THE PINE-APPLE. 379 



It has been said that the pine-apple was brought 

 from Brazil, first to the West Indies, and thence to 

 the East; but the evidence is not complete. It was 

 known in Holland some time before its introduction 

 into this country; and even about its introduction 

 here there are some disputes. The picture of King 

 Charles II., with his gardener presenting him with a 

 pine, said to be the first grown in England, is re- 

 jected by the better informed authorities; and the 

 pine, if ever such a fruit was offered to that 

 monarch, is supposed to have been brought from 

 Holland, or the pine to have been presented, and the 

 picture drawn, before his return to this country. 

 Mr. Bentinck, the ancestor of the Duke of Portland, 

 is, according to the best accounts, supposed to have 

 first introduced and cultivated the pine in the year 

 1690; and this is rendered the more likely, from the 

 fact that he was previously acquainted with the fruit 

 in Holland. And yet the cultivation of the pine had 

 made so little progress in England a quarter of a 

 century later, that Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, on 

 her journey to Constantinople in 1716, remarks the 

 circumstance of pine-apples being served up in the 

 dessert, at the Electoral table at Hanover, as a thing 

 she had never before seen or heard of* 



Pine-apples have been grown in this country of an 

 extraordinary size. One of the New Providence 

 kind, that weighed nine pounds, four ounces, was 

 presented to his Majesty, in June, 1820, by John 

 Edwards, Esq., of Rheola, Glamorganshire, where 

 it was grown. In July, 1821, another Providence 

 pine is mentioned, in the Transactions of the Horti- 

 cultural Society,! to have weighed ten pounds eight 

 ounces: it was grown by Mr. Buchan, gardener to 

 Lord Cawdor, at Stackpool Court, Pembrokeshire. 



* Letters of Lady M. W. Montagu. t Vol. v. p. 264 



