Cassell's Popular Gardening

Whilst the greatest effort has been made to ensure the quality of this text, due to the historical nature of this content, in some rare cases there may be minor issues with legibility. The rapid rise and progress of commercial horticulture, the demand for Open spaces, the multiplication and improvement of public pal ks, the enormous imports of foreign fruit and vegetables, the marvellous increase in the home culture of flowers, fruit, and seeds g - all these things point to an unlimited extension of garden pursuits in the near future. When the imperial importance of horticulture as a powerful factor in augmenting the food supplies, promoting the comfort, elevating the character, and improving the sani tary state of the nation, becomes better known and more generally appreciated, few will rest content until they possess a garden of some sort. And few need any longer stand aside from the pursuit of horticulture, as too difficult or too costly for them. Thoroughly understood and properly practised, it is neither one nor the other; while no pursuit yields quicker returns, cv' richer revenues of pleasure, profit, and relaxation for the money and time invested in it. While aiming, therefore, to make this work a safe and sufficient guide for the most experienced, it is hoped to avoid a glaring fault of many current treatises on gardening, viz., an assumption of the possession of too much knowledge on the part of their readers. Beginning at the very beginning of our subject, as regards the earth, and those plants which clothe it with plenty and adorn it with beauty, it will be our aim to teach, by a series of easy articles or lessons, how the former may be ameliorated and enriched.