12 AUGUST 1949, Page 16

In the Garden Everyone will have noticed the efforts of

makers of garden catalogues to describe colour. "Terra-cotta-salmon" is one such phrase. In one catalogue, kirsten and karcn, those almost indistinguishable Poulsen polyan- thuses, have not a single colour word in common. Fewer readers will have noticed the careful avoidance of certain colour words. " Magenta " is utterly taboo, for the very good reason that it is generally unpopular. Where a magenta flower is for sale it must be called by some such phrase as " a rich purple." One of the most hardly used words, interpreted differ- ently by different people, is carmine. Perhaps cinnabar is a word that might be given It wider currency, though the colour is not common.

W. BEAD( THOMAS. W. BEAD( THOMAS.