The Streets Every Where Showed Men, Women, And Children, Carrying
Their Pots Of Blooming Flowers.
Every person in Paris named Louis or
Louise, after this saint, has received this day little tokens of
affection from their friends, generally bouquets or flowers.
Madame
Belloc is named Louise, and her different friends and children called
and brought flowers, and a beautiful India China vase.
The life of Paris, indeed of the continent, is floral, to an extent of
which the people in the United States can form no conception. Flowers
are a part of all their lives. The churches are dressed with flowers,
and on _fete_ days are fragrant with them. A _jardiniere_
forms a part of the furniture of every parlor; a _jardiniere_ is
a receptacle made in various fanciful forms for holding pots of
flowers. These pots are bought at the daily flower market for a
trifle, in full bloom and high condition; they are placed in the
_jardiniere,_ the spaces around them filled with sand and covered
with moss.
Again, there are little hanging baskets suspended from the ceilings,
and filled with flowers. These things give a graceful and festive air
to apartments. When the plants are out of bloom, the porter of the
house takes them, waters, prunes, and tends them, then sells them
again: meanwhile the parlor is ornamented with fresh ones. Along the
streets on saints' days are little booths, where small vases of
artificial flowers are sold to dress the altars. I stopped to look at
one of these stalls, all brilliant with cheaply-made, showy vases of
flowers, that sell for one or two sous.
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