PART I. 



FACTS RELATIVE TO PLANTS, THE SOIL, MANURES, THE 



ATMOSPHERE, &c., ON WHICH HORTICULTURE IS 



FOUNDED. 



CHAPTER I. 



PLANTS CONSIDERED WITH REFERENCE TO THEIR CULTURE IN GARDENS. 



IT is not our intention to enter into any scientific discussion on the 

 nature of plants ; but it is necessary that we should strongly impress on the 

 mind of the reader who has little idea of their culture, that they are 

 living beings, and quite as sensible of good and bad treatment as animals. 

 Because a part of the leaves and branches of a plant may be cut off, and the 

 remainder which is attached to the root will continue to live and grow, it 

 seems to be inferred that a plant will bear any kind of treatment with 

 impunity. Many persons purchase a plant and plant it in their garden, as 

 they would purchase a piece of furniture and place it in a room, thinking 

 that the one act requires no more care than the other. Many labourers, 

 and even not a few gardeners, when planting a plant, insert it in the 

 soil with little more care than they would a stick or a post, crowding all 

 the roots into a small hole and then pressing the earth on them with their 

 feet, with apparently no other end than placing the plant upright and keeping 

 it firm. A person that knows anything of the nature of a plant, and of the 

 manner in which it draws its nourishment, by the means of the points of 

 fibrils so tender as to be rendered useless by the slightest bruise, and fur- 

 nished with mouths or pores so small as only to be seen by means of a 

 powerful magnifier, will feel this treatment to be barbarous and injurious. 

 Another person, on the contrary, who knows the grateful return that every 

 plant makes to him who bestows on it the operations of culture properly 

 performed, will take a degree of interest in the operation of planting, and 

 derive a degree of enjoyment from the future growth and development of 

 the plant, of which a person ignorant of the subject can form no idea. As all 

 men may be presumed to know something of the nature of animals, per- 

 haps the easiest way of giving some knowledge of plants to those who have 

 hitherto paid little attention to the vegetable kingdom, will be by first 

 exhibiting the principal points of analogy between plants and animals, and 

 next noticing the classification, nomenclature, structure, functions, geo- 

 graphy, and habitations of plants. 



SECT. I. The Analogy between Plants and Animals, considered with 

 reference to Horticulture. 



1. Plants are organised beings, that, like animals, depend for their exist- 

 ence on nourishment, warmth, air, and light. Their nourishment they 

 derive from the soil, their warmth and air jointly from the soil and the 

 atmosphere, and their light from the sun. 



2. Plants resemble animals in having an organic structure endowed with 

 life, and in requiring nourishment to enable them to continue to exist. They 

 absorb this nourishment through the small tubular fibres of their roots, in the 



