394 NOTICES. 



Horticulture and Agriculture, in all their numerous departments, than I do ; 

 for I well know how long your attention has been devoted to those subjects, 

 and with what zeal and unremitted industry you have collected specimens of 

 the most precious varieties of fruits, flowers and culinary vegetables, from 

 all parts of the globe, and how well you have cultivated them, as well as the 

 unwearied efforts you have made for the advancement of the best implements 

 for the field, the orchard, and the garden, while, as an author, you are en- 

 titled to the gratitude of every person who lives by, or is pleased with, the cul- 

 tivation of plants ; and as a generous contributor to the weekly and annual 

 exhibitions of the Horticultural Society ever since its establishment, you 

 stand in the front rank. 



With assurances of sincere esteem, I offer the most friendly salutations. 



H. A. S. DEARBORN. 



JOSEPH BRECK, Esq. 



The Hon. J. T. Buckingham, formerly editor of the Boston 

 Courier, well known throughout New England not only as an editor, 

 but for the deep interest he has taken in Agricultural and Horticul- 

 tural matters, has favored me with the following letter, which, with 

 his leave, I publish. As a gentleman of refinement and taste, and a 

 lover of all the wonderful works of God, from a humble flower to 

 the magnificent heavens, I regard his opinion and commendation of 

 my work with much satisfaction ; 



Cambridge, Feb. 7, 1856. 

 JOSEPH BRECK, Esq. 



Dear Sir : I understand that you are about publishing a new edition of 

 your "Flower-Garden, or Book of Flowers." I am heartily glad of it. It is 

 an evidence that the love of flowers, and their influence upon manners and 

 morals, are increasing in our community. To this prevailing sentiment your 

 book has essentially contributed. It has done much to improve the culture 

 of flowers, and to extend that improvement in all directions. Personal obser- 

 vation has furnished me with unmistakable indications of a refinement of 

 taste among the rural population, in regard to these " Day-stars that twinkle 

 from rainbow galaxies of earth's creation." Thirty years ago, a thrifty, 

 money-making farmer would hardly permit a peony or a dafi'y, a poppy or a 

 hollyhock, to show its face on his territory ; and if his wife or children had 

 contrived to raise a few of these or other flowers in some out-of-the-way 

 corner in a garden appropriated to the raising of beans or cabbages, the 

 chances were ten to one that he, or one of his hired men, would exterminate 

 them with as little remorse as they would pull up a nettle, a thistle, or a pig- 

 weed. Every vegetable, not esculent by man or beast, was dealt with as an 

 intruder, disfiguring the healthy countenance of the farm, or robbing it of 

 some portion of its coveted income ; and if a rose-bush had happily escaped 

 the general purgation by means of the earnest supplication of some domestic 



