214 Horticultural Society's Garden. 



again, e. g, corallorhiza innata. One reason why the American plants grow 

 so luxuriantly at Fonthill Abbey is, that they were introduced among the 

 native underwoods, interspersed among bushes of hazel, dog-wood, &c. 

 and sheltered by firs, oaks, and other timber trees. A shrubbery, therefore, 

 we should consider a very good situation for acclimating exotics, whether 

 trees or herbs, and more especially if the soil was dry, and the shrubs 

 chiefly deciduous; for it should not be forgotten that a coppice wood of 

 evergreens is always colder than one of deciduous bushes, owing to the 

 leaves presenting a greater surface for evaporation. Groves of evergreen 

 trees, on the other hand, especially of the pine and fir tribe, present a warmer 

 climate beneath them than groves of deciduous trees, because the former, 

 from the closer texture of their exterior surface, reflectback more completely 

 the heat radiated from the ground below. But where there are abundance 

 of plants of any tree or shrub to be acclimated, we should prefer to all other 

 modes that of planting each sort by itself in a compact clump, on dry 

 soil, and in a sheltered situation open to the south and west. We have 

 known the common myrtle escape in this way in the same garden in which 

 plants trained against a south wall had been killed. 

 That elegant evergreen shrub, the photinia serrulata, and also the eriobotrya 

 japonica, both trained, have stood uninjured without any protection ; so has 

 the single red and double white camellia as bushes, in Lee's nursery. We 

 have little doubt of these plants, as well as some other varieties of camellia, 

 becoming in a few years common inhabitants of our shrubberies, and no 

 such additions will have been made to them since the sera of Magnolia and 

 Rhododendron. 



The plants in the botanic stoves are in excellent condition; some 

 amaryllises, pancratiums, and different species of that new and valuable family 

 of plants, the epiphytical orchidese, together with a curious Chinese plant 

 aspidistra, with flowers not unlike those of asarum, are in flower. Above 

 a dozen varieties of camellia are beginning to expand their blossoms, among 

 which is a fine specimen of C. fimbriata and one of hexangularis ; and in the 

 botanic pits and frames, that invaluable ornament, the primula sinensis is in 

 the greatest luxuriance. The history of the introduction of this plant 

 shows how little attention was paid to searching for any new or interesting 

 plant in China till very lately. The first plant of P. sinensis was brought 

 home by Captain Raives, of Bromley, in 1820. Its value as an ornament 

 was soon ascertained, and in consequence, some captains who sailed shortly 

 afterwards, brought home abundance of seeds. Had the same desire for 

 finding out and bringing home Chinese plants existed a century ago, there 

 can be no doubt this plant and its seeds were as abundant then as now. 



In the forcing-houses, a great many varieties of peaches and nectarines, 

 and some cherries and plums in pots, are coming into flower. On the 

 back-wall trellis of one of these houses, there are several standard and 

 dwarf peaches, with different kinds budded on each ; by this means a great 

 varietyofsortsmaybeprovedinoneseason. In another housedifferent varieties 

 of strawberries are coming into blossom, and against the back wall various 

 figs in pots have already made shoots, which are stopped at the third, fourth, 

 or fifth leaf, agreeably to Mr. Knight's ingenious practice (Hort. Trans. 

 vol.iii. p. 459.). The fruit on some of these figs has attained its full size, and 

 according to the plan of always stopping the young shoots as they appear at 

 the fourth or fifth joint, three crops will have been ripened by Christmas 

 next. 



The plants are in large sized pots, and are occasionally watered with 

 liquid manure. A new house for fruiting pines has been erected since our 

 last notice of this garden ; it comes very near to that description of fruiting 

 house in use in the royal gardens, Kensington, (Encyc. of Gard. figs. 435, 

 436; and, The different modes of cultivating the pine apple, fyc.'mloco); but we 

 refcain at present from engraving the plan, lest it should be the intention 



