We venture to assert, that there is not any lady who can design a pattern, and embroider a gown, that might not, in a few hours, be taught to design flower-gardens with as much skill and taste as a professional landscape-gardener; and so as to produce incomparably better results than are now generally to be seen in the flower-gardens of the great majority of British country residences.

If we can succeed in rendering every lady her own landscape-gardener, which we are confident we can do, we shall have great hopes of effecting a general reform in the gardening taste, not only of this country, but of every other for which this work is calculated: and we intend it for circulation in the temperate climates of both hemispheres.

Next in influence on society, in every country, to the female sex, is the class of teachers; including under this class the two orders, ministers of religion and schoolmasters. The instruction of these orders in the science and practice of gardening shall be one of our principal aims in the composition of this work, as well in the hope of adding to their own resources for comforts and enjoyments, as of enabling them to infuse a taste for these comforts and enjoyments into the minds of the rising generation. We can hardly conceive any rural pursuits more adapted for a clergyman than natural history and gardening: and what can better afford a relaxation to the schoolmaster, from the arduous and sedentary duties of his profession, than the cultivation of a field of useful vegetables, and of a garden of curious and ornamental plants, not only for his own amusement, but for the instruction of his pupils? A garden and a field are, in our opinion, as well merited by the schoolmaster as a glebe is by the clergyman; and we trust they will, in a short time, be considered as no less indispensable in Britain (in the establishment of a national system of education) than they already are in most parts of Germany, and in many parts of North America.

We might enlarge here on the great advantages which would result from bringing up children with a taste for garden pursuits and natural history; and the vast influence which this is calculated to have on their future happiness, and on the welfare of society, by enabling them, instead of passing their leisure hours in a manner degrading to human nature, to interest themselves in recreations both agreeable and useful: but the field is too wide to be entered on within our limits, and we must therefore leave the subject to be worked out by the imagination of our readers.

Much of the enjoyment of a country residence depends on knowing what to expect from it; what, in short, is consistent, and what is inconsistent, with its limits and its local situation. We have shown, in the Encyclopedia of Cottage, Farm, and Vtlla Architecture (p. 8), that all, in the way of house accommodation, that is essential to the enjoyment of life, may be obtained in a cottage of three or four rooms as well as in a palace; and we shall prove, in this work, that a suburban villa, with a very small portion of land attached, will contain all that is essential to happiness in the garden, park, and demesne of the most extensive country residence. Let us briefly make the comparison. The objects of the possessors of both are the same: health, which is the result of temperance and exercise; enjoyment, which is the possession of something which we can call our own, and on which we can set our heart and affections; and the respect of society, which is the result of their favourable opinion of our sentiments and moral conduct No man in this world, however high may be his rank, great his wealth, powerful his genius, or extensive his acquirements, can ever attain more than health, enjoyment, and respect.

The lord of an extensive demesne seeks after health by hunting, shooting, or other field sports, or by superintending the general management and cultivation of his estate; the lady seeks recreation in her pleasure-ground, or in airings in her carriage; and both find their enjoyment in their children, and in their house and garden, and other surrounding objects. Now the master of a suburban villa finds health in the change it affords from his occupation as a citizen; or if he has retired from business, in the personal cultivation of his garden. He also finds enjoyment, not only in his family, friends, and hooks, hut in his garden, and in the other rural objects which he can call his own, and which he can alter at pleasure, at a trifling expense, and often with his own hands. It is this which gives the charm of creation, and makes a thing essentially one's own. Every one must have felt the infinitely greater pleasure which is enjoyed from the contemplation of what we have planned and executed ourselves, to what can be experienced by seeing the finest works belonging to, and planned by, another.

Our own work is endeared to us by the difficulties we have met with and conquered at every step: every step has indeed its history, and recalls a train of interesting recollections connected with it.

We shall arrange this work in books; and shall treat in succession of the general principles which should guide an amateur in the choice, laying out, and planting of a country residence; and of the planting and management of the villa kitchen-garden, orchard, flower-garden, pleasure-grounds, and shrubbery, and of the villa farm; concluding the whole with a monthly calendar of the management of villa residences.