INTRODUCTORY. 
13 
and our places of business, shedding their soft 
charms within the rude, rough sphere of this hurry¬ 
ing, pushing, hard, and too practical modern life 
of ours ! And if this volume may be the means 
of shedding even the smallest additional ray of 
happiness across the path of those who may 
read it, the knowledge of such a result will be to 
the Author the source of the most sincere and 
heartfelt satisfaction. 
The preceding introductory pages were pub¬ 
lished, under the address of c The Author to the 
Reader,’ as the Preface to the first three Editions 
of c The Fern Paradtse and they briefly unfold 
the aim and object of the volume. When, how¬ 
ever, an Author ventures upon the course of 
putting his suggestions into print, and issuing 
them in book-form, he must be prepared for the 
criticism of his Reviewers. Criticism is neces¬ 
sarily of two kinds. The one kind relates to the 
literary merits or demerits of a work: the other is 
concerned with its subject,—its raison-el’etre. 
Is the object of this volume one which it was 
