18 THE HORTICULTURE OF 



remembered that to the Massachusetts Horticultural 

 Society the public are indebted for the foundation and 

 consecration of Mount Auburn Cemetery." 



While we have no space to dwell on our long pre- 

 served Common with its lawns, its malls, fountains and 

 monuments, we must not forget the Public Garden of 

 Boston. The origin of this may be traced to the desire 

 of a few of her citizens who were interested in horti- 

 cultural improvements and rural embellishments, but 

 more especially in the establishment of a Botanic or 

 a Public Garden, similar to those of the cities of the 

 old world. Among these gentlemen was Mr. Horace 

 Gray, father of our Chief Justice Gray, to whose great 

 enterprise and indomitable perseverance we are, per- 

 haps, more indebted than to any other man for the 

 original idea for our Public Garden. Mr. Gray had a 

 small conservatory attached to his town house in King- 

 ston street, supplied from his country greenhouses at 

 Brighton, where he had grapehouses with curved 

 roofs, of which he was a great advocate. Mr. Gray, 

 in 1839, with a few associates, obtained from the 

 city a lease of the present site for a Botanic Gar- 

 den, upon which a greenhouse was built and the grounds 

 partially laid out and planted with a variety of orna- 

 mental trees and plants. A company was organized, 

 of which Mr. Gray was chairman of the proprietors, 

 and went zealously to work. A very large circus 

 building situated just back of the corner, west of 

 Beacon and Charles streets, was converted into an 

 immense conservatory for plants and birds. This had 

 four galleries, to each of which plants were assigned 

 according to a proper classification of their character. 



i Mr. Wilder's Address at the laying of the Corner Stone of Horticultural 

 Hall, on School Street, Sept. 14, 1844. 



