for referring to the home and colonial trade
circulars, Legislative papers, and scientific periodicals of different
countries. The harassing duties appertaining to the position of City
editor of a daily paper, coupled with numerous other literary
engagements, have afforded me insufficient time to do full justice to
the work while passing through the press; and several literal
typographical errors in the botanical names have, I find, escaped my
attention in the revision of the sheets. I have, however, thought it
scarcely necessary to make a list of errata for these. From want of
leisure, to reduce all the weights and measures named in the body of
the work into English, I have given their relative value in the Index.
I have taken considerable pains to make the Index most full and
complete, for it has always appeared to me, that in works embracing a
great variety of subjects, facility of reference is of paramount
importance.

Some discrepancy may here and there be found between the figures
quoted from Parliamentary returns and those derived from private trade
circulars; but the statistics are accurate enough for approximate
calculations.

Whilst the work has been passing through the press, several important
modifications and alterations have been made in our Tariff.

I have throughout found great difficulty in obtaining commercial
information from the various Colonial brokers and importers of the
City, who, with but few exceptions, have been stupidly jealous of any
publicity respecting the staples in the sale of which they were
specially interested. The greatest fear was expressed lest any details
as to the sources of supply, stocks on hand, and cost prices of many
of the minor articles, should transpire. After the results of the
Great Exhibition, the exertions making to establish Trade Museums, and
the prospect of information to be furnished at the new Crystal Palace,
this narrow-minded and selfish feeling seems singularly misplaced.

I had not originally contemplated touching upon the grain crops and
food plants of temperate regions; but the prospect of a failure in our
harvest, the disturbed state of political affairs on the Continent,
with short supplies from Russia and the Danubian provinces, and the
absence of any reliable statistics and information for convenient
reference on this all-important subject, added to the recommendations
of one or two well-informed correspondents, induced me to go more into
detail on