212 POT-POURRI FROM A SURREY GARDEN 



boldness and character about these drawings of ordinary 

 garden plants and flowers, but the colour has changed 

 on several of them. Like other books of the period, the 

 flowers are illustrated and described in an absolutely 

 chance and desultory way ; the only exception is when 

 the authors confine themselves to one family, like 

 Andrews' ' Heathery/ or Jacquin's ' Oxalises.' What is 

 striking in all these books is the beautiful paper and 

 printing. The drawing and painting are just beginning to 

 decline. 



1814 (about). 'The Botanic Garden,' by B. Maund. 

 I think this the most useful, from a modern gardener's 

 point of view, of all the old books in my possession. 

 Nothing approaches it for instructiveness in herbaceous 

 plants till we get to Eobinson's ' English Flower Garden.' 

 The complete set, consisting of sixteen volumes, is dim- 

 cult to find, though odd volumes or broken sets are often 

 advertised. This lovely * Botanic Garden ' is arranged 

 on an entirely new system. It is purely gardening and 

 botany, no medicine at all. The volumes are quarto, 

 and the illustrated page is divided into four. Each 

 square is filled with an illustration from a flowering 

 plant every one of which from the tallest Hollyhocks 

 to the smallest Alpine is drawn exactly the same size, 

 to fill the space. This, to my mind, is a grave fault, 

 continued to this day in flower illustration. 



In some of the old Dutch books which I have seen, 

 but, alas ! do not possess, they had a plan of drawing the 

 flowering branch, life size, in the middle of the page, with 

 a small drawing in the corner representing the growth 

 of the whole plant. This is a sensible and instructive 

 method. I should like all flower illustration to be 

 exactly the size of a fine specimen in Nature, quite 

 regardless of filling or non-filling the page. To give a 

 correct impression of the plant illustrated is very much 



