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Medical Officer, has brought into existence at that Station. 
These gardens are, and are intended to be, pleasure gardens, 
rather than botanical gardens; and though, therefore, they 
cannot compare, if regarded from the latter point of view, with 
the gardens at Victoria in the Cameroons Province, they are, 
in my opinion, much more charming and very much more pleasing 
and restful to the eye. 
“9. Taking full advantage of a natural hollow, or long 
rather narrow valley, where the subterranean water-level is 
near to the surface of the soil, and which was already ornamented 
by a number of fine trees, Dr. Moiser, by means of some fairly 
elaborate landscape gardening, and by the most skilful and 
painstaking horticulture, has converted what must have been 
a patch of rank, green scrub, set in the midst of a sandy, straw- 
coloured wilderness, into one of the most charming gardens 
that I have seen anywhere in the Tropics. I cannot understand 
how it is that the fame of this really notable achievement, and 
of the horticultural enthusiast whose patience, skill and devotion 
to his task have accomplished it, has not spread broadcast through- 
out Nigeria; and it is with shame that I record the fact that I 
first received a detailed account of what Dr. Moiser had done 
from Sir David Prain, the Director of the Royal Botanic Gardens 
at Kew, in the Atheneum Club a week or two before I sailed 
for West Africa in November last. Dr. Moiser has here per- 
formed precisely the sort of service to Nigeria which is so very 
rarely rendered to the countries in which they serve by officers 
living in West Africa, He has, by his unassisted efforts, suc- 
ceeded in adding immeasurably to the amenities and agréments 
of a station which, but for his horticultural work in it, would have 
possessed no special attractions. He has thereby raised the 
standard of comfort and of general living conditions for every 
European dweller in Sokoto; has given to each of them a realiy 
beautiful and shady place in which to congregate during their | 
leisure hours; and has supplied them with something lovely 
and refreshing for eyes to rest upon that have grown weary 
with staring through the glare at the dusty, parched country 
that surrounds them. Incidentally he has shown what enterprise 
and skill and energy can achieve in West Africa, as in other 
parts of the tropical world, in the direction of rendering an 
unpromising environment as agreeable and pleasure-giving as 
the comfort and the well-being of Europeans dwelling in it demand. 
“3. I shall be glad if you will cause a copy of this minute 
to be sent in due course to Dr. Moiser, through the D.MS., 
together with an official expression of the thanks of the Govern- 
ment of Nigeria for the very notable work which he has done. 
“4. I shall be glad, if you will be so good as to ask the 
Director of Forests to issue standing instructions to the Con- 
servator of Forests for the time being having his headquarters 
at Sokoto, to assume personal charge of and responsibility for 
these gardens whenever Dr. Moiser is absent on leave. At 
