FOREWORD 



fessional gardener as sensible, practical, and 

 helpful, and strictly in line with the things he 

 needs to know when he gets down to actual work. 



I have also tried to make it plain that much 

 of which goes to the making of the home is not 

 out of reach of the man of humble means — that it 

 is possible for the laboring man to have a home 

 as truly beautiful in the best sense of the term 

 as the man can have who has any amount of 

 money to spend — that it is not the money that 

 we put into it that counts so much as the love for 

 it and the desire to take advantage of every 

 chance for improvement. Home, for home's 

 sake, is the idea that should govern. Money can 

 hire the work done, but it cannot infuse into the 

 result the satisfaction that comes to the man who 

 is his own home-maker. 



But not every person who reads this book will 

 be a home-maker in the sense spoken of above. 

 It will come into the hands of those who have 

 homes about which improvements have already 

 been made by themselves or others, but who take 

 delight in the cultivation of shrubs and plants be- 

 cause of love for them. Many of these persons 

 get a great deal of pleasure out of experiment- 

 ing with them. Others do not care to spend time 

 in experiments, but would be glad to find a short 



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