PREFACE. 



When I was a child, I never could learn 

 Botany. There was something in the Linnean 

 system (the only one then taught) excessively 

 repugnant to me ; I never could remember the 

 different classes and orders, and after several 

 attempts the study was given up as one too 

 difficult for me to master. When I married, 

 however, I soon found the necessity of knowing 

 something of Botany, as well as of Gardening. 

 I always acconipanied my husband in his visits 

 to different gardens ; and when we saw beauti- 

 ful flowers, I was continually asking the names, 

 though alks ! these names, when I heard them, 

 conveyed no ideas to my mind, and I was not' 

 any wiser than before. Still the natural wish 

 to know something of what we admire, impelled 

 me to repeat my fruitless questions ; till at last, 

 vexed at my ignorance, and ashamed of not 



