Viii PRELIMINARY DISCOURSES. 



The successful culture of Vegetable Products, requires a know- 

 ledge of the character and habits of the Plants which yield them ; 

 and that knowledge so far as it is possessed and applied is neither 

 more nor less than practical Botany. He who is acquainted with 

 the greatest number, and best understands how to multiply the 

 most valuable, is at once the best Botanist, and the most accom- 

 plished Agriculturist and Gardener. 



Is it not desirable, then, that we should extend our knowledge of 

 the useful Plants, and learn to estimate correctly, their true and 

 relative values ? Is it not necessary, also, that we should have a 

 competent knowledge of the pernicious and worthless Plants ? But, 

 to accomplish this, is to make a respectable progress in the Science 

 of Botany. Hence I contend, that a certain portion of Botanical 

 knowledge is indispensable to the Farmer who aspires to excellence 

 in his profession, and who would aid in elevating that profession 

 to the rank which it is intitled to hold, among human pursuits. 

 It is not necessary that he should prosecute the study in all its 

 extent ; for that would be the business of a life-time : But he ought 

 to make himself acquainted with the Vegetation of the region, or 

 district, in which he resides, and he should understand well the 

 character of all those plants which immediately concern him, as an 

 Agriculturist. This is a duty by no means so difficult as is generally 

 supposed: And with the aid now afforded by elementary and 

 systematic writers on the subject, the attainment is rendered as 

 agreeably interesting, to an intelligent mind, as it is profitable in 

 its practical -results. The man who does not know the more im- 

 portant plants by which he is surrounded whose eye has not learnt 

 to discriminate their characters, is deficient in one of the primary 

 qualifications of an enlightened cultivator of the soil. In truth, it 

 is mortifying to see a good practical Farmer, or Gardener, ignorant 

 of some of the very plants which it most behoves him to know, 

 wasting his time, and his energies, in mis-directed ^efforts to protect 

 himself from the vegetable pests which invade his grounds. Many 

 of our farms are already over-run with worthless weeds, which are 

 extremely difficult to subdue; -and we are menaced with the inroads 

 of others still more annoying and pernicious : Yet there are but 

 few of our Agriculturists who fire able to identify these invaders, 

 when they make their appearance, or who seem to be aware of the 

 importance of prompt and vigorous measures for their extirpation.* 



* I have seen an excellent old Farmer zealously waging war upon the fetid 

 Chamomile (Maruta. Cotula, DC.), under the mistaken belief that he was contend- 

 ing against that troublesome nuisance, the Ox-eye Daisy (Leucanthemum, vulgare, 

 Lam). Some years since, a distinguished agricultural gentleman published a 



