She was a botanist, and painted a little.

So were most of the lady gardeners of her youth.

The education of women was, as a rule, poor enough in those days; but a study of "the Linnean system" was among the elegant accomplishments held to "become a young woman"; and one may feel pretty sure that even a smattering of botanical knowledge, and the observation needed for third or fourth-rate flower-painting, would tend to a love of variety in beds and borders which Ribbon-gardening would by no means satisfy.

_Lobelia erinus speciosa_ does make a wonderfully smooth blue stripe in sufficient quantities, but that would not console any one who knew or had painted _Lobelia cardinalis_, and _fulgens_, for the banishment of these from the garden.
I think we may dismiss Ribbon-gardening as unfit for a botanist, or for any one who happens to like _grubbing_, or tending his flowers.
Is it ever "fit" in a little garden?
Well, if the owner has either no taste for gardening, or no time, it may be the shortest and brightest plan to get some nurseryman near to fill the little beds and borders with Spring bedding plants for Spring (and let me note that this _Spring bedding_, which is of later date than the first rage for ribbon-borders, had to draw its supplies very largely from "herbaceous stuff," _myosotis_, _viola_, _aubretia_, _iberis_, &c., and may have paved the way for the return of hardy perennials into favour), and with Tom Thumb Geranium, Blue Lobelia, and Yellow Calceolaria for the summer and autumn.

These latter are most charming plants.