452 



AMERICAN HOMES AND GARDENS 



December, 1907 



The Culture of the White Lilac 



By W. G. Fitz-Gerald 



MIRACLE almost as wonderful as that of 

 Aaron's rod, which "brought forth buds 

 and bloomed blossoms," is wrought every 

 year in fair France, the home of hosts of 

 dainty things. Everyone will remember 

 the vast open-air flower farms of Provence, 

 especially at Grasse, near Cannes. Here 

 millions of pounds of roses, violets and lilies are converted 

 into essential oils for the world's perfume. 



But France also does an immense traffic in costly cut 

 blooms, which make beautiful all the homes of northern 

 Europe when winter's hand has laid the garden flowers aside. 

 In fact, the day when berry and bough were the principal 



home decorations in winter seems to be gone forever. Even 

 the exquisite white lilac is forced to perfection in less than 

 three weeks by a marvel of scientific gardening, and that 

 from dried rods that look like worthless brushwood, fit only 

 for the fire. Many people in London and Paris think that 

 these masses of exquisite blossoms come from the sunny 

 South, where they have blown and thriven in a warm and 

 generous soil kissed by the sun of genial Provence. 



But nothing could be further from the fact. It is the 

 neighborhood of Paris itself, with a winter climate little 

 better than London's own, that supplies most of the white 

 lilac used in Europe. And it is beneath the dull cold skies 

 that threaten Vitry-sur-Seine and Fontenay-les-Roses that the 



: >if)j|i|i 



Arranging the Blooms for Shipment to the Cities 



