THE FLOWER GROWER'S GUIDE. 



INTEODUCTION. 



PiF tlic progress that has been made in floriculture duriug the past quarter of a 

 century there can be no two opinions. It is exactl}' summed up in the favourite 

 ejaculation of the old schoolmaster in Scott's novel, " Clay Mannering," and that is, 

 " Prodigious ! " Horticulture has advanced by leaps and bounds, yet not spasmodicall}^ ; 

 there has been no reaction, and this marked progress shows no signs of diminution. 

 Nor is this great and well-sustained advance largely due to what may be termed 

 extraneous aids ; in other words it has not been fostered to any appreciable extent either 

 by royalty or the upper ranks of society, but is the outcome of a great and ever- 

 increasing love of Nature and Nature's products, among the middle classes more 

 especially. The prolonged agricultural depression has naturally left its mark on some 

 once-famed gardens of the "upper ten thousand," whose incomes are mainly dependent 

 oh the produce of their farms ; and if these gardens are not so well maintained as in by- 

 gone days, it is not the result of lack of interest, but insufficiency of means, and this we 

 will hopefully regard as a temporary inconvenience. When, however, we come to discuss 

 what has taken and is taking place in the gardens of our merchant princes, of our 

 business men, and the educated classes who are in receipt of good salaries, and therefore 

 in a position to devote a portion of their income to the pursuit of some favourite hobby, 

 it is then we plainly see what extraordinary strides floriculture has made. 



Thousands upon thousands have found that a garden is one of the best and 

 cheapest luxuries that anyone can well indulge in. Those who have gone intelligently 

 to work, whether on a large or small scale, have not been long in discovering what a 

 source of pleasure has been tapped, what a never-ceasiug round of enjoyment the 

 cultivation of "Flora's brilliant race" is constantly unfolding, and what a "thing of 



VOL. I. B 



