252 A BOOK ABOUT THE GARDEN. 



does not exhibit because his people do not wish it, and 

 he has quite enough to do at home ; tons of fruit, 

 trucks of vegetables, stacks of flowers to be supplied 

 daily. He finds time, notwithstanding, occasionally 

 to attend the shows, and you will hear his voice above 

 all the rest instructing the exhibitors how to grow 

 and train their specialities, assuring them that by 

 carefully obeying his precepts they may realize, as he 

 has realized, such developments of size and beauty as 

 will astonish all who see. If Mr. G. is in business, 

 he walks about his grounds with a demeanour which 

 at once revives our recollection of Alexander Selkirk, 

 and we almost listen for an utterance of the old 

 familiar lines, "I am monarch," &c., &c. If you go 

 into his office, you cannot help reading, as you are 

 intended to read, in huge black letters upon the white 

 page of an open ledger 



THE MARQUIS OF MULIGATAWNEY, K.C.B., 



MULIGATAWNEY CASTLE, 



IRELAND ; 



and you will presently hear Mr. G. inquiring in a loud 

 voice, from one of his men in a distant packing shed, 

 " whether those cases have been sent off to the Duke 

 of Seven Dials, and those cut flowers to Marlborough 

 House." 



Mr. Groundsel is head gardener at the Castle of 

 Indolence, on the banks of the river Idle (not the 

 river of that name in Nottinghamshire), and looking 

 down upon Sleepy Hollow. The stream gets as near 

 stagnation as a stream can in the marshy, boggy 



