deemed an elegant accomplishment, I know not how 

 an equally exquisite taste for the beauties of fine 

 flowers, should deserve any less honorable title. 

 " Some people," says Cobbett, in his usual homely 

 but perspicuous style, " may think that flowers are 

 of no use, that they are nonsensical things. The 

 same may be, perhaps with more reason, said of pic- 

 tures. For my part, as a thing to keep and not to 

 sell ; a thing, the possession of which is to give me 

 pleasure, I hesitate not a moment to prefer the plant 

 of a fine carnation, to a gold watch set with dia- 

 monds." 



If, however, the productions of the gardener's 

 labors are not to be placed in the same rank with 

 the works of the painter or sculptor, they possess 

 what, in our country, is a most important advantage 

 over them, viz. that they are within the reach of the 

 great mass of our community. Pictures and statues 

 are, even in older nations, confined to the precincts 

 of cities, or the villas of the opulent. Not so with 

 fine flowers. The proprietor of the smallest farm in 

 the country, or the inhabitant of the humblest tene- 

 ment in the city, may decorate his house with orna- 

 ments, surpassing in richness and delicacy, the most 

 costly productions of the upholsterer. The furnish- 

 ing of a single apartment in a style of very moderate 

 splendor, involves a greater expense, than many 

 florists incur at seed-stores and nurseries, during the 

 whole course of their lives. Well, then, does this 

 art deserve encouragement, in our republican and 

 economical country. 

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