70 MASSACHUSETTS HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



but erelong he will be tracing out analogies in plants, and will show 

 them up in magnified models so plainly, that more of botany can be 

 learned from them in a week than from months of other study. Such 

 models are now in this city exhibited at public lectures, and are recom- 

 mended earnestly to the attention of all. 



The whole community are interested in growth and order ; and if a 

 general education is essential to that end, so is the culture of taste and 

 a love of nature essential to a refined civilization. There is less crime 

 where the mind is full of flowers; less malice where plants instead of 

 faults are found ; a neighbor's new seedling is better for discussion than 

 his failings. The companionship of the sweet blooms of nature tends to 

 soften and refine. Set down the roughest immigrant where the lawn is 

 soft and velvety, and flowers in family groups are smiling, and shrubs 

 like candelabra stand showing their flames, and trees are waving 

 benedictions and the walks are shadowy and still; and you will find his 

 soul touched by a spell. He cannot break the order that surrounds 

 him. For the moment, he forgets himself, or rather, gets beyond him- 

 self, and feels the influence of an iinseen jDower. He may quickly rally 

 and call his old self back again, and try to be as rude as ever; but he 

 will, probably, not quit the place without turning to look once more 

 upon that quiet lesson, and may even speak of it to his associates. The 

 most uncultivated man in his senses cannot wend his way in solitude, 

 where the violets and anemones grow, and the trees keep silence, with- 

 out a sensation that he is somewhere intermediate between the land of 

 men and the land of spirits; and if he should happen to wander into 

 one of our gardens of the dead, and mark the care and reverence which 

 tend the grave, might he not learn to respect the virtues which com- 

 mand such love and reverence? 



One of the first spots visited by your Committee during the past sea- 

 son, was 



Mt. Hope Cemetery. 



This belongs now to the City of Boston, and is under the superintendence 

 of Mr. S. A. B. Bragg; to whom the Committee are indebted for 

 very kind attentions. The whole ground exhibited a marked improve- 

 ment since their last visit. 



The avenues and paths were in good condition; the flowers were 

 better in kind and quality, and were arranged with more taste, produc- 

 ing more pleasing effects. The ribbon planting, of double and single 

 Portulacas in thick rows, supported by fit lines of plants in their rear, 

 produced a fine efteet; and although this species of ornamentation must 

 not be too often repeated or carried too far, yet as here 'displayed, it 

 reflected credit on the planters. Many of the flowers were txquise. 



