166 OBSKHVATIONS ON KEW BOTANIC GARDEN. 



Mr. Aiton has sent the following letter in explanation of this : — 

 Royal Botanic Garden, Kew, February 22, 1838. 



Sir, Agreeably to the request conveyed to me in your letter of the 

 20th instant, I send you an abstract of all deliveries contained in the 

 garden-books, together with the names of the persons to whom the 

 same were forwarded ; but the residences not being always inserted 

 is the cause of several omissions in this particular. Many plants, 

 seeds, and cuttings, in small quantities, have been given to amateurs, 

 of which no account has been taken. It should be, however, parti- 

 cularly observed, that the royal collection has been required to supply 

 great quantities of flowering and other plants in the reign of His late 

 Majesty King George the Fourth, especially for the conservatories at 

 Carlton House, the King's House, Lodge at Windsor Park, the 

 orangery at the Castle ; and that these supplies being only from one 

 to another of the royal gardens, many of these deliveries were not 

 entered in the garden-books. There have been also considerable 

 numbers of plants sent to the royal palaces on birth-days, birth-nights, 

 and other grand entertainments, on which occasions many losses have 

 been sustained. 



With this explanation of a great dispersion of plants from the 

 Royal Botanic Garden, and bearing in mind that of the two collectors 

 sent abroad in 1814, one was recalled in 1S23, the other in 1830, by 

 the Lords of the Treasury, thereby cutting off the usual resources for 

 replenishing the losses, &c, of the garden, and that also within the 

 last ten years the allowance for keeping this garden being reduced 

 nearly 600/. a year, it is evident that adequate means of late years 

 have not been afforded so as to support a more extensive and more 

 valuable collection ; nor could a greater distribution of plants be 

 reasonably expected by the public, were it generally known that the 

 Botanic Garden at Kew was originally formed at the private expense 

 of the Royal Family, and has been maintained up to the present time 

 in like manner with the other departments of the household establish- 

 ments, the estimates of the expense being regulated and defrayed by 

 the Lord Steward and the Board of Green Cloth. 



I am, &c, 



To Dr. Lindley, fyc. §c. Sfc. (Signed) W. T. Aiton. 



It is perfectly true that the garden means have been much curtailed 

 for the last 10 years; but this seems, upon the whole, to have been 



