272 Nurse)y Gardens and HorticuUure 



and the poor get twice as many of those beginning to decay. 

 A brilliant display of flowers at the flower-stalls in the Toledo, 

 consisting of roses, ranunculuses, anemones, carnations, 

 stocks, livacintlis, asphodels, 8:c. &c. Vegetation not fartlier 

 advanceti than we left it at Rome. Horsechestnut trees in 

 the botanic garden with leaves one third expanded (March 6.), 

 and on the same day a few buds of the common acacias in 

 the Villa Reale unfolding. 



Art. III. Some Account of the Nursery Gardens and the State of 

 Horticulture in the Neighbourhood of Phitade/phia, ivilh Remarks 

 on the Subject of the Emigration of British Gardeners to the 

 United States. By Mr. William Wynne, Foreman in Bar- 

 tram's Botanic Garden, Philadelphia. • 



Sir, 



According to my promise before I left England, I proceed 

 to give you some account of the nurseries and gardens in the 

 neighbourhood of Philadelphia, after having seen all of them 

 worth looking at. 



I shall begin with Bartram's Botanic Garden ; the prece- 

 dence being due to it, botii for anti{]uity (it having been 

 established 100 years), and iVom its containing the best col- 

 lection of American plants in the United States. There are 

 above 2000 species (natives) contained in a space of six acres, 

 not including the fruit nursery and vineyard, which comprise 

 eight acres. The handsomest and largest tree I have ever 

 seen is here ; it is a Cupressus disticha L. [Schubert/rt dis- 

 ticha of Mirbcl, Taxodium distichum of lUchard'], and is 

 120 ft. high : at 18 ft. from the ground it is more than 28 ft. 

 in circumference, and it averages 28 ft.: it is 91 years old.* 

 A Gymnocladus canadensis, or Kentucky coffee tree, is here 

 80 ft. high; an y/cacia Ji///brissin, 35 ft.; an Andromeda 

 arborea, 75 ft. ; an Aralia spinosa, 25 ft. ; a Gordon/V/ })ubes- 

 cens, 50 It., this tree is now in flower ; and a /^iospyros 

 virginiana is 80 ft., and lias a fine crop of ripe fruit on it, 

 which tastes pretty well. The Americans distil an excellent 

 brandy from this fruit. There are also two trees of Magnol/a 

 acuminata 80 ft. higii, and six other American magnolias, 

 from 4-0 to GO ft. in height ; with species of Quc'rcus and 

 Phuis, &c. 8cc., in great variety. Indeed, the most remark- 



* 1 have seen an oak tree in Wynnstay Park, North Wales, that had 

 a tliicker trunk tluui the decicluons cypress described above, but was much 

 inferior in height and symmetry. 



