706 WHAT OUR NEIGHBOURS THINK OF US 



In England there is no less honoui% and much more profit. The 

 exhibition is a good speculation for the society which gives it, and 

 for the victors in the compstition. The prizes are of sufl&cient 

 importance to be seriously disputed. The great cultivators look 

 upon the prizes of the competition as something worth gaining. 

 Such a result is easily understood .when we learn that the exhibi- 

 tion at Kensington, on the 11th of June, was visited by 14,000 

 persons, th6 charge for admission being 75. 6i. It is a receipt of 

 about £4000 which the society has drawn that day. With such a 

 sum one can afford to give prizes."^ 



" The exhibitions of flowers at London remain open only for a 

 single day — or rather half a day, for the public is not admitted 

 until mid-day or one o'clock. The plants arrive in the morning, 

 the greatest part of them brought in small carriages ad hoc, and 

 are carried away again in the evening. A jury, very few in 

 number, subdivided into as many sections as there are categories 

 of plants, awaui the prizes with great rapidity. By this means 

 the plants, even the most delicate and the best flowered, do not 

 suffer. With us it is a veritable abuse to prolong the exhibition 

 for three, or moi-e properly speaking, six days. In fact, the 

 plants have in general to arrive at the place of exhibition by the 

 Priday which precedes the Sunday when the exhibition opens. 

 They are submitted to the jury on Saturday, and are not restored 

 to liberty until the following Wednesday. There are, in reality, 

 bIx days of prison — carceris duri — ^inflicted on the plants, which 

 return from it fatigued, and often all blighted and bruised. The 

 Tuesday, that is to say, the third day of the exhibition, is almost 

 always de trop, and ought to be suppressed in ordinary circum- 

 stances. In London the public, in place of coming negligently 

 to cast a glance over the flowers, runs in crowds to see them, and 

 admires them with interest. ^ 



" At London, too, the most distinguished and aristocratic society 

 make a23pointments for the floral exhibitions : the flowers are 

 loved and known ; one hears them called by their names (^loiiis 

 et prenoms) by the most of the young and beautiful lady-visitors. 

 Many of our young people in this respect still belong to the time 

 when it was a boast not to be able to write." 



Professor Morren's calculationa bere would scarcely do for our auditors. 



' His numbers, which are probably taken from some newspaper estimate, are 



* high, and he was obviously not aware that nearly 9000 Fellowa and season 



ticket holders Jiad the right of free admission. But enough remains to 

 Bustaiu his ar£rument- 



