No one knows exactly when the custom of adorning the home with flowers and potted plants arose, though man's love of flowers and blossoms goes back in its history to the most ancient of ages.

Among the earliest writings on the subject is a book entitled Flora Domestica, of 1824, con-taining a precise and complete description of the methods then followed for adorning homes with flowers and plants. And in another book that appeared in English in 1859, called Elegant Arts for Ladies, it was said that natural decorations and flowers, when arranged with sound taste, cast over the home an elegant

and splendid mantle — above all when the furnishings are not costly.

Toward the middle of the nineteenth century, the art of adorning homes with flowers and plants reached in the West a peak whose like was unknown in the history of nations — not even the most anciently steeped in luxury and taste. It rose to the rank of the fine arts in the Victorian age, when the leading critics on the subject declared that the garden had entered the house for the first time in that era.

The amateurs of those days showed great ingenuity: they planted beautiful plants — some of them from the tropical regions — in splendid porcelain and glass vessels to adorn the reception rooms, dining rooms, and bedrooms, adding to the beauty of the furnishings

touches of nature's enchant-ing masterpieces.

This art developed appreciably in the closing years of the last century, until the mistresses of great houses came to use vessels of various shapes in which they planted exquisite plants — for adornment first of all, and in place of certain furnishings. Some kinds of house plants were grown in special vessels and trained so as to be set in the windows with the curtains, shutting out the glare and the violent drafts of air. Other plants were grown in beautiful crystal or porcelain vessels to be set against the walls of the house or upon the dining table, casting an air of delightful gardens and bowers. And some went so far as to fashion arbors and canopies of roses and their foliage in the halls of mansions — true marvels of art and taste.