THE GREEN-HOUSE AND CONSERVATORY. 39 



question : Are we any nearer improvement ? These plants 

 are the fashion of to-day, and we fully appreciate their 

 beauty ; but to-morrow some new taste will develop, and 

 before our new plants, in the ordinary course of nature, 

 have time to grow into good-sized specimens, they are out 

 of date, and are discarded or neglected as old-fashioned. 

 This may seem a severe view, a harsh statement of facts, 

 but it is literally true. 



If we look at plants with the eye of the botanist, the 

 simplest weed becomes invested with the highest interest ; 

 and to the botanist the rarer and newer plants are objects 

 of special attention ; but his task, or rather pleasure, differs 

 from that of the florist : the botanist would turn away from 

 the most beautiful double flower ever produced, regarding it 

 as a monstrosity. But we are not writing for botanists, 

 with us they are few and far between, but for gardeners, 

 amateurs, and florists, who esteem a plant rather for its 

 flower, foliage, growth, and other obvious beauties, than for 

 its structural adaptations, be they ever so curious and 

 beautiful. 



If our amateurs will grow fewer plants, and grow these 

 few well, if they will discard the mass of rubbish (for it is 

 nothing else) which cumbers the stages of their green-houses, 



