278 THE PHILADELPHIA FLORIST. [Jan'y. 



ments of his social position ; but in order properly to fulfil the duties rU 

 he undertakes, he must be, to a certain extent, educated. He forms a M} 

 poor assistant to the improving employer if he cannot appreciate his 

 ideas and suggestions, as to the elements of beauty in the arrangement 

 of the garden, park or conservatory. If he cannot converse with him 

 at times upon the current topics of horticulture at home and abroad, 

 and enumerate some of the improved systems proposed in the different 

 departments of his business — if the common plants which spring up 

 around him are unknown to him in a botanical point of view, and their 

 position in the great scale of organised beings not ascertained or con- 

 sidered — if he only works without thinking or reflecting — if he carries 

 on his operations without stud} 7 or enquiry into the causes which re- 

 gulate them, then he is but a poor apology for a horticulturist, and not 

 in reality a gardener. 



The amateur desires to call to his aid an individual who possesses a 

 knowledge of the peculiar business which he professes ; not a man who 

 can dig and lop, and bury a tree here, and root up another there — but 

 a man with a fair amount of muscular strength, possessing an intelli- 

 gent mind, cultivated to a certain extent. He wants to learn from 

 him what he should do to gratify a certain taste, and how to do it in 

 the most appropriate and least expensive manner. How necessary it 

 is then, that the gardener, whose advice the employer seeks in the pro- 

 posed outlay of a large sum of money, should be informed accurately 

 on the questions within his province. More than this — he should be 

 obliging, and patient in the various difficulties connected with the de- 

 termination of points of difference between himself and his employer, 

 adapting himself as much as possible to the circumstances in which he 

 is placed, and making allowance for the different tastes of different in- 

 dividuals. A gardener, in fact, to afford satisfaction to an amateur 

 interested in horticulture, must be a man of intelligence, of general 

 information, and agreeable in his manners. Brought in contact fre- 

 quently with persons of refined taste, his address must be such as not 

 to disgust them. We are led to make these remarks by the frequent 

 difficulties that arise in the selection of gardeners ; much trouble is 

 caused by the want of a proper understanding of the duties of a 

 gardener; much also by the difference that is observable between the 

 arrangements in this country with respect to them, and those prevail- 

 ing in Europe. All admit that we are dependent on foreign countries 

 for our gardeners ; we are, because there, the art and science of horti- 

 culture has reached its climax. There, nothing is wanting in the ex- 

 tensive horticultural establishments that is requisite to prepare the gar- 

 dener, who undergoes a proper training, for assuming the charge of 

 any similar concern; and thus, by attention to the principles on which 

 «^ the different operations are based, nothing is necessary on a gardener's Jg 



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