PREFACE.

As I reside in town, and am known among my friends as a lover of the country, it has often happened that one or other of them would bring me consolation in the shape of a Myrtle, a Geranium, an Hydrangea, or a Rose-tree, &c. Liking plants, and loving my friends, I have earnestly desired to preserve these kind gifts; but, utterly ignorant of their wants and habits, I have seen my plants die one after the other, rather from attention ill-directed than from the want of it. I have many times seen others in the same situation as myself, and found it a common thing, upon the arrival of a new plant, to hear its owner say, “Now, I should like to know how I am to treat this? Should it stand within doors, or without? should it have much water, or little? should it stand in the sun, or in the shade?"

Even Myrtles and Geraniums, commonly as they are seen in flower-stands, balconies, &c., often meet with an untimely death from the ignorance of their nurses. Many a plant have I destroyed, like a fond and mistaken mother, by an inexperienced tenderness; until, in pity to these vegetable nurslings and their nurses, I resolved to obtain and to communicate such information as should be requisite for the rearing and preserving a portable garden in pots. This little volume is the result; the information contained in it has been carefully collected from the best authorities; and henceforward the death of any plant, owing to the