Plants in Health and Disease. 
Chapter 1. 
GENERAL FEATURES OF PLANT LIFE. 
Nutrition and propagation, vegetative and seed reproduction. 
Annuals, biennials, and perennials. General account of vegeta- 
tive organs. 
Gardeners being concerned in the cultivation of plants, 
it is obviously important that they should be acquainted 
with their structure and mode of life. They will find it 
particularly useful to know in what ways plants respond 
to their environment, for such knowledge will enable them 
by varying their treatment to modify the development of 
the plants they cultivate, to accelerate or retard their 
growth and to ensure the production of a greater number of 
flowers. The gardener’s aim is not always the same. The 
flower lover is anxious to obtain a wealth of bloom. The 
allotment holder on the other hand, concerned in raising 
vegetables, may desire well-developed leaves, roots or 
tubers. It is important therefore that we should study 
both the vegetative and the reproductive organs. 
The former are concerned mainly with nutrition, the 
latter with the propagation of the plant. These two sets 
of organs are often differently affected by external con- 
ditions. A gardener knows that by over-stimulating the 
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