HbrticuUuie mid Zandscape Gardening in ZJngland. 133 



large money premiuras for fine plants, and the exhibitions that I attended seemed to 

 warrant this course. At the exhibition of the Royal Botanical Gardens, I saw more, 

 and choicer plants shown by a single exhibitor, than I ever saw by one Society, 

 including all exhibitors in this country. Just imagine Fuchsias six feet high, and 

 four or five in diameter, completely covered with flowers ; Erica Candolleana, six 

 feet in diameter and three in height ; Alamandia grandiflora, a mass of flowers ; Pelar- 

 goniums, more than seven feet in diameter; also, John Waters & Sons' collection of 

 Azaleas and Rhododendrons, the finest in the United Kingdom ; in fact, these would 

 make an attractive exhibition without further accession. 



Jlosvs, 



In England the Rose seems to have attained perfection, and the demand is very 

 large. In walking over the grounds with one nurseryman in the suburbs of London, 

 he showed me his stock of forty acres of standard roses, and he assured me he was 

 not one of the largest growers. At the rose show at Sydenham Palace, the cut roses 

 were arranged in shallow boxes filled with moss, each box holding forty roses. These 

 boxes were placed in a line, and this line extended just half a mile, and the large 

 size of the roses was quite as surprising to me as that of the whole exhibition. 

 Another and very interesting feature of this show, and one that I hope some- day to 

 see adopted by our own Societies, was that of offering liberal premiums for dressing 

 breakfast, lunch and dinner tables with flowers. Here the tables in each class were 

 set, ready for a meal, with the plants arranged by the competitors, which in this 

 instance were about forty in number. For this purpose the different varieties of the 

 Fern were arranged with graceful and pleasing effect. In fact, this part of the exhi- 

 bition was more attractive to me than that of the roses. 



The London Horticultural Society's exhibition was smaller than I had reason to 

 suppose, from its standing and antiquity ; still, the collection of Jackman's Clematis, 

 in size, variety and brilliancy of colors, more than paid me for my visit. This, with 

 the hospitable reception from the active members of this representative Society, will 

 always be remembered by me with pleasure. 



Gnrdeninf). 



In what may be termed ornamental gardening, the English are far in advance of 

 us, but in the more practical part we take the lead by at least twenty years. During 

 my stay in England, I visited many of the largest and best-managed vegetable farms 

 in the vicinity of London, and I was surprised to witness their primitive methods, 

 both in their system of cropping and tedious way of doing the work. It is quite 

 within bounds to say, that a man familiar with trucking in New Jersey, will do a 

 third more work in a given time than a man in the same position in an English gar- 

 den. The ordinary implements used by the latter are clumsy and unnecessarily 

 heavy, and this weight has to be carried around at a considerable waste of strength 

 both of men and animals. For instance, a common digging spade or fork will weigh 

 at least twice as much as one of ours, intended for the same class of work. There is 

 more weight of wood in an English garden cart than would make two or three of 

 ours, and this seeming unnecessary weight will be found to run through the whole 

 list of English farm implements. 



