Page:Japanese flower arrangement.djvu/62

 First. The idea that your arrangement is to represent a living plant, not cut flowers.

Second. By form of arrangement to suggest the season of the year.

Third. Suggest the nature of the growth of the plant you are arranging by the proper use of buds, open flowers, and withered leaves.

Fourth. Be sure to keep all the branches or stems together at the base for at least four inches above the surface of the water, to form the parent stalk. This is most important. Branches separated at the base are very badly arranged. The surface of the water in which the flowers are placed represents the surface of the soil from which the group springs; so that here you want to convey the impression of strength and a vigorous origin. For four or five inches the stems or branches must follow the same line. This need not always be a strictly vertical one, but if curved, the curves must be strong and avoid all weak bends and angles. This is a most important rule, for without [56]