204 Kill es relaling lo Botany, collected from 



acorns on each acre. For this Mr. Buxton had a present of 

 a cold medal from the Society of Arts, Sec. Years or ages 

 hence it m;iy he worth a jomney to go and ohserve the pro- 

 gress of vegetation in the dimensions and heights of this 

 iainoiis phmtacion, whose beginning is so certainly known^ 



Bv a letter (November 2Slh, 176i2,) froni Thomas Know]- 

 ton, gardener to the duke of Devonshire at his seat of Lon- 

 desburgh near York, and director of his grace'^ new kitchen- 

 garden, stoves, &c., at Chatsworth, I am informed that 

 the duke of Devonshire is now sowing seventy quarters of 

 acorns, that is, 560 l>u>hcls ; an immense quantity: but 

 this year there was the greatest crop of acorns ever remetn- 

 bered. Besides this vast sowing, soiTie hundred thousands 

 of young seedling oaks are planting out this winter: be- 

 tween forty and fifty men areemploved about this work. In 

 the vear 1761, as many oaks were transplanted Irbni the 

 nursery, of two, three, and four years old. 



1761. Our last winter, if it may be called so, exceeded 

 for mildness 1759. The aulunnial flowers were not gone 

 before spring begHn in December with aconites, snowdrops, 

 polvanthuscs, &c. and continued without any alloy of in- 

 tervening sharp frosts, all Januarv, except two or three 

 frosty nights and mornings: a more delightful season could 

 not be enjoyed in southern latitudes. In January and Fe- 

 bruary my garden was covered with flowers. 



This sunnncr, 1703, I was visiting Mr. Wood, of Lit- 

 tleton, Middlesex. He showed me a curiosity which sur- 

 prised me. On a little slender twig of a peach-tree about 

 four inches long, that projected from the wall, grew a peach, 

 and close to it, on the other side of the twig, a nectarine. 

 This I\ir. Miller also assured me he had liimseU known, 

 although not mentioned here (in his Dictionary) ; and an- 

 other friend * assured me that he had a tree which produced 

 the like in his garden at Salisbury : but this I saw myself, 

 and it induces r:;t; lo think that the peach is the mother of 

 the nectarines; the latter being a modern fruit, as there is 

 no Greek or Latin name for it. 



Copied from my nephew Thomas Collinson's Journal of 

 his Travels, 1754. — "in the reign of Queen F.lizabeih, 

 aimo the first orange- and lemon-trees were introduced 



into England by two curious genllen)en, otie of them sir 



• 1 well knew the gentleman here alluded to, Dr. Hancock of Sa'.isbury, 

 wlio assured me oi -tins fact ; .-md a drawinfr showin<j both the fruits on t)je 

 same br:inch is no'.v ia tlie possession of H. P. WynJham, esq. of Salisbury. 



Dr. Hancock told me tliat he had the tree take^i up to send to the earl of 

 Harburgh, bul it was kill.- .1 by removing- -A. B. i., 



Nicholas 



