VISITING THE GARDENS 169 



that still dot the grounds here and there Temple 

 of ^Eolus, Temple of the Sun, and so forth. 

 Beyond the Rock Garden lies the Herbaceous 

 Ground's gathering of homely plants ; and at its 

 entrance, overshadowed by Museum II., a little 

 Alpine House accommodates Nature's hardy 

 dwarfs, needing no such costly shelter as her 

 tropical Brobdignagians. 



But we have not yet done with the hot- 

 houses. Just beyond the egress of the South 

 African annexe, another group begins with the 

 Succulent House, holding a store of fleshy, 

 scaly, spiky and prickly forms of the cactus and 

 aloe tribes, having so many odd uses, as the 

 " vegetable cows " milked three times a day in 

 Mexico, that their juice may be fermented into 

 the national thin tipple pulque, tasting like 

 buttermilk with a dash of sulphur, while the 

 root of another aloe yields mezcal as a stronger 

 drink. One American cactus is not so carefully 

 cultivated as it once was to rear the cochineal 

 insect that dyed "England's cruel red," now 

 procured more cheaply from aniline dyes first 

 made under the group of tall chimneys below 

 Harrow Hill. In South Africa aloes grow 

 almost as tall as chimney stacks, so it would take 



