406 Notes and Recollections of a Tour 



made an impression on our mind never to be forgotten. No 

 steep declivities or deep ravines, — no monntainons ridges 

 ■wreathed with perpetual verdure here attract the eye. The 

 scenery, though perhaps ratiier tame, is rendered surpass- 

 ingly beautiful by the broad and dense masses of foliage in 

 some places, and, we might say, almost gardenesque arrange- 

 ment of the trees in otiiers ; hundreds of specimens, stand- 

 ing out singly and detached from all others — their lofty 

 stems and wavy branches forming objects of great beauty. 

 All lovers of our native forest scenery, will be struck with 

 admiration at the vigor, as well as the picturesque grouping 

 of tliis richly wooded portion of New England. 



New Haven, October \2th. — We arrived here at 1 o'clock 

 in the afternoon, in little more than two hours from Hart- 

 ford, — distance about thirty-five miles. We were much 

 pleased with our visit to this city; the style of the buildings 

 generally, and particularly of the villa residences, we greatly 

 admired: they certainly surpass in fitness and expression, 

 those of any other town we have ever visited. Many of 

 the dwellings are of brick and stucco, in imitation of stone, 

 and the effect of the style is good and pleasing in a high 

 degree. 



Garden of Dr. A. S. Monson, Elm Street. — We first 

 called on oar correspondent, Dr. Monson, President of the 

 New Haven Horticultural Society, whose address at the 

 late anniversary, we reviewed at page 346. The garden 

 contains upwards of an acre, and is fully stocked with a 

 variety of fruit and ornamental trees, &c. 



The first object which we noticed was a grape, which 

 the Doctor designated as the Bland ; but it is not the Bland 

 as described by Prince and other authors. The true Bland 

 is a grape somewhat resembling the Catawba, but smaller : 

 the Bland, so called here, was a black, oval grape, very 

 nearly resembling the Isabella, but with a little more pulp, 

 and perhaps not quite as sweet; though as respects this, we 

 could not state, as the difference in the ripeness of the 

 berries might make the variation. We are inclined to 

 think it a mere variety of the Isabella, or at least something 

 nearly allied to it. He very kindly promised us a few cuttings, 

 and we shall endeavor to place it among our specimen vines 

 for trial. Dr. Monson showed us trees of the common Eng- 

 lish black mulberry, grafted on the Morus multicaulis, last 

 spring, which had made a rapid and healthy growth ; this 



