Choosing Flowers for Their Color 
III—A GUIDE TO THE PINK FLOWERS, WITH DIRECTIONS FOR 
THEIR USE IN GARDEN EFFECTS WITH BLUE AND YELLOW 
by Mary Youngs 
COLOR more difficult of management in the garden than 
one would suppose is the apparently simple pink. There 
are so many pink flowers, and some so lovely, that at first glance 
it seems the easiest thing on earth to use them, but in their very 
variety lies the difficulty, for the various hues often fail to har¬ 
monize, and the catalogues give little help, all pinks, apparently, 
being “rose.” It is true that the blue- or rose-pinks far exceed 
the yellow- or cream-pinks in number. The earliest of these 
blue-pinks is the pale Scilia campanu- 
lata; then come the hyacinths, both 
pale and deep, and the clear, bright 
rose of the English daisy ( Beilis per- 
ennis). Next comes Thrift ( Armena 
maritima ), a bright Tyrian pink, 
which makes a gay but somewhat 
“Dutchy” edging for the border. An¬ 
other early rose pink, luxuriant in 
bloom, but apt to be poor in color, is 
the Moss Pink ( Phlox subulata). 
There is a variety (Rosea) of a good, 
soft tint, but one is never sure of get¬ 
ting it, and the commonest variety is 
too purple for beauty. 
A charming flower of early May is 
the bleeding heart (Dicentra specta- 
bilis). The foliage is graceful and of 
a pretty, pale green, and the drooping 
sprays of heart-shaped flowers, each 
with a “drop” of carmine hanging 
from the “heart,” are a glistening, 
rose pink. Dicentra fonnosa, or exi- 
mea, is later, smaller and an 
color. 
Nearly all the early pink bedding 
tulips are rose in hue; some deep, 
some very pale, but practically all with 
the tinge of blue. The May-flowering 
tulips are also rose, or marked with 
rose; “Picotee, or Maiden's Blush,” is 
an old favorite, “white-margined, 
deep rose”; “Inglescombe Pink” is de¬ 
scribed by a dealer as “soft, rosy 
pink, with a salmon flush,” but it gives 
a bluer effect in mass than this would 
indicate. A fine Darwin of the deep, rose-pink called rosolane 
purple (a sort of paler “American Beauty” color) is “Nauticas,” 
and it is one of the largest; also “Baronne de la Tonnaye” is a 
good rose pink. “Ethel Roosevelt,” a “clear, soft rose, shaded 
darker, and “Mrs. Cleveland,” a lovely, pale rose hardly deeper 
than a blush white. 1 he colors of the Rose Bybloemen are hard 
and not good. 
1 here are lovely rose-pink columbines, one a delicate pale rose, 
and one a color hard to describe, as it varies somewhat, but per¬ 
haps the old-fashioned name of “crushed raspberry” explains it 
as well as any. 1 here is also at this time a pink perennial lupine 
(L. polyphyllus rosens) , which begins life a pale rose pink, but 
it turns an ugly purple as it ages, so cut it off when its youth is 
past. 
ugly 
Among the early flowers the little English daisy is to be had 
in a clear, bright rose 
The little daphne ( Cneorum, usually listed as a shrub) is a rose 
pink of a creamy quality; it is not conspicuous, and is a little 
fussy to establish, but it blossoms twice, in May and September, 
and has a most exquisite perfume. 
The pale rose, single Pyrethrum hybridum is a lovely color; the 
deeper ones are too deep for use in a pink border. The pretty 
Grass Pinks (Dianthns plumarius ) are a good, soft rose, some 
with an amaranth eye and some without. The “Maiden Pinks” 
are a very good color, and so are the 
“Vermont Pinks,” but the variety 
“Fettes Mount,” listed as rose pink, 
are an ugly light mallow purple. 
An unusual soft Tyrian pink is An- 
tranthus ruber, occasionally listed as 
Valeriana rubra. This is the “Va¬ 
lerian” of English walls and cliffs, and 
is distinctly different from the true 
“Valerian" (V. officinalis ), for which 
it is sometimes sold. True Tyrian 
pink is a little harsh, like Thrift, but 
the Antranthus is a lovely color, like 
deep, pink smoke. 
Fraxinella ( Dictamnus ) is a flower 
of lovely form, but the hue a little 
too blue for easy combination; better 
use the white variety, which is charm¬ 
ing. Under this color-head come also 
the old-fashioned Pceonia officinalis 
rosea, and the pink fox-gloves; these 
might follow the Tulip “Nauticas” in 
the border, being of much the same 
rosolane purple, or deep blue-pink. 
Most of the pink peonies are of the 
rose tones; “Mme. Forel,” deep; 
“Livingston,” pale, and “Mme. de 
Galhaw,” very pale, are good ones. 
Most of the sweet williams—pink, 
pink-and-white, and crimson-and- 
white—give the effect in mass of a 
clear, deep rose pink, but there are an 
eosine, or bright, cream pink, a deep 
Bordeaux red (called black-crimson), 
and a scarlet, or deep rose doree, 
which do not enter this class. There 
are clear, pale, rose-pink Campanula of all three kinds—annual, 
biennial and perennial. The hardy and decorative Lilium spe- 
ciosum roseum gives an effect in mass of a lovely, clear rose pink. 
Physostegia Virginica (Obedient Plant) is of the palest amaranth, 
almost over the line into lilac. 
There is an interesting “red” rudbeckia (var. purpurea), 
almost impossible to class; it is a deep, blue-pink, but it is over¬ 
laid with a shrimp-pink, and the conspicuous cone is bronze, 
tipped with yellow—and whether to call the whole effect purple, 
rose or bronze, is a proposition ! But it is most effective and worth 
experiment. 
A most delightful rose-pink phlox is “Selma,” and “Mme. Paul 
Dutrie” is a charming amaranthine pink, very pale. There are a 
number of rose-hued dahlias; the prolific, little, old-fashioned 
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