COMMONPLACE NOTES. 



469 



COMMONPLACE NOTES. 



Verandahs and Tea Houses. 



Fellows often want advice on the designs of Verandahs and Tea 

 Houses. Fig. 115 is an illustration of Lady Theodora Guest's most 

 elegant Tea House at Inwood. The illustration is excellent so far 

 as it goes, but it fails, of course, to give any suggestion of colour, and 

 this is a very strong point with the Tea House in question. The roof 

 and dome are of bright green copper, reminding one on a small scale of 

 the green roofs of Dresden ; the six uprights of delicate wrought-iron 

 work are painted red ; and the floor is of a pink Italian composition, 

 edged with white marble. 



The Verandah is very broad, so that it affords a delightful shelter 

 from the sun on a hot summer's day, furnished as it is with large 

 wicker armchairs and plenty of cushions, and with tables to match. 

 There is ample space for eight or ten friends to sit there in comfort 

 any time from May to October and enjoy the tea and gossip which 

 ladies so much delight in. 



Lady Theodora has tried various creepers to clothe lightly without 

 concealing the beautiful ironwork, and, after a good deal of trial and 

 experience with such things as Hoyas and Passion-flowers and such 

 like, has discarded them all in favour of Cobaea scandens, which is seen 

 in the illustration. The flowers begin to open in June, and the plant's 

 growth is so rapid that it very quickly covers the front of the Verandah 

 without in any way concealing it. The flowers, which are most 

 artistic as to both form and colour, are followed by the beautiful seed- 

 cases which, as may be seen in the illustration, hang gracefully down 

 somewhat like glorified acorns, 3 inches long, and of a rich, dark, polished 

 green colour. These seed-cases, later on, open into three elongated 

 segments, and the arrangement of the seeds inside is something to 

 admire and to wonder at. Even in the last closing days of November, 

 the festoons of flowers and of fruit are both still full of beauty and 

 vigour. 



The late Sir Joseph Dalton Hooker, V.M.H. 



Sir Joseph Dalton Hooker passed away in 191 1 full of years and 

 honours ; the greatest systematic botanist of his day, and one of the 

 great men of the Victorian era, honoured wherever botany is studied. 

 As Director of Kew, where he followed his father and developed his 

 work, he was in close touch with the garden as well as with the 

 herbarium, and his connexion with our Society was a long and useful 

 one. He was appointed Chairman of the Scientific Committee on 



