ON VEGETABLE GARDENING. 199 



of grass for a few lean and half- starved rabbits. Mr 

 Colquhoun, in his ' Statistical Researches,' estimated 

 the value of the turnip-crop annually grown in this 

 country at fourteen millions; but when we further 

 recollect that it enables the agriculturist to reclaim and 

 cultivate land which, without its aid, would remain in 

 a hopeless state of natural barrenness; that it leaves 

 the land so clean and in such fine condition, as almost 

 to insure a good crop of barley and a kind plant of 

 clover, and that this clover is found a most excellent 

 preparative for wheat, it will appear that the subse- 

 quent advantages derived from a crop of turnips must 

 infinitely exceed its estimated value as fodder for cattle. 

 If we were, therefore, asked to point out the individual 

 who, in modern times, has proved the greatest bene- 

 factor to the community, we should not hesitate to fix 

 upon the ingenious nobleman, whom the wits and 

 courtiers of his own day were pleased to laugh at as 

 ' Turnip Townshend.' In something less than one 

 hundred years, the agricultural practice which he in- 

 troduced from Hanover has spread itself throughout 

 this country, and now yields an annual return which, 

 probably, exceeds the interest of our national debt.'* 



What Lord Townshend did for the agriculture of 

 this country, the active research of professional gar- 

 deners does at the present day for our horticulture. 

 The earth is minutely surveyed for the discovery of 

 any new vegetable product, and experiments are made 

 upon every mode of cultivation that may impart a 

 new value, either of excellence or cheapness, to those 

 which we already possess. It must be obvious that 

 in gardening, as in every other art, excellence can 

 never be attained, -unless the study is systematically 

 and professionally pursued; and it will only be pur- 

 sued extensively where society is ready to pay for the 

 pursuit. In a country where the comforts of life are 



* Quart. Rev., No. 72, pp. 395-6. 



