CHAPTER XIV 



ANNUALS OF ADVANTAGEOUS COLORS 



THE will of the annual is to germinate its seed, 

 to raise its plants, to bloom, to form seed, 

 and to die, all between the days when the 

 frost leaves the ground in the spring and reinstates 

 itself in the autumn. During this period, the annual 

 would exist, accomplish its mission, and pass into 

 oblivion. It pretends to no lasting affection for, or 

 interest in, the garden that makes its home. It is 

 not like the old-time roses, or the sturdy perennials 

 that graced their abiding places from one year to 

 another. All that the annual demands, or rather 

 hopes, is that it may be left in undisturbed peace 

 until it has sown its seed and enjoyed the luxury of 

 dying. 



On this determination of the annual, the gardener 

 lays a deterring hand. He picks its blossoms up to 

 the very day of frost without allowing it to mature and 

 to form seed, since he knows that by so doing he will 

 encourage the plant to try again and to put forth 

 fresh flowers destined to make seed, but which prove 

 to be merely objects for his culling. In this way, the 

 natural course of things is interrupted in modern 

 gardens, as the longer a plant can be kept from forming 

 seed, the longer will be its period of bloom. Of many 



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