March I, 1877. ) 



JOURNAL OF HORTIOULTDEE AND COTTAGE QARDENEB. 



161 



The trees have grown to a size producing depth of green- 

 ness and breadth of shadow, and break the continuity of 

 view, BO that the eye cannot range over the whole space as 

 formerly without being attracted to some pleasing forms of 

 vegetation, and in all parts of the grounds there begins to 

 appear that boldness of relief which only time could give. 

 AU the decorations of this garden are highly ornamental, 

 and accord with the surrounding style and character of the 

 buildings; and if well kept up it would become very popular, 

 for it is well situated for fashionable resort and surrounded by 

 residences of families moving in the highest society, and the 

 garden preserves an open space in a district which has been fast 

 olosed-in by buildings in this fashionable quarter of the metro- 

 polis. A garden thus situated could not be better calculated 

 for exhibiting good examples of the high art of horticulture. 



All should again unite in fellowship to support the old 

 institution that has done so much good service in its pro- 



At this time (about 1818) the Society began the system of 

 procuring seeds and plants from abroad, and distributing them 

 to the Fellows. Plants were first sent from China by Mr. John 

 Reeves, a zealous horticulturist, and by-and-by the Council 

 began to send out collectors on their own account. The assets 

 of the Society increased. The house in Regent Street, which 

 for forty yeais afterwards was the focus of horticulture in 

 Europe, was bought at the price of £4200. The subscription 

 to the Society was raised from £2 2s. to £3 3s., and the ad- 

 mission fee from £3 3s. to £5 5s. ; and in 1821 there were as 

 many as 328 elections in one year. 



Stimulated (some have said intoxicated) by this prosperity, 

 the Society resolved to take a lease from the Duke of Devon- 

 shire of the present grounds at Chiswick, and abandoning the 

 gardens at Kensington and Ealing, to concentrate all their 

 operations there. The land consisted of thirty-three acres, 

 and was leased at a yearly rent of £300 a-year, with a power 



I ig. i;.'.— i;ov.iL 



gresB of sixty-eight years, fostering and encouraging every 

 branch of horticulture, the articles of necessity rendering the 

 vegetable kingdom still more useful and more pleasurable. 

 Certainly the Society has before been in cloudy circumstances 

 and on the point of extinction, but then the good Prince Con- 

 Bort revived it; his influence restored its prestige, his plans 

 which recruited its funds, and so enabled the Society to con- 

 etruot the garden and restored all to prospsrity. Captain 

 Fowke, Mr. Smirke, and :Mr. Nesfield furnished plans for the 

 garden, but it was the Prince who Uret suggested the ideas 

 which they put on paper; it was he wlio examined the plans, 

 altered, and corrected them until they gradually assumed their 

 preeent form. 



In 1818 it was thought the Society was in a position to 

 warrant the eetablishment of an experimental garden. The 

 income was £17;tl ; the funded property £1400, and floating 

 property ehtimated to be worth £3000 (a large proportion of 

 which wa?, doubtless, arrears of subscriptions). An experi- 

 mental garden was accordinply established at Kensington, 

 with an auxiliary nureery at EhHu j. The turn of events has 

 »B«in brought round a recurrence of the same conditions 

 which (xiitcd fifty years ago. The Horticultural Society has 

 tetnined to Ken-^ingtnn, m ar the spot where the old garden 

 ctoii.i, and it has HKaia its auxiliary nursery, only it ia at 

 Chiawick instead of Ealing. 



of renewal for ever upon n lino of t-i-iO every thirty years. 

 At the end of the first thirty years this power was not exercised, 

 and a renewed lease at the same rent was entered upon for 

 another thirty years, with power to relinquish possession on 

 giving one year's notice. This lease will come to a termina- 

 tion on the 29th of September, 1881. — N. Cole, Kensington, 



KITCHEN GARDENING. 



At the usual fortnightly meeting of the Darlington Gardeners' 

 Institute the following practical and useful paper was read by 

 Mr. Maclndoe of Hutton Hall: — 



At the present time the want of a knowledge of the culinary 

 garden is undoubtedly an ugly fact in connection with the 

 rising generation of gardeners. This no doubt arises from one 

 of two causes — either from want of opportunity or a disin- 

 clination on the part of young men to undergo the laborious 

 drudgery ot cultivating the soil. Journeymen gardeners who 

 can very creditably stake a Heath, turn a large Azalea bush 

 into a shapely pyramid, or neatly train a Peach tree to the 

 wires, are frequently met with ; but, whilst these things are 

 all very desirable in their way, how seldom do you find a 

 young gardener who can make an Onion bed in a workmanlike 

 manner, and I hold that no man has a right to call himself a 

 gardener until he is capable of making a neat and trim Onion 



