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63 Ornanental Gardening. 
within the preceding rules, which show that, ina general sense, 
contrasts are agreeable in the same proportion as they are 
decided. 
5. All colours, simple or compound, are brightened by the 
vicinity of white, and moreover, contrast with it in a most 
agreeable manner. White has the additional advantage of 
improving bad combinations, by being placed between the 
colours that do not look well together, as, for instance, between 
red and orange, red and violet, or violet and blue, ete. 
Hence, this colour, so freely lavished in nature, plays an im- 
portant réle in decorative culture. 
6. With the exception of white, all colours are weakened hy 
the neighbourhood of black, which deprives them to a certain 
extent of their briliancy. Dull or deep tints suffer especially 
when associated with black—resulting, of course, from the 
teebleness of the contrasts. But as black, broadly speaking, 
does not exist in the Vegetable Kingdom,' such contrasts could 
not be effected, except between the plants and the soil, and 
then the latter is never truly black. In the absence of this 
colour it is replaced to a certain degree by the dull purple 
foliage of such plants as Perilla Nankinensis, or by the very 
deep purple-violet flowers of the Sweet Scabious, some Dahlias 
and Hollyhocks. 
The combinations of colours in the flower-garden are com- 
monly binary or ternary, rarely quaternary, unless the green of 
the foliage be considered as taking rank in these combinations. 
The most. commendable binary combinations are as follow, 
which we arrange in the order of their respective merits :— 
a. All colours, simple and compound, with white, though 
the brighter and purer the colours the more pleasing the con- 
trasts ; for example, bright or deep blue with white, rose or red 
with white, bright yellow with white, orange with white, green 
with white, and violet with white. 
b. The simple colours together, or with their complemen- 
taries, such as red and yellow, red and blue, yellow and blue, 
yellow and violet, orange and blue, and green and red. 
Ternary combinations are far less numerous, and in most 
cases white is an element; often, indeed, it is repeated. The 
following examples will enable one to judge: White, red and 
green; or white, red. white and green ;—blue, orange, blue 
' The black sput on the flower of the Horse Bean (Faba vulgaris) is perhaps 
the only instance of pure black in flowers. 
