ns, with a comfortable complacency, satisfied with their
own share of fortune's goods, and benevolently disposed toward their
less favored neighbors?

To be sure much can not be said of the _artistic_ capabilities of some
of these cronies. One does not care to transfer marigolds, poppies,
lilacs, phlox, cockscomb, and cabbage-roses from their own garden-homes
to the more elevated sphere of domestic life. But snow-balls,
'flaunting' petunias, double hollyhocks, China asters, and tulips, they
certainly are available. By the way, what business have the juvenile
story-books to stigmatize tulips as vain and proud? The splendid things
have a right to be conscious of their glorious clothing. Who gave it
them? And dahlias, what purples, crimsons, and oranges they boast!
Formal they may be, but, at least in Yankee parlance, _handsome_, and
when arranged with woodbine-leaves October's earliest frosts have
painted, can there be a finer expression of the season of autumn?

In this connection one remembers Miss Mitford and her charming history
of the loss of her yellow pride--the Apollo among dahlias. Lovable Miss
Mitford! how pleasant would have been a flower-talk with her!

Now, having owned to so many shockingly low tastes, no one would, I
presume, be surprised to hear me avow a _penchant_ for sun-flowers and
peonies, dear old-fashioned creatures that they are! Shall I plead in
excuse for my weakness for the coarsest of the flowers yet another
reason? They form to me, in their extent of surface and fullness of
color, the nearest approach our chilly New-England can make to the blaze
and vitality of the Southern flora. And I so long for the luxuriant
vegetation of the tropics, the gorgeous magnificence I have never
seen--even the magnolia has only been disclosed to my dreams.

I would not disparage delicate and fragile flowerets, though I am so
infatuated by their brilliant sisters. They are lovely to examine, and,
as individuals, very precious, but in my opinion useless for decorative
purposes. In a body they confuse one another, and you can not _mass_
their colors.

This remark is also very applicable to wild flowers, which, moreover, be
they large or small, possess additional disqualifications for proper
arrangement. They are not at ease in cultivated atmospheres. Violets and
anemones--their sacredness, innocence, and peace--require the soothing
airs of woodland solitudes. Drawn from secret nooks and haunts into the
garish