BOTANICAL INFORMATION, 185 
and contains more than 6,000 species. There is a pretty large glass- 
house, one-half being a caldarium, the other a tepidarium : in the former 
are cultivated nearly 130 species of Orchidee, and 50 of Palms ; in the 
latter, among others, a considerable number of tropical and subtropical 
Ferns. A second house is to be erected in the course of the present 
year. A number of Crassulacee and Cactee, and similar plants of 
New Holland and the Cape, grow in the open air. The general 
number is constantly augmenting, and everything is done to cultivate 
plants of colder climates than the Valencian, by means of watering, 
artificial rocks, shrubberies, &c. This sudden and advantageous change 
in the state of things is almost exclusively due to the then Rector of 
the University.of Valencia, Don Francisco Carbonell. This learned, 
energetic, and wealthy gentleman, was political chief of Valencia in 
1844, and was much dreaded throughout the kingdom, on account 
of his inflexible and rather despotic procedure; but he made it a point, 
it seems, to restore, at any cost, the university garden. Though a 
diplomatist, and not a botanist, he interests himself actively in na- 
tural history, especially zoology and botany. The hitherto very in- 
significant zoological museum of the university was considerably 
enlarged during his rectorship; for instance, the indigenous bird: 
of Valencia, especially the numerous water-birds of the Albufera Sea 
have been added, and form a very interesting collection. The 
rector is Professor Don Ignacio Vidal, who is said to be a good 
zoologist. But Carbonell’s real hobby is the botanic garden. H 
has removed, somewhat arbitrarily, the old personnel, with the exception 
of D. José Pizcueta, Professor of Botany, who was garden-director _ 
in 1844, and continues so still, though, of course, only nominally ; and 
he has attached to it a clever, scientific French gardener, M. Jean 
Robillard, a zealous young man; and as the public funds were too - 
insignificant to restore and support the garden, he has contributed 
large sums out of his own means. M. Robillard has placed himself - 
in communication with the leading gardens in Europe, and will be able, - 
under the powerful patronage of Carbonell, to double and treble the 
number of plants in a short time. If we take into account the 
excellence of the climate of Valencia—in which New Holland and Cape 
plants, as well as many plants of tropical countries, thrive in the open 
ground,—the superiority of the soil, the abundant supply of water, 
the continually moist and never too hot air,—it must be admitted that 
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