INTRODUCTION. 



The very flattering reception given my recent work on 

 Vegetables " Gardening for Profit" has induced me to 

 again enter the field of horticultural literature and offer 

 to the public what knowledge twenty years of varied and 

 extensive experience has given me in floriculture. 



The subjects embraced by floriculture are now so vari- 

 ous and comprehensive, that the difficulty presenting itself 

 throughout has been to compress the work into moderate 

 limits, without omitting matters which it is requisite those 

 looking for information should know. But in endeavoring 

 to do so, it has been necessary to treat many subjects 

 much more briefly than their importance deserved. 



It has been my aim to make this book meet the require- 

 ments of the amateur and inexperienced florist, and in 

 this I trust I have partially succeeded. To do so, I have 

 had to give instructions on some subjects more in detail 

 than will seem necessary to the experienced gardener ; but 

 he should know that it is not for such as he that a book 

 like this is written. It is for the amateur who takes 

 pleasure in the work of, or superintendence of, his own 

 garden or green-house; or the unskilled florist in our 

 country towns, who has no one to consult with or to copy 

 from. With such I flatter myself that this book will be 

 welcome, as filling a want that no work before written in 

 this country has attempted to supply ; for all previous 

 works have been written for the amateur, or amateur's 

 gardener; commercial floriculture in all has been entirely 

 ignored. 

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