The most important matter in choosing flowers for March is to suggest the imminent arrival of Spring.

　　The tamatebako camellia, the blooms of which maintain a globular form, has gained its name because it opens its outer petals only one by one, much as one would slowly take out of a chest of jewels one treasure after another. In addition, in part its buds bear fine scarlet stripes, highly suggestive of the plaited silk cords with which such a chest would, in Japan, once have been kept closed. The whiteness of its petals is far purer than that of other species of camellia, and a thorough use of an atomizer filled with water, in order to bedew it after arrangement, will further bring out the pristine beauty of those petals. Kibushi can only be described as, for March, the ultimate choice of twig from a flowering tree. If one finds that its little flowers cluster too thickly, then a tactful reduction of their numbers is advisable.

　　The green-and-yellow-striped Japanese bamboo is a rare plant that has, due to its rarity, been in some areas designated as a natural monument. Its special characteristics are that, between node and node, one part of its stem will bear a broad stripe of green, while the rest is of a yellow both deep enough and yet sufficiently bright to remind one of gold; and that the location of this lateral alternation of hues differs entirely, between different pairs of nodes. 1