The cloths and flowers used for a big dinner party given recently in London will illustrate the value of our present-day freedom. The hostess was willing to consider a variety of ideas. She favoured a shell-pink cloth, and after discussion it was decided to make it of a pale pink slipper satin. Do not think from this that there was any foolish degree of lavishness: cloths such as this do not necessarily indicate wild extravagance. This' shimmering, gleaming surface made an ideal foundation for flowers, and the simplest decoration was chosen—a wide low bowl holding a mass of garden lilies-of-the-valley. This sounds almost inadequate for a large and formal dinner party—but it was the association of the lilies with the colour and texture of the cloth that made it particularly effective. supplement low arrangements with one or two really high vases, espe-ally if the stem of the vase is thin One can easily see past it But however colour and shape may be varied in a low arrangement the restriction of height is limiting.
Sometimes one has an opportunity for quite a different plan. For a small table with only three, or five, or seven diners it may be possible to leave one end of the table unoccupied, and this gives one scope for a massed flower effect right across one end of the table. Here a lavish group may be made, as high and as wide as you may think ft. A Flemish group, for instance, of mixed fruit and flowers will suit certain tables and certain rooms uncommonly well, and if this is flanked by high and branching candelabra the result may be lovely. In summer a high, overflowing chalice Of wide-open garden roses is good, or trailing flowers such as passion flowers or Coboea Scandens lend themselves to a tazza. Here is an opportunity to use old silver or Sheffield plate without having to obscure its beauty by keeping the flowers As in all of these flower arrangements there must be suitable vases— something good in shape and of a colour and texture sympathetic to the flowers. Old silver pieces, wine coolers, potato rings, and cake baskets are good with greys, pale pinks, and blues; copper bowls with zinnias and dahlias and simple garden baskets are in keeping with country flowers. ers associated with the Lord Mayor's Fund. They hope to be able to do work for the camp refugees im Hankow but they are putting themselves in the hands of the International Red Cross.
The women are Dr. Marjory Edwards, who has spent five years in China in charge of the medical work of the Arthington Memorial Women's Hospital at Taiyuanfü. Shansi, and Miss E. L. Beckingsale. The former is a gynaecologist, and since leaving China in 1925 has been in practice in London.
Miss Beckingsale, whose home is High Wycombe, has already done fourteen years' educational work in China. She was in Hankow when the revolution broke out in 1911, end did a great deal of relief work there, and also with the famine refugees in North China. She is a trained psychotherapist, and both she and Dr. Edwards speak Chinese.
We believe we are right in stating that the Miss Beckingsale referred io is a cousin of Mrs. G. Hummel, formerly of Shanghai, who was a Beckingsale before marriage. She has often spoken about a cousin, Elsie Beckingsale, who did so much good work in China, and from her experiences at one time undermined her health. At the time of the revolution referred to, she was a prisoner and in dire straits, but intervention got her through safely.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.