuse and timid avoidance of scarlet, the untutored 
eye welcoming contrasts, but ignoring harmonies. 
The terrace is a vantage ground. Thence the eye is led gradu- 
ally onward, down the broad walk between the beds of pink 
geranium and purple heliotrope, and less familiar plants, which 
blend admirably ; past the far end of the conservatory, with its 
mantle of creeper just described; past cyprus, and cedar, and 
Scottish fir, the dark foliage of all three contrasting with the 
brighter greens of the deciduous trees, already painted with patches 
of yellow ; on, right on, beyond all this to the open space of sky, 
and stretch of quiet park, where cattle are grazing, to where the 
glint of sunshine on a white sail, the occasional glimpse of the 
red funnel of a steamboat, the distant objects moving on the farther 
bank at the point at which the gardens of Kew descend to the 
towing path, sufficiently indicate the position of the invisible 
channel of the river. 
Turn a little to the right, keeping now the Gibbons vase upon 
your left, and a wider view of the flower-garden presents 
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