Flowers Blooming In And Out Of Season

( Originally Published 1913 )

IN Japan flowers which bloom in their proper season are the most highly esteemed and are considered the most suitable for gifts. When flowers blooming in season are arranged with flowers which have been forced into bloom in advance of or kept after their usual time of blossom, the seasonable flowers will always take the highest positions. Heaven and Man will be made of the seasonable flowers, and only Earth may be of those blooming out of their time.

FIowers blooming out of season would never be chosen for a present by a Japanese nor used as decorations for an entertainment. In fact a Japanese never attaches any value to flowers or fruit forced out of their proper season; strawberries in January have no charms for him. In presenting flowers to a friend they always send them in buds, so that the friend may experience the pleasure of seeing the flowers open in his own home;. and a branch of a non-flowering tree would be given while its Ieaves were forming, so that the pleasure of watching the leaves unfold would not be lost.