Identify main idea of each paragraph of Gilrays Flower Pot I charge Gilray's unreasonableness to his ignoble1
passion for cigarettes; and the story of his flower-pot
has therefore an obvious moral. The want of dignity he
displayed about that flower-pot, on his return to
London, would have made any one sorry for him. I had
my own work to look after, and really could not be
tending his chrysanthemum2 all day. After he came
back, however, there was no reasoning with him, and I
admit that I never did water his plant, though always
intending to do so.

The great mistake was in not leaving the flower-pot in
charge of William John. No doubt I readily promised to
attend to it, but Gilray deceived me by speaking as if
the watering of a plant was the merest pastime. He had
to leave London for a short provincial tour, and, as I
see now, took advantage of my good nature.

As Gilray had owned his flower-pot for several
months, during which time (I take him at his word) he
had watered it daily, he must have known he was
misleading me. He said that you got into the way of
watering a flower-pot regularly just as you wind up
your watch. That certainly is not the case. I always
wind up my watch, and I never watered the flower-pot.
Of course, if I had been living in Gilray's rooms with
the thing always before my eyes I might have done so.
I proposed to take it into my chambers at the time, but
he would not hear of that. Why? How Gilray came by
this chrysanthemum I do not inquire; but whether, in
the circumstances, he should not have made a clean
breast of it to me is another matter. Undoubtedly it was
an unusual thing to put a man to the trouble of watering
a chrysanthemum daily without giving him its history.
My own belief has always been that he got it in
exchange for a pair of boots and his old dressing-gown.
He hints that it was a present; but, as one who knows
him well, I may say that he is the last person a lady
would be likely to give a chrysanthemum to. Besides, if
he was so proud of the plant he should have stayed at
home and watered it himself.

He says that I never meant to water it, which is not
only a mistake, but unkind. My plan was to run
downstairs immediately after dinner every evening and
give it a thorough watering. One thing or another,
however, came in the way. I often remembered about
the chrysanthemum while I was in the office; but even
Gilray could hardly have expected me to ask leave of
absence merely to run home and water his plant. You
must draw the line somewhere, even in a government
office.