NOTES ON FLOWERS. 
521 
Ail of the preceding are very beautiful little 
plants for ornamenting the flower-garden 
during the early months of spring, when few 
gardens can boast of too bountiful a supply. 
FLOWERS AND THEIR ASSOCIATIONS.* 
BY ANNE PRATT. 
This work is calculated to please the lover 
of flowers, and even lay the foundation for a 
love of botany : there are thousands who 
love nature, but care little for the scientific 
arrangements of their odoriferous favourites, 
and in this little volume there is just enough 
to please these thousands. The writer seems 
always at home ; and if there be a fault, it is 
writing too flippantly on subjects, and sup- 
posed facts evidently borrowed. Rarely does 
the sentence, " there is nothing new under the 
sun," apply to any thing with such great force 
as to books on gardening. Those who read 
old works on the subject will recognise in 
almost all the modern publications a continued 
system of appropriating other people's ideas, 
and dressing them in a sort of disguise, but 
withal so flimsy as to be detected in almost 
all cases. The present little work pretends 
to nothing out of the common way, but it is 
possible to say too much. The authoress 
would be puzzled a little to prove that " our 
garden pansies have been introduced hither 
from various parts of the continent." Thomp- 
son of Iver has the merit of raising the ear- 
liest of our garden varieties, for the best that 
were known before were little better than 
weeds, and could never bear the title of garden 
varieties. However, we have no doubt the 
writer had read the fact somewhere. Never- 
theless, this volume is admirably adapted 
for youth. 
VEGETABLE SUBSTANCES 
USED FOR THE FOOD OF MAN.f 
Under this title two small volumes have 
been published, for the purpose of explaining 
chemically the nature of the numerous vege- 
tables which have been resorted to as food by 
the various classes of the community at home 
and abroad — the various plants and mode of 
using them, the nature of their constituent 
parts, the quantity of nourishment they con- 
tain and its value, and all the varied effects of 
their use as human food. We have the intro- 
duction, in which the writer, whose name is 
not given, proposes some odd theories as to 
what the earth would be without vegetation ; 
but we pass over this to general considerations 
on the nature of vegetable food, and thence to 
the classification of plants yielding nutritious 
* Cox, 12, King William-street, Strand, 
f Ibid. 
secretions : wheat, rye, barley, oats, rice, 
maize, buckwheat, millet, leguminous plants, 
bread-fruit, the potato, arrow-root, sago, tur- 
nip, carrot, parsnip, cabbage, &c. Then plants 
containing sugar: the fig, vine, banana, date, 
&c. Then those containing oil, as the olive, 
and various nuts ; and so on, through all the 
classes of plants. It is a reprint of a work 
published by the Society for the Diffusion of 
Useful Knowledge, very considerably im- 
proved in respect to the chemical descriptions, 
and as such useful and very interesting to the 
young student in the chemistry of horticulture 
and agriculture. 
THE FIELD, THE GARDEN, AND THE 
WOODLAND.* 
BY ANNE PRATT. 
In this volume many interesting facts with 
which botanists become acquainted in the pur- 
suit of science, are collected and presented to 
the reader in familiar and agreeable language, 
well calculated to awaken some interest 
in the study and observation of nature — 
a study alike elevating and consoling in its 
influences on the mind. The fair authoress 
has not confined herself to the vegetation 
of Europe, but the whole world has been her 
woodland ; the gardens of all climates have 
supplied her with one of the powerful features 
of her work ; while the wild flowers of the 
field have been for the most part selected 
from subjects within the reach of all her 
English readers. The natures of the most 
remarkable plants, trees, flowers, and grasses, 
have been well explained in simple language, 
and there is a very proper feeling pervading 
those explanations wherein the wonderful 
provisions of the Creator are pointed out. It 
is a pocket volume that may be advantage- 
ously placed in the hands of youth. 
NOTES ON FLOWERS AND FLOWERING 
PLANTS. 
Cooperia Drtjmmondi, Herbert (Drum- 
mond's Cooperia). — Amaryllidaceas § Arnaryl- 
leas. — A bulbous plant, with strap-shaped, 
twisted green leaves, more than a foot long, 
and a stem about nine inches high, supporting 
one large fragrant flower, which opens in the 
evening ; the tube of the flower is four inches 
long, greenish ; the six segments each an inch 
long, white, fading off to reddish as the flower 
decays. A native of Texas. Introduced in 
1834. Flowers in June and July. Culture. — 
Nearly hardy ; sandy compost ; thorough 
drainage, and protection in severe weather ; 
propagated by offsets or seeds. 
* Cox, 12, King William-street, Strand. 
i 
