WOOD AND GARDEN 



always tlimk of the grand colour of Ins reticulata as an 

 example of a rich violet-purple. But purple equally 

 stands for this, and for many shades redder. 



Snow-white is very vague. There is nearly always 

 so much blue about the colour of snow, from its 

 crystalline surface and partial transparency, and the 

 texture is so unlike that of any kind of flower, that the 

 comparison is scarcely permissible. I take it that the 

 use of " snow-white " , is, like that of " golden-yellow," 

 more symbolical than descriptive, meaning any white 

 that gives an impression of purity. Nearly all white 

 flowers are yellowish-white, and the comparatively 

 few that are bluish-white, such, for example, as 

 Omphalodes Unifolia, are of a texture so different from 

 snow that one cannot compare them at all. I should 

 say that most white flowers are near the colour of chalk ; 

 for although the word chalky-white has been used in 

 rather a contemptuous way, the colour is really a very 

 beautiful warm white, but by no means an intense white. 

 The flower that always looks to me the whitest is that 

 of Iberis sempervirens. The white is dead and hard, 

 like a piece of glazed stoneware, quite without play or 

 variation, and hence uninteresting. 



