LIBRAR 
NEW y¥c 
BOTANIC 
GARDE 
PUBLISHER'S PREFACE. 
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saw the light, great changes have been brought about—changes which demand 
to be recognised in a work such as this aims to be, In nomenclature alone 
they have been exceedingly numerous, and plant names which had become almost 
household words have now been usurped by others unknown to any but botanists. 
Familiar examples of such changes may be cited in the Pampas Grass, formerly 
Gynerium argenteum, but now OCortaderia argentea, and in Ampelopsis tricuspidata 
(Syn. A. Veitchii), now known as Vitis inconstans. 
Ss: the first Part of NicHoLson’s “DICTIONARY OF GARDENING” first 
In Horticultural practice a more extended experience with certain plants has resulted 
in the overthrow of some of the long-cherished notions entertained in regard to their 
treatment, necessitating some considerable modifications. And in no section perhaps 
is this more clearly shown than in Orchids on the one hand, or in Fruit Culture, 
both out of doors and under glass, on the other. 
Certain groups of plants, like most other things, haye had their day. Old 
favourites have gone and new ones have taken their place. Their prominence for the 
time may be due to Fashion alone; or it may be, and still oftener is, due to 
the fact that the florist has really improved upon existing forms by producing some- 
thing of still greater beauty and of more robust constitution, or has introduced 
something new of great merit. Who, for instance, twenty years ago could have 
foretold the advent of the beautiful, if over-named, Hybrid Water-Lilies associated 
with M. MARLIAC? Or, again, who could have anticipated those beautiful additions 
to our outside gardens, the Hardy Bamboos, for whose introduction we owe so much 
to Mr. FREEMAN MITFORD ? 
Considerable progress has been made in what are termed Florists’ Flowers— 
Dahlias, Roses, Violas, Carnations, Gladioli, Narcissi, &c.—and these plants of to-day 
are vastly different from those of the time of the first publication of the 
“DICTIONARY OF GARDENING”; and life-histories of Insects and Mites, as well 
as of Parasitic Fungi, have been so accurately worked out by entomologists and : 
plant-pathologists that the methods of dealing with foes generally have been 
considerably improved upon. 
The above are suggestive of some of the many and great changes which have 
taken place in the last two decades. How best to adequately deal with them, in 
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