jQuery append object and add string

The problem is your selectors: .div1 and .div2, these are searching for elements that have the class of div1 and div2; whereas you want the div elements, with class 1 or 2.

Therefore I'd suggest:

$('div.2').text(function(i,t){
    return '(' + t + ')';
});
$('div.1').append($('div.2'));

JS Fiddle demo.

Although do be aware that using a numeral character as the first character of a class, or id, can be problematic in CSS.

References:

• append().
• text().

Try this

$(function(){
    $('div.2').text('('+$('div.2').text()+')');
    $('div.1').html($('div.2'));
});

Demo

$(function(){
    //$('.div1').append('(', $('.div2'), ')'); //this is better way but you can try following
    $('.div1').append($('.div2'));
    $('.div2').html('('+$('.div2').html()+')');
});

Demo: http://jsfiddle.net/aamir/jNU4B/

Try:

var html = $('.div2');
var text = $('.div2').text();
$(html).text("("+text+")");             
$('.div1').append(html);

Fiddle here.

Note:

Name of class never starts with numeric values.

You JS could look like this

$( document ).ready(function() {
  $('.1').append('(' + $('.2').html() + ')');
   $('.2').remove();
});

Here's a working example. http://jsfiddle.net/cVD6X/

Hopefully this is what you intended.

Regards, Eric Robinson

Hope this helps..

$('div.1').append($('div.2'));
$('div.2').html("(" + $('div.2').html() + ")");

You should clone the element then add the parentesis to it, and append it to the other div. After that you can always remove the old element.

JS

var div2 = $('.div2').clone();
div2.text('(' + div2.text() + ')');
$('.div1').append(div2);

Html

<div class="div1"></div>
<div class="div2">blah</div>

Jsfiddle