THOUGHTS ON GARDENING 89 



that it becomes a tight wrinkled hemisphere. The 

 beautiful hollyhock has a distinct wide outer 

 petticoat, and the inner portion is not so tightly 

 packed but that its component petals, though 

 closely grouped and loosely crumpled, admit of 

 the free play of light and colour. 



The undesirable influence of false ideal and of 

 the rage for novelty, rather than a calm judgment 

 of what is most beautiful, is also seen in the matter 

 of colour. Some flowers have naturally only a 

 tender tinting, which seems to be so much a part 

 of their true nature that attempts to force 

 them into stronger colouring can only detract from 

 their refinement. Such a plant is the delicious 

 mignonette, with a tender colouring that seems 

 like a modest self-depreciating introduction to its 

 delicious and wholesome quality of sweetness. The 

 slightly warmer shade of the anthers in the plant 

 of normal tinting, with a general absence of any 

 positively bright colouring, is exactly in accordance 

 with the plant's character, and with that modest 

 charm that gives it a warm place in every good 

 gardener's heart. But when, as in some of the so- 

 called improvements, the graceful head is aalarged 

 and condensed into a broad, thickened squatness, 

 with large brick-red anthers, the modest grace that 



12 



