J 856.1 Our Botanic Garden. 599 



whicli our botanical friends— far and near— may see fit to send us, 

 whether roots, seeds, or cuttings. 



That so little attention should have been given heretofore, to sci- 

 entific collections of plants, is much to be regretted. We do^ not 

 speak of floicer gardens, where only plants remarkable as curious, 

 or beautiful, are admitted. These are sufiiciently abundant, perhaps j 

 some indeed, in this vicinity, are wonderfully extensive and beautiful, 

 but none are of value in science, as exponents of any known Flora. 

 There is not at present, west of the Alleghenies, a hoianic garden 

 worthy of the name. East of that range, there is the Cambridge 

 Garden of small extent, but in tolerably good condition ; and Ber- 

 tram's garden near Philadelphia, is in a ruinous state ; but none at 

 all comparable to the Kew Gardens of London, or the Jardin de 

 Plants of Paris, where nearly every flora may be seen in a living 

 state. A garden containing a full representation of the Phseno-ga- 

 mous Flora of the United States, would be an object of unspeakable 

 interest, and honorable to our State and our country. To consum- 

 mate such an object would be well worthy the attention of Govern- 

 ment, either State or National. To such a garden the student of 

 Nature might resort, sure to find the plant he seeks, though native 

 of the ' South Pass,' or the ' Everglades ' when at home. There too, 

 he would behold— saved from utter extinction, and safely enclosed in 

 this floral asylum— many lovely species of our own native plants 

 once common, but now unknown in our borders, having been swept 

 away by the tide of advancing civilization, like other tenants of this 

 once unbroken wilderness. Many such were recognized by those 

 old botanists, whose names are indentified with our flowers — Pursh, 

 Nuttall, Lea, etc., etc. — as common tenants of our woods in this vi- 

 cinity, which the botanist now searches for in vain. What pleasure 

 would be his, again to behold a blooming Calypso, a modest Alche- 

 milla, or a Quercus Leana ! In such a garden, also, the student of 

 Nature would see what so few have seen, entire families of plants, 

 growing adjacent, and subject to his immediate comparison and rec- 

 ognition. Think, ye botanists, of an arboretum composed of the 

 30 species of our native Willows! of the 27 species of the American 

 Oaks, or the T known sorts of our Native Magnolias ! With what 

 delight would you feast in a patch of violets, where our 32 known 

 kinds recognized by science, should sweetly bloom together in emu- 

 lous beauty ! Think, too, of 2i parterre of the 131 species of Asters, 

 so graphically described in Torry k Gray's American Flora, or of 



