232 Works on Gardening, Agriculture, fyc. 



kind, which has just appeared. Every one who knows any thing about getting 

 up a magazine, knows that to receive a MS. communication and an original 

 sketch or perhaps model, or to have liberty to inspect the original and make 

 a drawing from it, having afterwards to prepare these for the printer or the 

 engraver, is a very different thing from printing or engraving from articles 

 already engraved or printed. We may safely state that, on an average, the 

 expense is treble in one case what it is in the other. Now, supposing it were 

 lawful to copy the greater part of one magazine, just after its appearance, 

 into another magazine sold at the same price ; it is evident that, while the 

 magazine containing original matter was losing, the other which copied from 

 it would be making a handsome profit. The losing magazine would have no 

 alternative, but either to give up appearing, or to adopt the practice of the 

 other, and to take its articles ready prepared from some other published work. 

 Both magazines, in consequence of this, would be rendered almost worthless 

 to the public. This is an extreme case, put hypothetically, to show what 

 unfair competition is, and what would be its consequences to individuals and 

 the public. 



A good deal of borrowing, and some plagiarism, were carried on for some 

 time by Mr. Harrison. The article on the pronunciation of botanic names, 

 in No. i. of the Floricultural Cabinet, was taken verbatim from us, without the 

 slightest acknowledgment ; and one number of the Gardener's Record, we forget 

 which, was almost entirely made up from the Gardener's Magazine. Having 

 written at that time to Mr. Harrison, he has since been more moderate, and 

 we hope he will continue to be so. 



We may observe here, that numerous articles are taken verbatim, both by 

 Paxton and Harrison, from the Gardener's Magazine, which we had translated 

 for that work, from the French, German, or Italian, and the name of the ori- 

 ginal work is given as the sole authority. This is a most disingenuous mode, 

 altogether unworthy of that straightforward conduct which alone can per- 

 manently insure public confidence. Much as we deprecate this practice, we 

 do not consider it nearly so bad as that which Mr. Maund commenced some 

 months ago, noticed IX. 457. The amount of injury which would be done 

 by Mr. Maund to us, or to any other person from whom he might choose to 

 quote in the manner described in the page referred to, might possibly not be 

 very great; but a more disingenuous mode of quoting, or one more repug- 

 nant to our feelings, we have not met with since we commenced our literary 

 career. 



Though we have travelled far from Paxtori 's Magazine of Botany, we return 

 to it to say, that we think it will be very useful to the manufacturers of 

 articles which are decorated with figures of plants ; such as cotton-printers, 

 porcelain manufacturers, paper-hanging manufacturers, &c. To botanists it 

 is of no use ; as the plants are neither new, nor described with scientific 

 accuracy. Gardeners who wish to become acquainted with the newest plants, 

 and the proper method of describing them botanically, will consult the Bo- 

 tanical Register, the Botanical Magazine, or Sweet's British Flower-Garden ; 

 and for the gardener who does not pretend to much botanical knowledge, the 

 amateur in moderate circumstances, and the floricultural operative, there is 

 the Floricultural Cabinet. 



Art. III. Catalogue of Works on Gardening, Agriculture, Botany, Rural Archi- 

 tecture, fyc, lately published, with some Account of those considered the most 

 interesting. 



THE Journal of Botany, being a second Series of the Botanical Miscellany : con- 

 taining figures and descriptions of such plants as recommend themselves by 

 their novelty, rarity, or history, or by the uses to which they are applied in 

 the arts, in medicine, and in domestic economy ; together with occasional 



