1879. 



AND HORTICULTURIST. 



283 



tect knew nothing about this, or never thought 

 of it. Again we have long stretches of orna- 

 mental wall, wholly to be hidden by planting, 

 as if tlie pretty structure was some unsightly ob- 

 ject to be planted out ; rock-work with pahns 

 and otlier things that are anything else but rock- 

 plants ; and other little inconsistencies that 

 cannot but strike the eye of one guided by re- 

 cognized artistic rules. Some of these may be 

 noted in this cemetery, — they would be wholly 

 overlooked if it were not for the high reputation 

 it enjoys as a model work, and which in the 

 main it well deserves. But here let us say a 

 word of praise for the gardener in charge, for 

 in few places of this class have we seen so much 

 neatness and general industry displayed in keep- 

 ing everything in first-rate condition. Bosto- 

 nians are very proud of this cemetery, and they 

 have good cause to be. It is open freely to 

 everybody six days in the week, and to none but 

 the lot-holders on Sundays. 



The botanic garden at Cambridge claimed a 

 few hour's attention, and I was glad to meet 

 with Mr. Falconer the gardener in charge, 

 whose intelligent articles on flowers are so 

 highly appreciated by the readers of the Gar- 

 dener's Monthly. Mr. Falconer is a com- 

 paratively young man, of medium size, and 

 somewhat slender, but with great working ac- 

 tivity, and unless the future prove very unpro- 

 pitious, will probably leave behind him a good 

 record for usefulness to American horticulture. 

 It is many years since I saw the botanic garden, 

 and I was agreeably surprised at its transforma- 

 tion from its old style — the stereotyped botanic 

 garden with which all over the world we are 

 all familiar — to a real beauty-spot ; at least a 

 spot as beautiful as it is possible to make a bo- 

 tanic garden so long as it is thought necessary 

 to have the plants arranged like shelves in an 

 herbarium. The plant houses, herbarium, 

 librai'y, and other buildings are on an extensive 

 plateau, bounded by a slope. From this terrace 

 we look down some feet to the flower garden. 

 The centre of this is a pond for aquatic plants, 

 and around this are arranged in segments of 

 circles the flower beds. The pathways are 

 about as wide as the beds, made of grass, and 

 kept neatly mown. Here and there were plants 

 in flower ; but as the Spring flowers were gone 

 and the Summer flowers scarcely in season, 

 many of the beds were liare, and seemed 

 to long for even some friendly mass of weeds, 

 in order to have something to do, for even 



the dull clod in this busy world detests 

 idleness. Here are the beds for " Rununcula- 

 ca3," " Liliacea}," or what not, but only the 

 labels are there now in many cases. The most 

 complete success is in the rockeries, in which 

 are many plants which will only thrive in such 

 situations and persistently set all " classifica- 

 tions " by herbarium rule at defiance. It is to 

 the great merit of the rock garden here that it 

 is made to suit the wants of plant growth, 

 rather than some imaginary piece of scenery ; 

 for here very often comes in the opposite horti- 

 cultural extreme, the sacrifice of the useful 

 wholly to some ideal. As long as a botanic 

 garden must be made subordinate to the rules 

 of the herbarium, we do not see how such a 

 garden as this at Cambridge could be made 

 more beautiful •, and the comparative reclama- 

 tion from its former ugliness reflects great credit 

 on the taste of Prof. C. S. Sargent under whose 

 direction the changes have been made. With 

 the end of this season Prof. Sargent retires from 

 the directorship of this garden, in order to as- 

 sume the duties of Professor of Arboriculture in 

 the Arnold Arboretum, which garden has 

 hitherto divided with Cambridge his attentions. 

 As the first professor of Arboriculture chosen 

 in this country he will have an eminent field; 

 but those who know of his incidental woi'k in 

 this direction, as already accomplished, have a 

 forecast of how well his future work will be 

 done. The botanic garden will in future be un- 

 der Professor Goodale's management. I found 

 Prof. Goodale, though in his holiday season, 

 busily at work with an independent class of 

 students. He seems to have a peculiar power 

 of making abstruse physiological points very 

 clear to his students. He does not teach merely 

 what has been already taught, but encourages 

 original investigations. At the time of my visit 

 he was explaining the Embryology of the seed 

 by the aid of a seed of common " Shepherd's- 

 purse," in which, assisted by a powerful micro- 

 scope, even the earliest processes of seminal 

 cell germination could be seen. In the herba- 

 rium Professor Asa Gray, small of frame, and 

 grizzled by the passage of near seventy winters 

 was still as actively at work as one of thirty. I 

 left him studying out a set of his favorite Aster- 

 aceous plants, which had been collected on 

 some government exploration. It is amazing 

 how Dr. Gray gets through with so many useful 

 tasks. His "Structural Botany," which is really 

 a wholly new work succeeding to his " Text 



