Out of print since 1856, The American Gardener is perhaps the first classic work of American gardening literature. In it, William Cobbett, Victorian England's greatest and most gifted journalist, draws upon his experiences during a two-year exile on a Long Island, New York, farm to lay out the rudiments of gardening for American farmers and, ultimately, to tailor principles developed in wet, drippy, weed-prone British gardens to their fine, sun-drenched counterparts in America. Full of practical knowledge memorably imparted with Cobbett's gift...

Old Herbaceous is a classic British novel of the garden, with a title character as outsized and unforgettable as P. G. Wodehouse's immortal butler, Jeeves. Born at the dusk of the Victorian era, Bert Pinnegar, an awkward orphan child with one leg a tad longer than the other, rises from inauspicious schoolboy days spent picking wildflowers and dodging angry farmers to become the legendary head gardener "Old Herbaceous," the most esteemed flower-show judge in the county and a famed horticultural wizard capable of producing dazzling April...