12 Present State of Gardening in Ireland. 



be quite superfluous. All these botanic gardens are ably de- 

 scribed in the Edinburgh and Gardening Encyclopedias. 



The only public grounds about Dublin are contained in 

 the Phoenix Park, in which are also the country residences 

 of the Lord Lieutenant, Chief and Under Secretaries, &c. 

 This Park is very extensive, and the grounds are more ele- 

 vated and contain a greater variety of surface than any of the 

 Royal Parks in the vicinity of London. There appears to 

 have been no general design in the disposition of the trees, if 

 we except the alternate groups of English elm, on each side 

 of the public road, and the trees around the residences we 

 have just mentioned. A great many hawthorns have been 

 irregularly scattered throughout the grounds, and during the 

 administration of Earl Talbot several very formal groups and 

 clumps were made without the least regard to the general 

 ornament of the place. It is to be regretted that some pro- 

 fessional landscape gardener was not employed in the orna- 

 menting of this Park, for if it was judiciously planted, due 

 advantage being taken of the numerous objects within itself, 

 and of the endless variety of delightful scenery which sur- 

 round it, assuredly there would be nothing like it in the empire. 



The enclosure around the Lord Lieutenant's house is of 

 itself a very charming little demesne, and contains several 

 fine ornamental trees. We observed some large well formed 

 trees of the Ulmus parvifolia, generally confounded with 

 the common English elm, which, from the different mode 

 of growth, form a fine contrast with the nem oralis. There 

 are several very fine oaks to the westward of the house, 

 where the woody character has been properly preserved. The 

 gardens are extensive in every department, and are admira- 

 bly kept by the present superintendent, Mr. Robson. There 

 is nothing very interesting or grand about them ; on the con- 

 trary, all is plain, neat, and economical. The fruit trees 

 on the walls are well managed. We observed a beautiful 

 variety of pyracantha against the walls of one of the little en- 

 closures near the gardener's house, with deep scarlet haws. 

 Mr. Robson has been in the habit of propagating in autumn, 

 by cuttings, large quantities of the different free growing sorts 

 of pelargoniums, hemmemerises, and heliotropes, &c. which 

 he keeps over the winter in frames, and in spring plants out 

 distinctly in separate beds throughout the flower garden, where 

 they blow during the summer and autumn in great luxuriance. 

 Having had a number of plants this year of the Coboea scan- 

 dens, he planted several of them against walls, palings, &c. and 

 their growth was really amazing. They all fruited, and many 

 of them are likely to ripen seed. We mention this circum- 



