296 



Malmsey. Lunan observes, in his Hortus 

 Jamaicensis, that these plants grow most luxu- 

 riantly when they are associated together; 

 and the suckers from them are stronger and 

 finer, than when the plants are separated at a 

 distance from each other : by this their roots 

 are likewise kept cooler and moister. 



It is stated, that the first pine-apples 

 raised in Europe, were by M. la Cour of 

 Leyden; and the Sloanean manuscripts in 

 the British Museum inform us, that the Earl 

 of Portland had the honour of introducing 

 this plant into England from Holland, in the 

 year 1690. 



In the Fitzwilliam Museum, at the Uni- 

 versity of Cambridge, is a painting by Nets- 

 cher, of a landscape with a pine-apple, and 

 there stated to be the first that ever fruited 

 in England, which was in Sir Matthew Dec- 

 ker's garden at Richmond, in Surry, grand- 

 father to the late Lord Fitzwilliam. Gough 

 says also, that it was Sir Matthew Decker, 

 Bart who first introduced the culture of the 

 ananas. 



Brookshaw relates, that when the pine- 

 apple first produced fruit in England, it was 

 deemed so great a curiosity, and of so much 

 importance, that persons of rank came from 

 France, Holland, and Germany, to see it, 



