Flowers and Gardens 



way in which all things, however appa- 

 rently incompatible, seem present and 

 blended together when the imaginative 

 faculty is at work. The common Star of 

 Bethlehem (Ornithogalum Mrnbellatum) is 

 a good illustration of the working of this 

 principle. When I look at the beautiful 

 silver white of the inner surface of the 

 petals, my mind is always dwelling upon 

 and rejoicing in the fact that their outer 

 side is green, though of that green outside 

 I cannot see a hair's-breadth. Again, we 

 find the same principle at work in the 

 feeling which compelled the old sculptors 

 to finish the hidden side of the statue. 

 They said, For the gods are every- 

 where."^ They meant that when they 

 looked upon their labours the imagination 

 would necessarily carry away their thoughts 

 to that hidden side, and that, if not finished 

 like the rest, it would have pained them 

 by its incompleteness. Of course, when 

 Snowdrops are placed together in a bunch, 

 we see in some the full beauty of the 

 interior, whilst the defects of that position 

 are covered by the presence of the sur- 

 rounding flowers. 



1 [Tcoj/ Beoav eucKa was the reason, and it was the rule 

 with the workmen of the Middle Ages : the inner hidden 

 side of arches, as of sedilia, was as carefully carved as the 

 conspicuous outside. — H. N. E.] 



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