of Horticulture in the United States. 9 



though many of the more dehcate ones are not so generally to 

 be seen in the farmers' gardens as we could desire. This, how- 

 ever, arises from ignorance of their excellence, which will grad- 

 ually give way as their good qualities become more known through 

 trial. The principal operatives in our best gardens are as yet 

 foreigners, chiefly from England — the demand for persons of this 

 description being yet hardly sufficient to make it a distinct trade 

 or profession, as in Europe. Our easy access to all the best 

 works published in England, while it has greatly aided our prac- 

 tical advancement, has of course precluded the necessity of 

 many original books on the same subjects here; but several ex- 

 cellent practical works have made their appearance, and obtained 

 an extensive circulation here, among which we will mention, 

 Coxe on Fruit Trees, Thatcher'' s Orchardist, McMahon''s Gar- 

 dening, Prince's Treatise on Horticulture, and Pomological 

 JSIanual, Fessenden's American Gardener, Hibberl's Flower 

 Garden Directory, Bridgeman's Gardenerh Assistant, Wilson's 

 Kitchen Gardening, Kenrick's American Orchardist, Sj-c. The 

 various agricultural periodicals have also aided much in increasing 

 horticultural taste and knowledge. Loudon's Encyclopedia of 

 Gardening, the most valuable compilation on the subject in any 

 language, is the standard work here, as in England. 



After the statement in this hasty and imperfect notice, and from 

 the fact that there are ten horticultural societies now in operation 

 among us, it will be inferred that horticulture is making rapid pro- 

 gress in the United States. Such is really the case. But what 

 we especially deplore, is the fact that not one of the above ten so- 

 cieties, nor any one of the corporations of our numerous cities, 

 possesses a single acre of land appropriated to the purposes of 

 a public experimental garden! For proofs of the great and 

 happy influence such an establishment, properly conducted, might 

 and would have, we only need appeal to the single and well 

 known example of the garden of the Horticultural Society of 

 London. The good effects of the system of careful culture, 

 liberal exchanges and donations, and accurate experiments, made 

 at that garden alone, have already been experienced in every 

 quarter of the globe, and not less here than in any other country. 

 That some of our societies will soon find means to carry a simi- 

 lar plan into execution we ardently hope. If, however, we were 

 allowed to suggest a plan for a public garden, to be of the most 

 extensive utility, we should undoubtedly take for a model that of 

 the great Jardin des Plantes, at Paris, and make it, like that, a 

 national establishment, supported by government. Similar to 

 that garden, it should include professorships of botany and agri- 

 culture, which would constitute it a perpetual school of those 

 branches. Its primary objects should be to collect the most val- 



VOL. III. NO. I. 2 



