CHAP. II. BRITISH ISLANDS. 41 
brought from Soesdyke in Holland, the seat of Mr. Bentinck, 
afterwards Earl of Portland. The gardens of Holland were 
at that time the richest in Europe. 
The gteat introducer of foreign trees in this century was Dr. 
Compton, who was the bishop of London from 1675 to 1713, 
and who may truly be said to have been the father of all that 
has since been done in this branch of rural improvement. 
Bishop Compton was the youngest son of Spencer, Earl of 
Northampton ; he was made bishop of Oxford in 1674, and 
was translated to the see of London in the following year. 
He was a zealous protestant and a most excellent man. He 
lived a retired life at Fulham, attending to his episcopal duties 
and to his garden. 
In the 32d book of Ray’s Historia Plantarum, written in 1686, 
in which he treats of plants imperfectly known, there is a chapter 
on the rare trees and shrubs which he saw in the garden of 
Bishop Compton at Fulham. Among these are enumerated 
the tulip tree, the magnolia, the sassafras, the tree angelica 
(Aralia spinosa), the hickory, the box elder, the liquidambar, the 
Constantinople nut, some species of Crate gus, some of his, 
some of Cornus, and some of 4'triplex. Bishop Compton died 
in 1713, at the age of 81 years. His garden was visited by Sir 
William Watson in 1751, 48 years after his death; and he gave 
the following account of this bishop and his garden to the 
Royal Society: —‘ Dr. Henry Compton,” he observes, “planted 
a greater variety of curious exotic plants and trees, than had at 
that time been collected in any garden in England. This ex- 
cellent prelate presided over the see of London from the year 
1675 to 1713; during which time, by means of a large corre- 
spondence with the principal botanists of Europe and America, 
he introduced into England a great number of plants, but more 
especially trees, which had never been seen here before, and 
described by no author; and in the cultivation of these (as we 
are informed by the late most ingenious Mr. Ray) he agreeably 
spent such part of his time as could most conveniently be 
spared from his other more arduous occupations. From this 
prelate’s goodness, in permitting, with freedom, persons curious 
in botany to visit his garden, and see therein what was to be 
found nowhere else; and from his zeal in propagating botanical 
knowledge, by readily communicating to others, as well to 
foreigners as to our own countrymen, such plants and seeds as 
he was in possession of, his name is mentioned with the greatest 
encomiums by the botanical writers of his time; viz., by Hermann, 
Ray, Plukenet, and others. As this prelate’s length of life and 
continuance in the see of London were remarkable, so we find 
the botanists, who wrote after Mr. Ray, most frequently men- 
tioning in their works the new accessions of treasures to this 
