44 HISTORY AND GEOGRAPHY OF TREES. PART I. 



(1809) 7 ft. li in.; the Juglans nigra, 1] ft. 5j in.; the 

 Pinus Pinaster, 10 ft. 1 in.; the Quercus / x lex, 9 ft. 1 in.; the 

 Quercus alba, 8 ft. 1 J in. ; the Quercus Suber, of which I had 

 not a satisfactory measure in 1793, is now (1809) 8 ft. 4 in. in 

 girt ; the. largest cedar now measures 8 ft. 8f in. in girt ; 

 another, in a court of the palace, about 7 ft. : it is probable that 

 the latter has been lessened in girt, from having been drawn 

 up by its situation to a remarkable height. The lime tree above 

 mentioned now measures 14- ft. 1 in. in girt. The Cytisus 

 Laburnum is an old decayed tree in the close (without the 

 lodge) near the moat, about 3 ft. in girt. There are two of the 

 RobinzVz Pseud-acacia, one near the porter's lodge, and one on 

 the lawn near the moat ; they are both in a state of great 

 decay, and their trunks in such a state as not to admit of mea- 

 surement." 



All the trees mentioned in the above extract, except those 

 contained in the table, the large limes, the remains of the 

 robinia, and one or two others, are decayed or taken down ; the 

 grounds having undergone several alterations during the occu- 

 pancy of Bishop Porteus, between 1800 and 1816. Both Bishop 

 Porteus and the present bishop have added considerably to the 

 collection. 



It would be interesting to know the means by which Bishop 

 Compton procured his trees and shrubs from America, and who 

 were the botanical collectors of that day. Several may have 

 existed whose names are now lost. It appears highly probable 

 that most of the American trees and plants at Fulham were intro- 

 duced by the Rev. John Banister, who was sent by the bishop as 

 a missionary to Virginia. John Banister, according to Dr. Pul- 

 tenev (Sketches, &c., vol. i.), was one of the first British collectors 

 in North America. He published a Catalogue of the plants he ob- 

 served there, dated 1680. He is mentioned repeatedly by Ray, 

 as having introduced many plants. Banister was one of the early 

 martyrs to natural history, having, in one of his excursions, fallen 

 from a rock and perished. His Catalogue will be found in the 

 second volume of Ray's Historia Plantarum, and several of his 

 papers are published in the Philosophical Transactions. Pluke- 

 net, describing the Azalea viscosa, says that a drawing of it, by 

 his own hand, was sent by him to Bishop Compton, his patron. 



The name of Evelyn is well known, as belonging to this cen- 

 tury. His Sylva was published in 1664-, from which, and from 

 his Calendarium Hortense, it appears that the number of species 

 and varieties of trees and shrubs in the London gardens was 

 then extremely limited. In one of the later editions of the Sylva, 

 Evelyn mentions the tulip tree as having been introduced by 

 Tradescant. His description of the tree is curious. He says, 

 " they have a poplar in Virginia of a very peculiar-shaped leaf, 



