Severin Roesen’s dewy summer bouquet spills out of a footed glass ordinarily used to serve celery stalks on Victorian dinner tables. For 19th-century viewers interested in botany, the painting’s fidelity to sharp naturalism would have been most appealing. The prolific display also captures the optimistic vision of pre-Civil War Americans who saw themselves as beneficiaries of God's blessings in an abundant New World. Yet abundance goes hand in hand with a precarious existence, the message often sent by 17th-century Dutch still life painters who inspired Roesen. Morning glory tendrils twine round a nest filled with fragile bird’s eggs, while several roses, having tumbled out of the vase, will soon wither on the marble table.