PREFACE. 
I was induced to undertake the present work chiefly 
because there appeared to be no really practical, exhaustive, 
or modern guide to the construction and heating of glass 
structures—in fact there is, as far as I am aware, no work 
worth the name of any kind upon the subject. A somewhat 
voluminous treatise upon heating by means of hot water 
must be excepted, however, but if not exactly obsolete this 
is now decidedly out of date, and scarcely practical enough 
for the modern horticultural builder, besides which, some of 
the tables it contains are scarcely correct, or at least 
somewhat misleading. 
In view of the enormous increase in indoor horticulture, 
or ‘‘market-gardening under glass,’ that has taken place 
during the last decade or two in this country, the absence of 
some such work is a matter for surprise, but since the want 
existed, and no more gifted hand essayed the task, I have 
done the best I could myself. I have endeavoured to treat 
the subject, as far as possible, from the point of view of 
a grower as well as of a builder, and I venture to hope that 
over a quarter of a century of practical experience and 
careful study of plant-growing and plant-houses has enabled 
me to point out the kind of structure most suitable for 
the various descriptions of plants, and for different purposes. 
‘ 
