OF FLOWERING PLANTS. 1o 



error; they arc anxious to speed, while they are doing all they can to 

 impede. 



However, all plants do not require the same length, or perhaps 

 the same season of repose ; but the law is general, and the exceptions 

 must be corrected in practice. A good collection may contain plants 

 from all the quarters of the globe : some may have been obtained 

 from the recesses of the forest, where sunlight never shone on its re- 

 treat ; others from the mountain side, where a pure air and clear light 

 was ever around it : all this points out to the intelligent cultivator the 

 necessity of making himself intimately acquainted with all that per- 

 tains to his plants individually ; the country they come from, their 

 widest range of distribution in that country, all the various elementary 

 influences to which they are there subjected, the soil in which they 

 attain their greatest luxuriance, both in flower and foliage ; in fact, 

 every fact connected with their native habitats becomes very useful 

 in one way or other. Where this knowledge is attained cultivation 

 becomes something more than the work of chance — it eminently ranks 

 as one of the fine arts ; in fact, it is only when thus followed out, that 

 an intelligent mind derives from it that lofty degree of pleasure that 

 it is so well fitted to yield, when the result of diligent study comes up 

 to the standard of expectation, and success can be traced not to 

 chance, but to skill and forethought. 



Our advice to every amateur who can afford it, is to purchase some 

 standard work on the physiology of plants, and make himself 

 thorough master of it in all its details. It is not a dry and uninter- 

 esting theme, but one richly fraught with pleasure, and, moreover, 

 he will be constantly seeing, in attending on his collection, illustra- 

 tions of his studies. He will as certainly see cause producing effect in 

 this as in any other art. He will learn to give impulse to the efforts 

 of nature instead of obstructing her obvious relations ; and this is the 

 most common fault among amateur cultivators, they oftener kill 

 through excessive attention than neglect ; the means are different but 

 the end is the same, death follows either. 



lie will also learn many useful lessons by keeping his eyes open 

 when he has an opportunity of being in the country; every mountain, 

 wood, and glade, are ever ready to offer some illustration of the 

 great laws by which nature is governed. He will often see instances 

 of plants having come under the influence of some accidental circum- 



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