viii PREFACE TO FIRST EDITION 



has been adopted, both with regard to the genera and 

 species, it is hoped, will greatly facilitate the work of 

 reference to its pages. The descriptive notes and hints 

 on cultivation, the selected lists of Trees and Shrubs for 

 various special purposes, and the calendarial list which 

 indicates the flowering season of the different species, may 

 be considered all the more valuable for being concisely 

 written, and made readily accessible by means of the 

 Index. 



No work written on a similar plan and treating solely 

 of Hardy Ornamental Flowering Trees and Shrubs has 

 hitherto been published; and it is not supposed for a 

 moment that the present one will entirely supply the 

 deficiency; but should it meet with any measure of 

 public approval, it may be the means of paving the way 

 towards the publication of a more elaborate work — and 

 one altogether more worthy of the interesting and beau- 

 tiful Flowering Trees and Shrubs that have been found 

 suitable for planting in the climate of the British Isles. 



Of the fully thirteen hundred Bpecies and varieties of 

 Trees and Shrubs enumerated, all may be depended upon 

 as being hardy in some part of the country. Several of 

 them, and particularly those introduced from China and 

 Japan, have not before been included in a book of this 

 character. Trials for the special purpose of testing the 

 hardiness of the more tender kinds have been instituted 

 and carried out in several favoured parts of England and 

 Ireland. 



A. D. W. 



