PREFACE 



THE best way to study plants is to grow them for 

 ourselves. Even when our attempt is a failure, and they 

 fog off and die, that chastening experience at least teacher, 

 us that the ' environment ' we provided was not suited 

 to our poor victims, while the joy of success can be 

 realized 'only by those who have tasted it. Many 

 ' economic ' plants, of course, require great heat, and 

 can be grown in this country only under glass, but many 

 others do quite well in the border of an ordinary school 

 garden. Dr. Jamieson B. Hurry, of Reading, has both 

 kinds growing in his ' educational ' garden at Westfield, 

 and I should like to offer him my warmest thanks for the 

 pleasant hours I have spent there, while my friend, 

 Miss Buchanan, made sketches of some of the most 

 interesting specimens in the c economic ' border. 

 Mrs. Grieve, too, of Chalfont St. Peter, kindly allowed 

 me to visit her Herb Farm, and gave me much useful 

 information. She has published a large number of 

 pamphlets, each dealing with one particular plant. 



The chapter on * Fisheries ' is based on the information 

 contained in * Marketable Marine Fishes ' by my brother, 

 Mr. J. T. Cunningham, M.A., and on an article by 

 Professor Stanley Gardiner, of Cambridge, on the 

 ' Geography of British Fisheries '. published in the June 

 number of the Geographical Journal, 1915. I wish also 

 to offer my thanks to Professor Gardiner for reading 



