SEMITEOPICAL GAHDENING. 115 



possession of the heart. One must learn something of the relationship 

 of the plant, the origin and history of the variety, the culture which 

 enables it to attain its highest excellence. Then comes the yearning for 

 more varieties, to know which are the best, and to secure them. The 

 home acre becomes no longer merely a piece of decoration; it is an 

 awakener of the deepest interest, a sharpener of the senses and the per- 

 ceptions; an incentive to admiration and adoration. It invites thought 

 and purpose; it affords the most charming recreation; it softens, ele- 

 vates, and ennobles our manhood and womanhood. 



Among our wonderful achievements we are too apt to forget the 

 heart work which is the greatest of the humanities. Many agencies min- 

 ister to the awakening of purer, truer sentiment. Not the least of them 

 is that branch of nature study which we as flower-growers and flower- 

 lovers enjoy. Let us not cease, then, to urge its delights and its bene- 

 fits upon the attention of our friends and associates and upon all to 

 whom our influence can extend. 



A grand opportunity has recently opened to American horticultural 

 enterprise and effort. The new lands which have recently fallen to 

 our care and guidance are naturally endowed with every phase of trop- 

 ical and semitropical conditions. They have largely lacked, hitherto, 

 the motive and incentive to higher civilization. With the other noble 

 efforts which Americans shall make for the uplifting of these benighted 

 peoples, the popularization of tropical and semitropical horticulture, and 

 the appreciation of its spirit and its influence in the advancement of 

 civilization, should be earnestly promoted, both by individual and gov- 

 ernmental effort. It is the duty of all who understand the humanizing 

 and civilizing power of enlightening horticulture to insist that Amer- 

 icans shall invoke this power as one of the agencies in the solution of 

 the difficult problems which now impend. 



University of California. 



