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P R E P A C E. 



The success whicli has distinguished the "Hand-Book to 

 the Flower-Garden and Greenhouse," and the " Hand-Book 

 to the Kitchen-Garden and Orchard," both of which are being 

 revised for further editions, suggested the propriety of providing 

 a Manual of Practical Gardening, comprising plain instructions 

 for all the operations necessary in the culture of the ground, 

 commencing with draining, digging, and trenching, and going 

 through all the branches and departments of the art or 

 profession. Not that there was any scarcity of books on the 

 subject, but that the books we possessed already were not 

 plainly written, — that they were adapted for the reading of 

 those who knew a good deal already, instead of being written 

 down to the understandings of the million. 



The intention of the following pages is, that they should 

 convey to all classes, in language they can understand, the 

 most simple method of accomplishing any task in gardening, 

 pruning, grafting, budding, propagating, sowing, planting, 

 training, &c. ; in short, every operation that is performed is 

 explained so as to instruct the tyro who has to begin to learn. 

 "We have, perhaps, been prolix in some things, but we have 

 determined to be understood by persons who have never held 

 a spade. How far we have succeeded will be seen on a careftd 



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