IS 
the amateur’s flower garden. 
material for boundary lines, for relief agents, and for marking 
the rhythm of combinations. Every scheme that is to be 
viewed as a whole, must be coloured as a whole, and with the 
object of producing a complete and harmonious picture. What¬ 
ever the nature of the materials employed, certain principles 
must be followed to insure a satisfactory result. The strong 
colours must be spread pretty equally over the whole scheme 
with neutral and intermediate tints to harmonize and combine 
them. The colours containing most light, such as yellow, 
white, and pink, should be placed in the outer parts of the 
design, to draw it out to its full extent; and the heavier 
colours, such as scarlet, crimson, and purple, should occupy 
the more central portions of the scheme. The most difficult 
of all colours to dispose of satisfactorily is pure yellow, and its 
related tints of buff and orange. A bed of yellow calceo¬ 
larias in the centre of a group will be pretty sure to spoil it, 
no matter how skilfully in other respects it may be planted. 
But a few of the most conspicuously placed of the beds in 
the boundary of the pattern may be planted with calceolarias 
to assist in defining the arrangement. Bright and sharp 
edgings are eminently desirable, and it is a good point if 
the edgings are the same throughout, forming clear fillets of 
silvery or golden leafage, or some suitable flowering plant, 
which carries plenty of light in its colour. Objection may 
be taken to this rule, on the ground that beds containing 
plants that nearly approximate in tone to that of the general 
edging, will be spoiled if edged like the rest. But the objec¬ 
tion is superficial. When we cannot bring out the masses by 
means of the edgings, and it is desirable to have the boundary 
lines ahke all through, we must change our tactics, and bring 
out the edgings. For example, we are to suppose three beds 
filled with flowers. No. 1 contains scarlet < geraniums, and 
may be edged with a band of blue lobelia, and an outer de¬ 
fining line of silvery cerastium; No. 2 is filled with blue 
ageratum, and edged with a band of Purple King verbena, 
with a finishing line of cerastium. No. 3 consists of Mrs. 
Pollock geranium and blue lobelia, plant and plant, with a 
finishing band of lobelia, and a boundary line of cerastium. 
Thus, in three extremely different cases, the final fillet is the 
same without violation of harmony or detraction from the 
pronounced character of the beds. It is a matter equally im¬ 
portant and interesting, that a perfect hypothetical balance of 
