HORTICULTURAL DEPARTMENT 



OF THE 



WORLD'S EXPOSITION AT N'BW ORLEANS. 



In the second volume of Transactions of this Society may be found a gen- 

 eral reference to the part horticulture had in store for the visitor at the 

 World's Exposition of 1884-85, to be held in New Orleans; also, an architec- 

 tural description of Horticultui'al Hall. 



The location of Horticultural Hall is both well chosen and historic. It is 

 situated near the great Father of Waters, whose turbid waves are only held 

 in abeyance by the slender levee that alone saves the site from frequent 

 inundations. It is surrounded by grand old live oaks and pecan trees, with 

 their graceful curtains of Spanish moss. The planting of these trees dates 

 far back of the present century arid by subjects of a foreign potentate. 



It is historic in the fact that the spot on which the hall now stands was 

 the site of a military hospital during the late war; the fountain that now 

 adorns the hall having served as a cistern for hospital uses, and said to have 

 been erected by General Butler while in command of the Union forces at 

 New Orleans. 



This old hospital cistern, by the inspiration of an artist, has become the 

 beautiful fountain, with its sparkling jets and cooling spray, surrounded by 

 tropical verdure, that now so gracefully adorned the hall. 



THE SURROUNDINGS. 



Before visiting the hall, the reader will pardon me for suggesting a stroll 

 through the horticultural grounds. 



I have already intimated that long before the acquisition of Louisiana from 

 the French, and while it was yet a province of Spain, the landscape gardener 

 had placed an almost indelible mark upon the surroundings of Horticultural 

 Hall. The grand old live oaks and pecan trees, which the visitor can not 

 fail to admire, if not, indeed, to reverence, are fitting monuments to forgot- 

 ten genius. The "Giant," a live oak measuring over twenty-seven feet in cir- 

 cumference, six feet from the ground, and whose evergreen boughs, draped 



