All Japanese love flowers. Girls are taught how to arrange flowers at school, where every girl must know the art of flower arrangement before becoming a bride.
The Japanese have rules for arranging flowers, just as we have rules for playing games. One of the rules is that the tallest flower in the bowl or vase symbolizes heaven, and the shorter, the earth, and the medium-sized sprinkler, the man.
Little Japanese girls sometimes try to teach their dolls how to arrange flowers.
Nellie, a flower arrangement doll, was given to an American girl, the daughter of an American missionary living in Japan, over forty years ago. Nelly is the name of the American doll.