VI PREFACE. 



must be necessary, and, as the utility of the 

 work must, in some degree, depend on the /a- 

 cility with which the several parts of it can be 

 referred to, there are two Indexes at the end, 

 one, of the names of the several plants, and, 

 the other, of the matters generally. For the 

 same reason, I have numbered the paragraphs 

 throughout the work. A more proper term 

 might have been found than that of Vegetables > 

 seeing, that, strictly speaking, that word ap- 

 plies to all things that grow from the earth. 

 but, as we call those products of the garden, 

 which we use, in their natural shape, as human 

 food; as we generally call these only by the 

 name of vegetables, I have chosen that word 

 in preference to one, which, though more strict- 

 ly proper, would be less generally understood. 

 N early the same may be said of the word Herbs. 



6. Some persons may think, that flowers are 

 things of no use: that they are nonsensical 

 things. The same may be, and, perhaps, with 

 more reason, said of pictures. An Italian, while 

 he gives his fortune for a picture, will laugh 

 to scorn a Hollander, who leaves a tulip -root 

 as a fortune to his son. For my part, as a thing 

 to keep and not to sell; as a thing, ihe posses- 

 sion of which is to give me pleasure, I hesitate 

 not a moment to prefer the plant of a fine car- 

 nation to a gold watch set with diamonds. 



7. The territory of the United States includes 

 such a variety of climates ; degrees of heat and 

 cold so different at the same period of the year; 

 that it is impossible to give instructions, as 

 relating to time, for sowing, planting, and so 

 forth, that shall be applicable to every part of 



