The Flower Book. Written by Constance Armfield. Pictured by Maxwell
Armfield. (Chatto and Winans. 7s. 6d.)-The flowers "confabulate," sometimes perhaps a little too sentimentally-one has to consider for whom these talks are meant-but still in a pleasing way. And they teach some good lessons : books of this kind are bound to be didactic. It is a happy idea, for instance, when the nasturtium has invaded the herb garden, consecrated to utility, though not divorced from beauty, and finds that he too is useful with his capers. The next chapter, about the evening prim- rose, we should class with the over-sentimental. Mr. Armfield's pictures are full of grace and delicacy. The flowers, we should say, vary in rank and position ; some represent the meadow and the hedge, others the garden, and others again the pool. The peacock in the convolvulus picture puzzles us. If he is in stone, this should be hinted in the text.
Previous page
