• AND ORNAMENTAL TREATMENT. i3 



round London at the time of its publication, it contains some hundreds of plates in the six 

 Volumes of which it consists. From its rarity and great costliness, it is one of those books that 

 the designer will scarcely be able to secure for his own library : it is well, therefore, to know 

 where it may be consulted. To this we may add the Medical Botany of Woodville, and a book 

 with a similar title, by Stephenson aftd Churchill ; though, like the Flora Londinensis, books of 

 a considerable age, they are not the less excellent. The plants selected are such as have me- 

 dicinal value, and include both British and foreign species. The illustrations have clearly been 

 drawn and coloured from Nature. In these three works, the plants are arranged according to 

 the Linnaean system — a classification of plants now given up in favour of what is termed the 

 Natural system ; but this in no way impairs the value of the illustrations to the art-student. 

 The third edition of Sowerby's English Botany, recently completed, is an invaluable work for 

 consultation. It contains a carefully-drawn and coloured figure of every British plant ; but, like 

 the others we have mentioned, it is naturally a book rather for library reference than for 

 individual possession, as a work so comprehensive and elaborate must, of necessity, be high in 

 price. The student may also refer to Ov/en Jones's Grammar of Ornament, where he will find 

 some few plates, towards the end of the book, devoted to natural forms ; and to the large 

 volumes of illustrations of the Natural Orders of Plants, by Elizabeth Twining. Figuier's 

 Vegetable World, and Coleman's Woodlands, Heaths, and Hedges, are valuable ; and so, too, are 

 the two volumes of the illustrated edition of Bentham's British Flora, wherein wood cuts of 

 every British plant are given, though to a rather small scale. To these we may, perhaps, be 

 pardoned, if we add a work on Plant Form, by the author of the present pages, in which 

 numerous plants, adapted to ornamental purposes, are drawn to a large size, and analysed with a 

 special view to art-treatment. 



A few details, in conclusion, before passing to plate 5, concerning the plants partially 

 illustrated on the present plate. 



The Sycamore (Acer pseudo platanus, fig. 36) — so called from a slight resemblance the 

 tree bears to the true Sycamore (Ficus Sycamorus) of the East — though not indigenous, is suffi- 

 ciently common for most of our readers to have frequently seen it. It is one of the very few 

 trees in which the leaves are arranged in pairs— the Ash, Maple, and Horse Chestnut being the 

 other examples. The leaves of the Sycamore are often, during the autumnal months, found 

 covered with purplish, black, irregular blotches : a feature that the ornamentist will make a note 

 of as it comes under his observation. These stains are caused by Xyloma acermum, a fungoid 

 growth. The flowers, green in colour, and in long, drooping clusters, appear in May ; they are, 

 however, too small, both in their details, and even in the aggregate, to be of practical service 

 to the designer, though the winged fruit that succeeds them is a very suggestive and beautiful 

 ornamental form. We are not aware of any existing instance of the use of the Sycamore in 

 decorative art, though the Maple (Acer campestre), an allied species, is, as we shall see in 

 speaking of that plant, one of the greatest favourites of the carvers, during the Decorated period 

 of Gothic. 



The Pelargonium, or Geranium leaf (fig. 37), is one of the numerous forms produced by 

 cultivation : a form so familiar to all, that we need not — having already referred to it — dwell 

 further upon it. 



Fig. 38 is the leaf of the Corn Convolvulus (Convolvulus arvensis), a very beautiful and 

 common plant, strewing the bank with its profusion of pink and white flowers, or twining in a 

 graceful spiral up the stems of the growing corn. An exceedingly beautiful plant for any light 

 class of design, as, for instance, muslins, damasks, or lace. An instance of its use in the art- 

 work of the past may be seen at the end of one of the stalls in Wells Cathedral ; the leaves, 

 however, alone being represented. It is sometimes called the Small Bindweed, in contradistinction 

 to an ally, the Calystegia sepium, or Great Bindweed, the large, white Convolvulus of our hedges. 



The Sweet-William (Dianthus barbatus, fig. 39), a native of Southern Europe, is a 

 very favourite flower in cottage gardens. The heads of blossoms show a very considerable 

 variety of tint ; but in almost, if not quite, all, the characteristic ring of colour, either darker or 

 lighter than the ground, is present. Many of the pinks and carnations in cultivation also show 

 this feature very clearly. The familiar name of the present plant does not, as one might suppose, 

 commemorate some rustic hero, but is a good illustration of the curious modifications that plant 

 names are sometimes found to undergo. Its name in France is Oeillet, a little eye, in allusion 

 to the pupil-like central spot seen in many of the flowers, and, the original significance being lost 

 in crossing the Channel, the transition to Willy, and thence to Sweet-William, was easy ; as the 

 illiterate will always modify a word that is meaningless to them into something that, however wide 

 of the mark, seems more familiar ; thus the word Asparagus, originally derived from a Greek 

 word, signifying to tear (many of the species beins: armed with. sharp spines), being thus without 



