The Flora of England 



before ; and for three hundred years no vegetable 

 has been introduced that can in any degree com- 

 pare with the results, commercial, agricultural, and 

 even political, of the potato. Nor can it even be 

 said that the vegetables as now grown are very 

 different or much better than those grown by our 

 forefathers. In a few instances varieties have 

 been introduced which are more prolific, or in 

 some respects more profitable, but in spite of the 

 nurserymen, whose catalogues announce novelties 

 and improvements every year, the plants prac- 

 tically remain very much the same, and those 

 who can look back fifty years or more are very 

 positive in their assertions that the peas, asparagus, 

 potatoes, etc., which they ate in their youth, were 

 in no way inferior to what they get now ; some 

 even will go further, and say that they were 

 superior, for that now everything, flavour included, 

 is sacrificed to size. 



I have left myself too small a place to speak, 

 as I should have wished, of the native Flora other 

 than trees and vegetables, but I must not pass it 

 by altogether. I do not suppose that the ancient 

 Briton was much given to ornamental or pleasure 

 gardening. The necessities of life would have 

 compelled him, when he was not hunting the wild 

 animals for food, to give his attention almost 

 entirely to the plants that were necessary for his 

 daily bread, such as wheat, barley and oats. Nor 

 do I suppose that he gave much heed to his 

 native Flora, except so far as he could find plants 

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