44 
House & Garden 
BOUQUETS THE WINTER THROUGH 
'•Hi*' 
Wild, Flowers and Grasses and Even Many from the Cultivated Garden 
Can Be Collected Now for the Flowerless Months 
EVELYN CRAIG CORLETT 
T 
Teazel from the waste 
sandy places bears hooked 
spines and tiny lilac 
flowers 
"'HE most valuable 
subjects for dried 
bouquets are the com¬ 
mon wild flowers and 
grasses of fields and 
woods. That one may 
know where to find 
these various plants in 
the autumn, it is well 
to learn their habitat 
and appearance during 
their growing period. 
Then while walking or 
riding through the 
country, the location of 
particular specimens 
should be noted for a 
visit at the time when 
they are ready for pick¬ 
ing. 
On almost every 
stretch of open meadow 
and along every roadside the tall prairie dock 
and wild lettuce attract attention because of 
their large leaves, often a foot in length. Few 
observers realize that their leaves turn their 
edges due North and South, which gives both 
the name of compass weed. Many a traveler 
astray on the prairie has been guided by these 
natural compasses. Dock leaves are entire 
with finely serrated edges while those of the 
wild lettuce are deeply cut, giving them a less 
robust appearance. It must have been the 
latter of which Longfellow wrote in Evange¬ 
line: 
Look at this delicate 
plant that lifts its 
head from the 
meadow; 
See how its leaves 
all point to the 
North as true as 
the magnet. 
In the autumn the 
leaves of both these 
plants twist and curl 
into interesting 
forms and turn to a 
beautiful brown. 
They should be 
gathered in October 
before winds whip 
and fray them. The 
prairie dock leaves 
particularly furnish 
a fine base for deco¬ 
ration where large 
masses are desired, 
and, combined with 
feathery blooms, 
give a pleasing 
change from the 
conventional palms 
or ferns that so many 
householders choose 
for winter. 
At a recent floral 
exhibit, the landing 
of a wide staircase 
Piairie dock and moth mullein can be 
combined, the curled leaves of the dock 
offering a pleasant contrast to the. daintv 
brown balls of the other wild flower 
was flanked by large jars filled with tall wavy 
plumes of Japanese plume grass with a few 
dock leaves close to the top of the jars and 
touches of brilliant col¬ 
or given the tan and 
brown mass by a scat¬ 
tering of Chinese lan¬ 
tern pods of orange red. 
Where more formal 
decoration is suitable, 
dock leaves are com¬ 
bined with the stately 
lotus, honored from 
ancient times, but un¬ 
fortunately found in 
but few favored spots 
in this country. Its 
top-shaped seed pods 
with flat surface deeply 
pitted, each hollow 
holding a marble-like 
seed of the same soft 
Honesty, beloved of our 
brown as the compass grandmothers, still con- 
a r„__. _ r 1 , tributes to the winter 
bouquet 
Both the dock leaves 
An early spring bouquet can be made of laurel and pussy willow The laurel 
months. Set m a large floor )ar, as in this music room , they make a rarely 
to a room Walker & Gillette,' architects 
leaves. A few of each 
in a tall bouquet make 
a dignified ornament, 
and lotus pods are sometimes painted irides 
cent colors, giving a decidedly Egyptian touch 
to the decoration. 
The closely clustered seed spikes of common 
■dieep sorrel, and the various docks retain their 
coloring if gathered in midsummer before fully 
ripe, when the colors shade from delicate pink 
to crimson brown. If hung heads down in a 
dark closet until thoroughly dried they are 
valuable material for use with grasses. 
Many wild flowers if picked in full bloom, 
lose little of their 
color in drying. One 
of the most abun¬ 
dant of these is liat- 
ris or blazing star, 
known in practically 
every section of the 
United States. In 
midsummer many 
meadows are waving 
seas of rose lavender 
due to this so-called 
weed which grows to 
a height of 6' with 
flower spikes of 12" 
or more in length. 
A bouquet of liatris 
in a tall vase of har¬ 
monious tone gives 
one of the best ex¬ 
amples of the value 
of dried flowers 
where a note of dig¬ 
nity and grace is 
needed. Few, if any, 
flowers from the 
winter greenhouse 
have form or color 
suitable to such a 
position. 
Resembling the 
liatris somewhat in 
size and color and 
of the same numer¬ 
ous composite family 
is the ironweed — 
bete noire of the 
will keep its color for 
beautiful contribution 
