14 
French Gardens 
Grenoble 
From Ventimiglia we proceeded by train to Nice and thence, via 
La route des Alpes, by auto-bus to Grenoble. The Jardin des 
Plantes here is affliated with the botanical institute of the Uni- 
versity of Grenoble. The herbaceous garden is arranged on the 
Systematic basis. Small rectangular concrete tanks built into the 
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1rerbaceous beds provide for aquatic plants in the same bed as their 
“dry” land relatives. Clumps of rock are also placed in the 
herbaceous beds to provide for saxatile species in their systematic 
sequence. ‘The systematic beds have borders of labelled horti- 
cultural varieties that may or may not be related botanically to 
1 to the appearance of the 
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the species in the beds. This adds muc 
garden. About half of the garden, containing trees and shrubs, 
serves also as a public park, and is apparently much used as such 
by the public. The garden was established in 1899; it has an alti- 
tude of 2075 meters, and an area of about ten acres. It is divided 
into the following sections : 
l. A large area, scattered with rocks, simulating a small valley, 
traversed by a rivulet which empties into a small pond. This sec- 
tion is devoted specially to the flora of Lauteret, the classic Alpine 
ground of botanists. 2. A large area, comprising the systematic 
collection, is devoted to the flora of the western Alps in general. 
3. All the rest of the garden 1s divided into eight regions, each built 
up of a collection of rocks, and devoted, respectively, to the follow- 
ing botanical regions: a. Jura (caleareous rocks); 6. Pyrinees; 
c. Mountains of the Mediterranean region; d. Caucasus and Ural; 
>, Eastern Alps and Carpathians; f. Himalaya, Tibet, Altai, Sibe- 
ria; g. Arctic regions; /. Miscellaneous mountain regions. 
The University of Grenoble maintains two other Alpine gardens 
—Chaumusse (altitude 1850 meters), established 1892; and Vil- 
-’Arenes (1675 meters), established 1899, 
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larc 
Paris 
From Grenoble we proceeded to Paris and re-visited the Jardin 
des Plantes which we first visited in 1927. It is not essential fully 
to describe here this famous garden, which has been so often de- 
