HERBACEOUS GARDEN 
82 
I / . . . ... 
/ But take the highly polished gold of gold 
plate, and can anything be brighter ? Anyone 
who has seen a Royal collection of gold plate, 
filling one side of a room from ceiling to side- 
board, will know that golden and dazzling 
are synonymous, and that even “ vivid ” or 
“ brilliant ” yellow does not quite interpret 
“ golden.” Moreover, the expression has, by 
length of usage, come to mean this highest 
effect of any colour, the highest in the gamut, 
and no one would think of connecting it with 
the colour of a sovereign, when seeing it used 
as a description. 
Where a catalogue really runs riot is when 
purples and mauves are described. At this 
moment I have a bloom of Iris stylosa in front 
of me, of the warmest, most vivid mauve, like 
a very well-grown Marie Louise violet, or a 
certain variety of Cattleya orchid. This iris 
is described by one of our best firms as a 
“lavender blue.” Now, the lavender is grey, 
with a small, not very light purple flower, and 
the effect is quiet, not to say dull. The 
generally accepted tint of lavender, as applied 
to kid gloves, is a pale grey with perhaps a 
tinge of blue or mauve- — at any rate the 
coolest, lightest of tints, far remote from the 
vivid flower facing me. 
