MEMOIR. 87 
Park. Another son, James Edward Smith Don, also went to 
England, being gardener to Earl Amherst, and Charles Lyell 
Linnzus Don was also gardener at Bedgebury Park, where he 
was killed in trying to stop a runaway horse. 
Don’s grandson, the son of Patrick Neill Don, writing from 
Bedgebury, Kent, in a letter quoted by Mr. Knox, says—“ After 
George Don’s death in 1814, my grandmother sold all the nursery 
stock and went to live at Newburgh, Fife. As my grandfather 
left no provision for his wife and family, she had a hard struggle 
to bring up and educate the children decently. Out of the large 
family of fifteen she bore to my grandfather, only six reached 
adult age, and one of them, the eldest, and the only girl, I think, 
died soon after their father, and before they left Forfar. All the 
five sons were bred to gardening, and they all came to England 
and settled in different parts of the country. The two eldest 
sons, George and David, did not long follow gardening, but 
having ability, and a great love for botanical science, struck out 
a higher and more congenial path for themselves. The others 
were not so fortunate, although they all held good appointments 
in their calling.” 
The Forfar garden! was let to Thomas Drummond, who after- 
wards became a botanical explorer, especially in Texas and the 
Rocky Mountains, and he was a tenant for ten or twelve years. 
On his leaving, the ground was divided. A part was given as a 
garden to the occupant of the house. The rest was parcelled 
out in gardens. Soon after this the house became a public- 
house, and the last traces of Don’s garden ceased to exist. The 
hillock, and all to the west of it, Mr. Knox says is now enclosed 
‘ The following is a contemporary record in the “ Dundee, Perth, and 
Cupar Advertiser,” April 28th, 1815, of the fate of George Don’s collection 
of plants :-— 
ADVERTISEMENT. 
TO BOTANISTS, &c. 
To be disposed of forthwith. aoe 
The whole of the PLANTS in the late Mr. George Don’s Botanic Garden at 
Fortar, 
Orders addressed to Mr. Don’s sons, George and David, will be executed 
with the utmost care, and on the most moderate terms.—A. P. Stevenson, 
Dundee. 
