Provincial Horticultural Societies : — Huntingdonshire. 349 



Art. VIII. A Commercial Horticultural Society. 



Sir, I ought sooner to have sent you some account of the endea- 

 vours which I and some of my friends are making to establish a Horticul- 

 tural Society at the city end of the town. It is not intended at all to be a 

 rival of the great aristocratical Society at the west end ; but merely to supply 

 the wants of the lovers of horticulture in the east end. We propose it to 

 be of a much more humble description, and more of a commercial nature 

 than the parent Horticultural Society. It will combine some of the best 

 features of the pleasure-garden, the flower-garden, the nursery, and even 

 the tea-garden, and there will be tidded a literary mechanics institution. 

 Ladies as well as gentlemen may be subscribers, and tickets will be trans- 

 ferable like shares, under certain regulations. Ten acres of garden ground 

 are in view, in which nothing will be grown that does not properly 

 belong to horticulture or floriculture, neither pure botanical plants, nor 

 forest trees will be attended to. Every subscriber will have at least half 

 the amount of his subscription returned to him, in the form of seeds, 

 roots, or plants, at stated periods during each year. There will be 

 a house in the garden for refreshments of all kinds, and for dinners, 

 at which members may prove the quality of fruits and vegetables. In this 

 house there will be a meeting-room, in which will be a collection of 

 books for the use of the members and gardeners; and there will be 

 voluntary lectures and instructions given there on every branch of science 

 connected with gardening, as well for the attendance of subscribers and 

 working gardeners, as for that of all gardeners and persons whatever who 

 choose to pay a small fee. The Society will take in apprentices and send 

 out gardeners to situations. They will have a large show conservatory, 

 or bazaar, in town for the exhibition and sale of plants in pots, from their 

 own or from any other garden or nursery; and, adjoining this flower 

 bazaar, there will be a gardener's coffee-house, and a room for the 

 monthly meetings of the Society. At these meetings lady-members may 

 attend ; and it is proposed that the discussions should be rather more in 

 the nature of convei-sazioni, than in the meetings of the Regent Street 

 Horticultural Society. The next thing which I mean to propose, I am 

 sure you will approve of, and that is voluntary travelling missions in Bri- 

 tain and on the Continent, the individuals composing the mission to have 

 only a part of their expenses allowed, both with a view of acquiring infor- 

 mation, purchasing foreign plants, roots, and seeds, and of criticising gar- 

 dens for the benefit of gardeners and their employers. Finally, and diis 

 you will, perhaps, not approve of, we intend publishing a weekly Gardener's 

 Neivsjyaper, in imitation of the Farmer's Journal, 



We may not accomplish all these things at once, but we shall attempt 

 them, unless something better can be suggested; and it is with a view to 

 invite suggestions that 1 send you this letter ; to which I have only to add, 

 that I shall be happy to hear from, or to meet, any gentleman on the subject, 

 and to introduce him to such of my friends as are assisting me in promoting 

 these views. I am. Sir, yours, truly. — J.P. Burnard. Formosa Cottage, 

 Eden Grove, Holloivay, Mat/ 16. 1829. 



Art. IX. Provincial Horticultural Societies. 



HuNTINCDONSHIKE. 



HU2^TINGD0N Horticultural Society. — The Annual Spring Show of the 

 above Society was held in Huntingdon on April 22., when prizes were 

 awarded as follows : — 



