JOOM 



STATISTICS OF GARDENING. 



Part IV. 



The BatFs-pond Nursery, Messrs. Brooks and Co., has 

 been established upwards of half a century, and is carried on 

 with much spirit, collectors being sent out to distant coun- 

 tries, and many new plants imported. Among these are several 

 chrysanthemums, psidiums, &c. 



The Mile-end Nursery was established by James Gordon, 

 gardener to Dr. Sherrard, at Eltham, and passed successively 

 to Gordon, Dermer, Thompson and Co. ; Gordon, For.syth, 

 and Co. ; and Thompson and Co., by whom it is at present 

 kept up in a very respectable style. 



The Mary-lt-honne Nursery, Thomas Jenkins, has been 

 established within the present century ; it is of considerable 

 extent ; contains extensive hot-houses for forcing flowers, for 

 green-house plants, and pits for pine-apples. It also contains 

 a subscription botanic garden. 



Other Nurseries. Of these there are, perhaps, a hundred 



in this county that might be deservedly mentioned. That of 

 Fraser and Co., in the King's Road, noted for American her. 

 baceous plants; of Harrison and Co., Old Brompton, for its 

 antiquity ; Schaler and Co., King's Road, as famous for roses ; 

 Joseph Knight for a general collection of exotics and hardy 

 flowers, and for excellent management ; that of Kirk and Son 

 for its antiquity, the grounds being in part surrounded by the 

 walls of Cromwell's garden ; Henderson's, in the Edgeware 

 Road, for pine-apples ; Forsyth (one of the principal London 

 seedsmen), at Mile-end ; Ross, at Kingsland, &c. 



7519. Private gardens come next in order. 



Street-Gardens {Jig- 740.) are necessarily numerous in the 

 outlets of the metropolis; many of them in the New Road, 

 Hammersmith Rood, and in the parishes of Chelsea, Fulham, 

 and Kensington, are very neatly kept. 



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The Cottage-gardens of Laborers, near town, are not remark- 

 able for management, but in the western and eastern extre- 

 mities of the county they are better. 



The Cottage-gardens of Artificers are often very neatly kept ; 

 particularly those of the Spitalfields weavers, and other opera- 

 tives who have a taste for flowers. 



Farmers' Gardens As many of the farmers near the metro- 

 polis are retired or speculative London tradesmen, they have 

 often very neat gardens. Those to the west of London may be 

 referred to as examples. 



Suburban and Citizens' Villas are in considerable number, 

 of various degrees of extent ; but generally neatly kept. 



7520. Villas are numerous in every part of the 

 country ; a few may be enumerated : 



Arno's Vale, - near Southgate ; J. Walker, Esq. A noble 

 mansion, chiefly by Sir R. Taylor: the grounds comprise 

 woods watered by the New River ; the flower-garden is rich, 

 and there is an extensive range of hot -houses containing an 

 abundant collection of exotics. 



Culland's Grove, near Southgate ; Sir W. Curtis. A sub- 

 stantial villa, and good kitchen-gardens, with hothouses, on 

 which no expense is spared. 



Canons, near Edgeware; Sir Thomas Plumer. A dull flat 

 of rich pasture, intersected by rows of elms, and surrounded by 

 a brick wall. 



This Dlace is remarkable as having been the site of the 

 improvements of the celebrated Duke of Chandos, who rose 

 from the rank of a private gentleman. James Bridges, Esq. 

 married into the family of Lake, then proprietors of Canons. 

 Having made his fortune as a paymaster in the German war, 

 and acquired his title, he built the magnificent mansion of 

 Canons about 1712. It stood nearly in the centre of the 

 park, at the end of a spacious avenue, being placed diagonally 

 so as to show two sides of the building, which, at a distance, 

 gave the appearance of a front of a prodigious extent. Vertue 

 describes it as a " noble square pile, all of stone ; the four sides 

 almost alike, with statues on the front ; within was a small 

 square of brick, not handsome, the out-offices of brick and stone, 

 very convenient and well disposed," &c. The architect was 

 James, of Greenwich, and the whole expense of the building 

 and furniture is said to have amounted to 200,000/. Dr. Alex- 

 ander Blackwell, author of a treatise on agriculture, who 

 afterwards went to Sweden, where he died, and whose widow 

 published figures of plants, was employed to superintend the 

 works out of doors. Lysons thinks it is probable he laid out the 



Sleasure-grounds ; but it is not unlikely that the architect, 

 ames, who translated I.c Blond's Gardening, disposed of the 

 grounds as well as of the house. The duke's manner of living 

 corresponded with the magnificence of his mansion, and fell 

 little short of the state of a 'sovereign prinoe. Canons and the 



duke were satirised by Pope under the character of Timon 

 and his villa, in 1731. Pope at first denied it, and afterwards 

 wrote an exculpatory letter to the duke, who answered it with 

 great magnanimity, as by a man who accepted his excuse with- 

 out believing his professions. There is a print of Hogarth's, in 

 which he represents Pope whitewashing the Earl of Burling- 

 ton's house, and bespattering the Duke of Chandos's carriage 

 as it passes by 

 When 'the duke died, the mansion being thought to require 



an establishment too expensive for the income of his I 

 after fruitless attempts to disj>ose of it entire, was pulled down^ 

 and the materials sold by auction in 1747. The grand stair- 

 case,of which each step was a single block of marble above twenty 

 five feet in length, is in Lord Chesterfield's house in May Fair ; 

 the equestrian statue of Geo. I . in the centre of Leicester Square ; 

 the park was purchased by an upholsterer (Hallet), who built 

 the house now existing, and successively occupied by himself, 

 by O'Kelly, and the present proprietor. Two poems were 

 written on Canons; one by S. Humphreys, in 1728, the other 

 by Gildon. 



Cranford Lodge, near Norwood; Countess of Berkeley. 

 Remarkable for its pheasants, which, in the late earl's time, 

 were everywhere as abundant, and 'seeking their food on the 

 green sward with all the confident serenity of domestic fowls. 



Delaford Par k, near Uxhridge; C.Clowes, Esq. A hand- 

 some mansion ; and grounds finely undulated, well wooded, 

 and watered by the river Colne. 



Durham Park, near South Mims ; J. Trotter, Esq. A 

 good house, well wooded grounds, and a productive kitchen- 

 garden. 



Ealing Grove, near Ealing; C. Wyatt, Esq. A substan- 

 tial and commodious, house, and forty acres of ground arranged 

 with much judgment. 



Earl's Court Villa, at Earl's Court; John Baynes, Esq. 

 Was the villa for the late celebrated surgeon, John Hunter. 

 Here he had a curious menagerie. 



Flambards, near Harrow; Lord Northwick. The house 

 being in the village, from its elevation commands astonish- 

 ingly fine views ; the grounds are disposed in good taste. 



Fordhook, near Ealing; Charles Duval, Esq. A good 

 house, once the residence of Fielding ; the grounds economically 

 and tastefully disposed. 



Forty Hall, near Enfield; J. Meyers, Esq. The house 

 originally by Jones, but altered ; the grounds extensive, undu- 

 lating, abounding in lofty elm and ash-trees, and adorned with 

 some fine pieces of water. 



The Grove, near Stanmore; C. Poole, Esq. The grounds 

 are remarkable for containing an island and tomb, in Imitation 

 of the Isle des Pcufiliers, at Ermenonville, and of Rousseau's 

 tomb, formerly there, but now in the pantheon of Paris. 



X Gunnersbury, near Ealing; A. Copland, Esq. A de- 

 sirable villa, with seventy acres of ground, adorned by two 



