264< State of Gardening in Ireland. 



Before journeying northwards, we beg leave to introduce 

 Merino, the seat of Earl Charlemont, and then to make a few 

 general remarks. Merino has more the character of a country 

 residence than any yet specified. Its extensive woods, com- 

 paratively speaking, closely surrounded by the trees of the ad- 

 joining villas, give it, as you approach from the south, the ap- 

 pearance of a dense forest. The gardens are extensive, and, 

 we are happy to state, rapidly improving in every department, 

 under the management of Mr. Hethrington, the president of 

 the Irish Horticultural Society. This demesne is open to the 

 public. 



The gardens, generally speaking, around the city, have been 

 laid down upon too large a scale ; the consequences are, a fall- 

 ing off in the means necessary to support them in their pristine 

 st}de, and a neglect of those particulars which constitute the 

 chief beauties of gardening. With the view of having them 

 near the mansion, a very obvious mistake has been made on 

 the part of the proprietors, the outside walls and borders being 

 thereby sacrificed. Independent of the economy, we know of 

 no plan so neat and comfortable as a moderate-sized garden, 

 from one to two Irish acres, according to the nature of the 

 family, with a properly secured slip around, so that due advan- 

 tage maybe taken of both sides of the walls. This is the prac- 

 tice of Mr. Hay, round Edinburgh, whose designs have given 

 such general satisfaction, and of Mr. M'Leish, throughout this 

 country. In the formation and internal arrangement of the 

 houses for ornamental plants, little improvement has been 

 made on their original simplicity; and, except the conservatory 

 in the Dublin Society's Botanical Gardens, there are none to 

 vie with the late Mr. Angerstein's at Blackheath, or Sir Robert 

 Liston's at Milburn Tower, in Mid-Lothian, nearer than that 

 at Shane's Castle, in the county of Antrim. The application 

 of steam has been confined to one or two places, and the me- 

 tallic sash to a like number. We have no want of horticul- 

 tural erections of this sort, attached to dwelling-houses, of 

 every scale and form ; but they are, with very few exceptions, 

 the mere gewgaws of some city architect, in which, perhaps, a 

 myrtle or orange-tree might struggle out a wretched existence. 

 Until the prejudices which exist among operatives to the cul- 

 tivation of exotics are removed, we cannot look for much 

 improvement in this department. True it is, that in the pro- 

 duction of early culinary crops, peaches, and the framing de- 

 partment, the Dublin gardeners are only to be excelled by those 

 around London ; they certainly exceed those of Edinburgh. 

 In the cultivation of the pine-apple and vine, in the manage- 

 ment of wall-trees, and in several of the more elegant branches 

 of the art, much remains to be done. The dissemination of the 



