498 LETTERS FROM ENGLAND. 



the Duke of Devonshire is a bachelor ; that it is a principle with 

 him to expend the most of his enormous income on his estate, and 

 that gardening is his passion. He is the President of the London 

 Horticultural Society, where he is, among enthusiastic amateurs, the 

 most enthusiastic among them all. He sends botanical collectors 

 to the most distant and unexplored countries, in search of new plants 

 at his own cost. He travels, with his head gardener, all over Eu- 

 rope, to examine the finest conservatories, and returns home to build 

 one larger and loftier than them all. He goes to Italy, to study the 

 effect of a ruined aqueduct, that he may copy it on a grand scale in 

 the waterworks at his private country-place ; and he takes down a 

 whole village near the borders of his park, in order to improve and 

 rebuild it in the most tasteful, comfortable, and picturesque manner. 



But it is not only in gardening, that the Duke of Devonshire dis- 

 plays his admirable taste. Chatsworth is not less remarkable for the 

 treasures of art collected within its walls. Its picture galleries, its 

 library, its hall of sculpture, its Egyptian antiquities, its stores of 

 plate, each is so remarkable in its way, that it would make a repu- 

 tation for any place of less note. In his equipage, though often 

 simple enough, the Duke has an individuality of his own, and we 

 remember reading a description by that excellent judge of such 

 matters, Prince Puckler Muskau, of the Duke's turn-out at Doncaster 

 races a coach with six horses and twelve outriders, which in point 

 of taste and effect, eclipsed all competitors, even there. 



But this is of little moment to our readers, most of whom, 

 doubtless, relish more their Maydukes, than anecdotes of even the 

 Royal Dukes themselves. But there is a certain satisfaction, even 

 to the humble cultivator of a dozen trees or plants, or a little plat 

 of ground, in feeling that his dtarost hobby gardening is also the 

 favorite resource of one of the wealthiest and most cultivated Eng- 

 lish nobles. It is, perhaps, doubtful whether the former does not 

 gather with a stronger satisfaction, the few fruits and flowers so 

 carefully watched and reared by his own hands, than the latter ex- 

 periences in beholding the superb desserts of hot-house growth, 

 which every day adorn his table, but which he does not know indi- 

 vidually and by heart which others have reared for him thinned, 

 watered, and shaded matched the sunny cheek redden, and the 



