226 Biography. 



in South America it promises to be equally so. Among the West India 

 Islands education is now becoming general, even to the children of slaves; 

 and the President Boyer, of the republic of Hayti, has declared to his black 

 subjects, in a manifesto published some years ago, that " education and 

 agriculture constitute the chief strength of states." 



Under these circumstances, it is not our intention to invite or court the 

 young gardener to cultivate his intellectual faculties, but rather to point out 

 to him the- absolute necessity of doing so, if he wishes to maintain any 

 higher station than that of a country labourer. If he remains content with 

 the elementary knowledge he has acquired, or as gardener lads acquire 

 under ordinary circumstances, he will assuredly never advance beyond the 

 condition of a working gardener, and may not improbably sink into that of 

 a nurseryman's lahourer of all work. To get a good place as a gentleman's 

 gardener, it is not sufficient now-a-days to know the culture of kitchen- 

 crops and fruits; the man who gets eighty or a hundred pounds a-year 

 must know plants well, and be able to converse on botany as a science. 

 He must not only be a good practical botanist, but possess some knowledge 

 of chemistry, mechanics, and even of the principles of taste. Instead of 

 being barely able to write and guess at the spelling of words, he will never 

 be admitted, even as a candidate for a situation, unless he writes a good 

 hand, Spells and points correctly, and can compose what is called a good 

 letter. Drawing, at least of ground-pians, is indispensible ; and for a first- 

 rate situation, sketching landscape, and some knowledge of French, equally 

 so. A knowledge of the rudiments of Latin and of Greek, so far as to be 

 able to find out the meaning of nouns in a Greco-English dictionary, is pre- 

 included in some knowledge of scientific botany. Every gardener, in short, 

 who can now be considered worthy of the name, must understand the prin- 

 ciples of English composition, and be capable at the desire of his master, or 

 of his own proper motion, to write a paper on his art, fit to be introduced 

 in the Horticultural Society's Transactions, or in the Gardener's Magazine. 

 The gardener who has no ambition to appear as a writer in one or both of 

 these works, must be a heartless mass of subsoil. 



'■ Viewing the subject of education as of so much importance to gardeners, 

 we shall from time to time recur to it, more particularly with a view to 

 enable young men who are already engaged in their profession, to work 

 out their own scholastic education, in so far as that may have been imperfect, 

 in the hours devoted to rest and refreshment. 



But previously to entering on the subject of young men instructing them- 

 selves in science, we shall in our next number point out what we consider 

 the best mode by which a working gardener who is too old, or whose mind 

 is not sufficiently pliable to derive instruction from books, may improve his 

 circumstances, and prevent him from falling back in the latter period pf life 

 into the condition of a jobbing gardener ; the miseries of which have been so 

 feelingly depicted in our last number, by our worthy correspondent, Mr. 

 M'Naughton. 



Art. XI. Biography. 



Andrew Thoirin, {Jig. 42.) born in Paris, 1745, devoted himself from his 

 infancy to the study of botany, and merited being chosen to replace Guettard 

 in' the garden of plants, of which his father was head gardener. In 17S6 he 

 was admitted a Member of the Academy of Sciences. It was by his care 

 that the garden was improved, the system of cultivation perfected, and more 

 certain methods used for preserving and propagating the numerous plants 

 with which every day this valuable depot was enriched. It was. from his 

 solicitation that a professorship of practical cultivation was established y and 

 the first public iecture on the subject given in France. M. Thouin was 



