Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1904-10-29

ensd with determination are the victims.
not OF commercial exploitation. but Of
Tower loving children. and even less dis
eliminating adults enjoying outings in for
est and field. The wild Flower Pressrva-
ZION society realizes the validity Of this
craving Tor wild plants, and does not seek
TO uproot 1t. but hopes through its Ice
lures In America and primarily through
the medium Of public school instruction
TO create more artistic taste among COL
Valuable Suggestions.
The convention at Philadelphia will prob
ably issue q memorial to tho American
people setting forth. among other things.
that q choice bouquet Of wild flowers 10
really more beautiful than heaped arm
ful. Steps are to be taken. however. to
provide blossoms in abundance. and fields
or sturdy viOlets, wild carrots and daisies
ana groves OF hardy Towering trees may
pc extensively dedicated to children by
school boards and municipalities, II the
plans of the Wild Flower Society are popu-
larly adopted.
An important work of the convention. it
10 expected. will be an effort to counterfeit
the ultra-sentamentallsm that protests
against the conversion of fields Of flowers
INTO acres OF corn and wheat, the reclama-
ton OF lily-gr0wn swamps into useful areas
and the encroachment of expanding cities
upon green hills and valleys In the suburbs.
This bizarre resentment against the normal
Increase of urban and agricultural districts
has had tendency to repel popular inter-
est In the wild flower preservation move
ment. Sensitive botanists, for example.
have inveighed against the draining OF q
swamp near Bronx Park, New York. Incl
dent to building operations, because this
necessary Improvement destroyed q mass
of marsh marigolds. Another swamp had
for years produced in great beauty pogonia
and calopogan. and when this was filled in
to make room for the march of Greater
New York esthetic critics set up the COM
plant that these delicate orchids grew in
no other part of Manhattan, and that there
fore the swamp should have been preserved
undisturbed. The idea that the extension
of the city streets and the building of
stores. dwellings and apartment houses
should pause to let pogonia and calopogan
multiply In marsh Is an extreme view,
not advocated by the society as whole.
Carrying It Too Far.
Between the census Of 1850 and 1900 the
tillable area of the state of Indiana was in
creased 80 per cent largely through the
reclamation Of swamps, and sensible bot
anists regard with disfavor the protest that
would lament the acres of marigolds, lilies
and orchids that have made way in that
state for profitable crops of corn and rye.
Yet an ardent botanist of the extreme
type complained publicly about the met
amorphosis into potatoe patch OF field
where "trillium cerunum" had formerly
held sway. And there has been esthetic
outcry because woods, Splendored with the
painted cup, have given place to fields of
grain and pink crypuediums In forests have
been sacrificed to the legitimate activities
of the lumber business, and because azaleas
In city suburbs have been plOwed under in
the process of extending macadamized
streets.
The personnel standing Of the manage
ment of the organization is sufficient to
warrant that such fantastic opposition to
material progress will not become part Of
the society's propaganda. Among those
prominent In the movement and-who viii
be conspicuous leaders of the national con-
vention at Philadelphia are Prof. Stanley
Coulter of Pudue University, DR.. Frederic
v. Colville chief botanist of the United
States government; DR.. Charles Louis Pol
lard, formerly in charge or the botanical
exhibit of the National Museum; Prof;
Charles E. Bessey Of the University of
Nebraska, Dr. F. II. Knowlton of the Unitel
States geological survey, Dr. c. p. Waters
of Johns Hopkins University Mr.: Joseph
Beal of the Michigan Agricultural College
DIR. L. H. Bailey of Cornell, Mr. Walter
Deane of Cambridge, Mass; Mrs. N. L.
Britton of the New York Botanical Garden
DR.. c. p Millspaugh of the Field Columbian
Museum, Mr. G.. D. Peadle of Biltmore
Herbarium and DR.. William Trelease of the
Missouri botanical garden
The society has branches in number of
cities the most western being at Colorado
SPRINGS. but the organization has mem
hers in California and even in the Hawaiian
Islands
Contemplated Reforms.
One of the contemplated reforms, re-
rarded by the organization as sensible, is
directed against the practice of red lily
decorations in churches, especially when
these flowers are banked in great masses.
rThe society's argument on this subject will
he that such wholesale array of lilies Is in
artistic that this flower In It's natural en-
yIronment-one or two red lilies, setting OH
the blended green of briers, scrub naples
and milkweed-is good to look upon, but
that when gathered by the hundred and
ranged densely in church, the effect, to
naturalists and artists, is oppressive. This
general argument, in fact, Will be empha-
sized throughout the national campaign
which, it is expected is to emanate from
the philadelphia convention. The idea is to
impress upon the school children of America
and upon the public generally the fact that
wild plant life is most beautiful in its ma
tive environment, and that the pleasure of
ruthless picking is not to be compared with
the 10y Of unselfish admiration of the grow
ms flower
In this connection is to be cited the ma
t,onal custom of the people of Japan who
go out in multitudes to gaze upon lotus
flowers and cherry blossoms, but who re-
frain from picking them. Another reform
aims at the elimination or wild plants from
weddings. Recently a fad has developed,
which insists upon wild flowers for nuptfal
decorations. and the competition in display
has created demand for the rarest species,
so that a new menace has been added to the
threatened determination of certain plants.
The Philadelphia conventions task of
adopting a national program that will ena-
able all botanists and other nature lovers to
work with coordination of purpose Will be
a difficult one and one of considerable pub
lie interest.
Dumley-"Newman tells me he Is growing