4G THE GARDENER. [Jan. 



discussion of the question undoubted originality, keen intelligence, and a practical 

 observation. He is very severe on some of the attempts at ornamental gardening 

 in the London parks, and says, on p. G : "Of the attempts at landscape and orna- 

 mental gardening lately made in Hyde Park it is impossible to speak in language 

 too severe. The extravagant system of attempting to convert our parks into 

 sub-tropical gardens, with luxuriant parterres of flowers, cannot be too strongly 

 condemned. Neither the climate nor the soil are such as to do justice to the 

 former, and a display of choice spring bulbs, succeeded by tender plants and 

 expensive gardening, is a system which even a wealthy nobleman would not for 

 a moment tolerate in his own park. In all public parks there should be some 

 spots dedicated to flora ; but, whilst these should be excellently kept, it is only 

 necessary that they should be of moderate extent. At present upwards of 

 100,000 plants are annually bedded out in Hyde Park. The most extraordinary 

 attempt at improvement, so called, in Hyde Park, is that which was carried out 

 last year on either side of Rotten Row, where money enough has been spent to 

 have insured infinitely better results. To the man of taste few things can be more 

 annoying, but for the amusement they excite, than the elaborate efforts of the 

 suburban labourer or mechanic, who, naturally 'fond of gardening,' but utterly 

 untaught and inexperienced, seeks to convert the few yards of ground adjoining 

 his cottage into an innate and fantastic jumble of brick rock-work, pebbles, 

 oyster-shells, and bits of glass, with miniature gravel-walks, and all kinds of 

 tender and hardy plants and flowers mixed together without the slightest per- 

 ception of their natural habits and requirements." 



In this part of his pamphlet Mr M'Kenzie is emphatically destructive, and 

 scarcely one of the features of " modern gardening " lately introduced into Hyde 

 Park and elsewhere, finds favour in his eyes. He then goes on to make some 

 capital suggestions as to the ornamentation and beautifying of the common spaces 

 round London, which he would zealously preserve for public use ; and there 

 he would also provide opportunities for public recreations, such as gymnasiums, 

 water, cricket-grounds, &c. He would also abolish the monopoly that now affects 

 the gardens in the public squares in London, and throw them open to the poorer 

 classes ; and utilise the disused burial-grounds of the metropolis as places of 

 public resort and recreation. He also suggests new thoroughfares that might be 

 opened up, and advocates the embellishment of some of the great lines of com- 

 munication with the suburbs by planting lines of trees on either side, with seats 

 beneath them. The office of Chief Commissioner of Public Works should be no 

 longer a political office, subject to changes of Government, but a permanent ap- 

 pointment — an opinion with which we think few horticulturists, at least, would 

 be disposed to disagree. 



Mr M'Kenzie advances his several positions clearly, boldly, and with much 

 force, and his pamphlet will amply repa} 7 perusal. 



The Gardener's Year-Book, Almanac, and Directory for 1870. By Robert 

 Hogg, LL.D. Journal of Horticulture Office, 171 Fleet Street, London. 



This very useful gardening manual has reached the eleventh year of publication, 

 and still holds on its way as popular as ever. A closely-printed almanac of 

 some 160 pages is surely cheap at a shilling for the fund of information it 

 supplies to horticulturists alone, inclusive of carefully-prepared lists of new Fruits, 

 Plants, and Flowers of the year ; but, in addition, there is so much matter of gen- 

 eral importance that its value is considerably enhanced. We don't compare it 

 with other almanacs of a similar character ; we simply speak of it on its own merits, 

 and commend it as it deserves to be commended. 



