1837] 



FARMERS' REGISTER. 



495 



their gardens, had a tendency to depress, and even 

 degrade, yourii^ men desirous of becoming profi- 

 cients in gardening, rather than to encourage 

 them; and to lower the art of gariiening, and the 

 profession of a gardener, in the eyes ot' the coun- 

 try gentleman, their employers, rather than to ele- 

 vate both. In tiu-t, it ajipears to have been thought 

 by the influential party connected with the Horti- 

 cultural Society, about the time the garden ,at 

 Cliiswiclc was commenced, that it was possible to 

 improve the art of ganlciling without at all im- 

 proving either the mind::! or the condition of gar- 

 deners; and that, while the latter were to be kept 

 stationary as tiir as respected themselves, the pro- 

 ductions of the gardens they cultivated were to be 

 greatly increased in excellence, orenhanced in val- 

 ue, by being produced at unusual seasons. We 

 reter, for the grounds of our opinion, to the Report 

 of the Garden Ctunmitiei, i^c. published in IMarch, 

 182u, an abstract of which will be Ibund in V^ol. -1, 

 312 — 316. In that Report two conditions only are 

 stated with reference to young men desiring ad- 

 mission into the garden; viz. first, that\ the party 

 should be reconmiended by a subscriber; and, sec- 

 ondly, that he must be between the ages of eigh- 

 teen and twenty-six, educated as a gardener, un- 

 married, and ''capable of reading and writing mod- 

 erately well.'''' These young men are designated 

 in the regulations as "laborers," and the terms 

 "gardener" and "under gardener" ar£ only applied 

 to the head gardener and the foremen of the differ- 

 ent departments. 



It is curious and interesting to look back to the 

 time of the commencement of this Magazine 

 (182B,) and to mark the difl^erent opinions which 

 now prevail amongst the higher ranks respecting 

 the working classes of society, from what were 

 prevalent even at that short distance of time. The 

 working classes, and more especially servants of 

 all sorts, were then considered as the^ natural ene- 

 mies of the wealthy and independent classed; and 

 the great object of government, and of individuals, 

 was to keep them ignorant of every thing beyoncl 

 the kmd of work in which they were employed. 

 The contrast between these times, near though 

 they be, and the tinifis at present, is indeed most 

 remarkable; and not l^s remarkable than it is grat- 

 ifying. We find, in 1886, a committee of the 

 House of Commons recommending the establish- 

 ment of a general system of education, in which 

 all useful knowledge is to be taught to all persons; 

 and another committee (that on the fine artsj re- 

 commending the establishment of schools of de- 

 sign, museums, and libraries, for the benefit of the 

 working mechanics and manufacturdrs; and also 

 the establishment of botanic gardens, &c., for the 

 same purpose. We find, too, a benevolent indi- 

 vidual in the House of Commons, and a hitrhly 

 respectable committee under the presidency of the 

 Earl of Euston (see Architectural .Magazine, vol. 

 iii. p. 360;) recommending the establishment of 

 public gardens and public baths, and promenades 

 for the health and recreation of the inhabitants of 

 towns. It is evident, from these appearances, that 

 the working classes are now looked upon in a very 

 difl'erent point of view from what they were for- 

 merly; and that, instead of attempting to keep 

 them under as slaves, or useful living machines, 

 Ihey are now considered worthy of enjoying life, 

 as well as the rich, and of being raised to the 

 moral and iniellectuai level of their employers. 



Such is the wonderful chano-e of opinion that has 

 come over the lace of society in this country du- 

 ring the last ten years! 



It is highly satisftictory to us to find the London 

 Horticultural Society keeping pace v,-ith the spirit 

 of the limes; anilco-operaiing with the general de- 

 sire fijr improvemenl. The idea of examining 

 gardervers in ihe manner before slated, we have no 

 doubt originated with Dr. Lindley, who has thus 

 rendered a most important service to the garden- 

 ing world. It afibivls us some satisliiction to reflect 

 thai, ti-om the period of the publication of the first 

 edition of the Encyclopaidiu of Gardsiving, in 1822, 

 to the present moment, we have always been an 

 advocate for a general system of education appli- 

 cable to all; and especially for highly educating 

 gardeners. We have persisted in recommending 

 this, both in the Gardener''s Magazine, and in the 

 Magazine of Natural History. Mr. Denson, in 

 the year 1834 (see vol x. p. 59.), also strongly re- 

 commended that candidates for the curatorshipsof 

 public gardens should be examined by a professor 

 of established reputation, either belonging to the 

 institute, or hired for the occasion; an excellent 

 idea, which may afford a valuable hint to provin- 

 cial societies of various descriptions, both with ref- 

 erence to their curators, and to the recommenda- 

 tion of young men from their gardens. 

 ■ The London Horticultural Society ha,ving ad- 

 vanced in their conditions of qualifications for the 

 admission of young gardeners, from "reading and 

 writing moderately well" (see vol. i. p. 315.). to 

 "vvriting, arithmetic, land-surveying, mapping, 

 and geography" (see p. 610.), the circumstance 

 will not only tend to raise the character of jrarden- 

 ers but to show the real practical value of school 

 education to working men generally. This will 

 consequently aid in accelerating the progress of 

 measures for establishing a national system of ed- 

 ucation; a part of which system will consist in^ 

 the examination of pupils, and the grantincj of cer- 

 tificates from Ihe masters and managerss of the na- 

 tional schools to all persons whatever that have 

 been educated in those schools, after the}^ have 

 been publicly examined. These certificates, by 

 showing the natural taste and acquired knowledge 

 of the pupils, will regulate the kind of profession, 

 or employment, to which they are most likely to 

 apply with success. This is the case at present in 

 Wirlemburg and other parts of Germany. See 

 vol. V. p. 692.) 



Vegetable Physiology and Systematic Botany. 

 We have not much to saj' under these heads. 

 The facts that plants may be kept alive in the 

 smoke of cities, and in close rooms, by covering 

 them with glass cases, the lower rims of which 

 are placed in water, so as to exclude the free en- 

 trance of air; and also that they may in this man- 

 ner be transported in a livinsi state from any one 

 part of the world to any other part, have been 

 proved by the indefatigable zeal of Mr. Ward, 

 whose experiments we have noticed in former vol- 

 umes, A curious fact, which bears on the subject 

 of the duration of the vitality of seeds, will be 

 found noticed in a paragraph in a fiiture page, res- 

 pecting some raspberry seeds which vegetated af- 

 ter having been buried many centuries. A hybrid 

 plant between cytisus purpureus and c. labur- 

 num has reverted to its original parentage; by one 

 part.of the plant becoming cytisus purpureus, and 

 the other cytisus laburnum; which seems to 



