17 PREFACE. 



larger the list of names, the greater the merit of his work j 

 and it is not wonderful that his descriptions of fruits are 

 unintelligible to the reader, when it is known that by far 

 the larger portion were perfectly unknown to the professed 

 describer, and many of them indeed to every body else, 

 seeing they exist only in the imagination of some nursery- 

 man, from whose catalogue the names were copied. Again 

 we have what may be styled the truly patriotic pomologist, 

 whose aim it is, seeing ours is the finest country in the 

 world, to Americanize everything. With him the Pears of 

 Belgium, the Peaches and the Grapes of Italy and France, 

 the Cherries, even the Goosberries of England, are not wor- 

 thy to be compared with our own domestic productions ; 

 with the seedlings, which have had the good fortune to 

 spring into being on this side of the Atlantic, or even the 

 chance-begotten fruit found by the way-side. Now we 

 trust we are as patriotic as our neighbors, but this under- 

 valuing of everything European, while it may evince great 

 love for country; unfortunately deprives us of fruits which in 

 reality we cannot spare, unless, as is done by a recent au- 

 thority, we adopt the petty meanness and unmanly subter- 

 fuge of concealing well known European fruits by 

 changing their names, and then, by way of exposing our 

 own folly and of indicating what is really meant, give the 

 true, long known and well established name as a mere 

 synonym. 



It is unnecessary that we should be more specific or 

 definite in this matter. Those who have been humbugged 

 by the authors of either class to which we have alluded 

 will have no difficulty in ascertaing to whom our remarks 

 refer, while it will be neither edifying nor profitable to 

 others to have further intimacy with them. 



The peculiarities of Mr. Lindley's volume, which render 

 it superior to all others on the subject, and which havegiv- 

 en it, wherever known, the reputation of a standard work, 

 are, in the first place, the exceeding accuracy of his no- 

 menclature, the result of his own long practical study, and 

 of facilities afforded him by the gardens of the Horticultu- 

 ral Society of London, where fruits of all kinds and from 

 all quarters are cultivated, their characters noted, their 

 fruits tested, and their merits or demerits fairly weighed. 

 In no one of the sister sciences is there anything like the 



