REVIEW. 



Mkmoirs of John Bartram and Humphrey 

 Marshall, with Notices of their Botanical 

 Cotemporaries. By Wm. Darlington, M. 

 D., L. L. D. With illustrations. Octavo, 

 pp. 535. 



[We are indebted to a Philadelphia cor- 

 respondent for the following notice of this 

 work.* Ed.] 



This book tells its own story admirably ; 

 as a picture of colonial life it is truely gra- 

 phic, but as the biography of an honest, 

 self-educated man of genius, it is beyond 

 all praise. While we say this, we must 

 remark that some further expurgations from 

 the text would have made the work more 

 valuable, and less open to the criticisms of 

 those, (and we envy them not,) who can- 

 not appreciate the beauty, the simplicity, 

 the sterling good sense, but above all the 

 natural character of John Bartram. He 

 was among the very first, if not the first, 

 who turned their scrutinizing eyes to the 

 wonderful flora of this continent, and who, 

 by their zeal and industry, were the instru- 

 ments of adding most materially to the beau- 

 ties of the unrivalled parks and gardens of 

 Europe. 



Mr. Bartram was of American birth, 

 respectably connected, and inherited a mo- 

 derate fortune in land, but having earl}' 

 imbibed a fondness for the study of natural 

 history, set up the first commercial botani- 

 cal garden in the province of Pennsylvania. 

 It still exists in the possesion of his grand- 

 daughter, Mrs. Carr, and her husband, on 



* Dr. Darlington has prepared this volume with a sketch 

 of the " Progress of Botany in North America." which will 

 interest botanical readers. We regTet to see that the artist 

 employed to sketch that picturesque old stone mansion — 

 Bartram's house— standing in the midst of the Bartram 

 garden, still well preserved and finely covered with ivy, 

 should have so utterly failed in the plate which is the fron- 

 tispiece to this work. The house is a gem for the lover of 



the picturesque, and this cut is a fright for the lovers of 



anything. Help it by all means in the next edition. Ed. 



the banks of the Schuylkill, near Philadel- 

 phia, rich in fine old specimens of trees and 

 shrubs. Especially to be noticed in that 

 fine old garden, is the enormous cypress, 

 (Cypressus disticha,) the larges ttree known 

 in that region of country. And here we 

 would incidentally remark, without intend- 

 ing to depreciate the one or eulogise the 

 other, the great advantage the planter of 

 trees possesses over the lover of the green- 

 house, in perpetuating the memory of his 

 labors ; the one places his trees in the ground 

 for posterity to love and admire, and pos- 

 terity, (barring some insane descendant's 

 axe,) will be sure to pay its tribute at the 

 shrine ; while the too frequent fate of the 

 green-house, when its owner leaves the 

 scene he so much enjoyed, is destruction or 

 decay. The Arboretum survives, in at 

 least one fine specimen ; it may be overrun 

 with weeds, but a noble tree or shrub at- 

 tests its owner's taste, and is his best mon- 

 ument ; the green-house, without daily and 

 nightly care, as much attention as a young 

 baby, soon loses all its attraction, and is no 

 more. We might safely compare the two 

 operations thus : the green-house lover is 

 like the actor, remembered by his cotem- 

 poraries, and by them only, while the tree- 

 planter is the author, who survives the re- 

 presentation of the painted scene, and in 

 his works lives after them. Could we pos- 

 sess absolute power, we should at once say 

 to some of our friends who only plant in 

 tubs and pots, " go at once and plant a Ce- 

 dar of Lebanon, a Deodara Cedar, all the 

 magnolias, that you may do something by 

 which you will be thanked by posterity." 

 Humphrey Marshall, also commemorated 

 in this volume, did this, and now that there 



