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long, running east and west, with a front both to the north 
and south; the roof will be constructed entirely of iron, 
glazed with patent sheet glass, and will have the form of a 
Gothic arch. The west wing, rather more than 180 feet 
long and 27 feet high, has been contracted for by Messrs. 
D. and E. Baileys of Holborn, and will probably be com- 
pleted by the middle of May. The whole range, when 
executed, will be one of the most extensive in the world. 
No association of individuals has ever introduced so large a 
quantity of beautiful and useful plants into this country, as 
have been procured by the funds of the Horticultural Society 
of London; but those plants have necessarily been confined 
very much to hardy species, in consequence of the want of 
extensive glass-houses. It is now to be expected that green- 
house and stove plants, especially the former, will become a 
great object of attention with the Society ; the effect of which 
will doubtless be to improve the ornamental character of 
tender plants in the same degree as that of hardy collections. 
Few persons know how many objects are within their reach, 
the beauty of which is far beyond any thing now in our 
gardens, and that only require space in which to grow them. 
The following account of the Pisonai, which it is to be hoped 
will be one of the first novelties established in the Society’s 
new conservatory, will serve to illustrate this assertion. 
** The Pisonai Tree.—This is one of the most magnificent 
trees, both in foliage and flower, perhaps that exists. It 
appears to have been introduced during the Inca dynasty 
into the vallies of Cusco, where, in a climate the mean tem- 
perature of which is 60° Fahr., it attains such a size as I 
have never witnessed in the largest of our European forest 
trees. It was generally planted about villages; in that of 
Yucay, the country residence of the latter Incas, eight leagues 
from Cusco, there exist specimens of it five fathoms in cir- 
cumference, and nearly seventy feet high; the foliage, of a 
deep green, is thick and spreading, the leaf in shape some- 
thing like the Cinchonas; it flowers in December, and is 
then one mass of carnation colour. I think it might be 
naturalized in the south of Europe, and in our greenhouses; 
the elevation of the places where I have seen it grow to the 
greatest size, above the sea, are respectively 9500 and 9680 
feet." — Extract of a letter from J. B. Pentland, Esq. to the 
Hon. W. F. Strangways. | E 
