436 Provincial Gardms. 



What supports the perfect keeping of the whole is, a large reserve or 

 nursery {garden (o), containing several pits and frames, in which Mr. Toward 

 carries on some professional practices which deserve to be better known, 

 and of which we hope he will favour us with some account. Of these, the 

 first that occurs to our recollection is his mode of piping, in March, the 

 grass of the pink plants that have been forced in the past winter, and 

 flowering the plants so produced in the September and October following. 

 This practice, which we never before heard of, supplies much beauty to 

 the flower-garden at a season when flowers are becoming scarce, and when 

 there is scarcely any blossoms that are not yellow. Mr. Toward has large 

 flowers of Hydrangea in pots of the smallest size, and the manner in which 

 he procures these is as follows : — In April or May, he takes off" the points 

 of such young shoots as he judges, by feeling them, will produce flowers ; 

 these he strikes in a moist heat in those very small pots called thumbs ; 

 they root in a short time, when he transplants them into sixties, in which 

 they flower in great luxuriance, forming a corymb, sometimes nearly a foot 

 in diameter, and not more than 5 or 6 in. higher than the pot. Lobelia 

 erinoides, struck from cuttings, and shifted from one pot into another, be- 

 ginning with the smallest-sized pots, becomes a large and vigorous plant, 

 either trained to a rod, or allowed to trail or hang down from an upper 

 shelf^ or a vase or rustic basket in the open air, and covered with its fine 

 deep blue flowers during the whole summer. 



In renewing rare plants by propagation, Mr. Toward takes one genus or 

 natural family, as Vvotedcece, for example, at a time, and strikes as many 

 plants as will keep up the stock. This systematic mode of proceeding has 

 several advantages; among others, that of diminishing labour, inasmuch 

 as one mode of treatment serves for a number of cuttings ; and diminishing 

 risk from neglect or accident, since it is easier to be correct in attending to 

 the shading, airing, and watering of one set of things in one way, than of 

 several sets of things in several ways. 



In regard to order and keeping, every thing here was as we could wish 

 it, considering the season of the year, and the circumstance of the family 

 being absent. When the Duchess is at Bagshot, the keeping and polish of 

 the pleasure-ground scenery is said to be carried to a very high pitch. The 

 Duchess is much attached to Bagshot Park, and those who are placed 

 there seem not less attached to her. 



We were much gratified to observe Mr. To ward's taste for natural his- 

 tory, evinced by a collection of specimens in diiFerent departments, and an 

 excellent herbarium in four thick folio volumes, mounted and bound in a 

 superior manner, at the expense of the Duchess. It may be useful to state, 

 that the binder was Mr. Ferryman of Windsor, himself an ardent horticul- 

 turist, and one of the founders of the Gardeners' Society there. The 

 number of species in this herbarium exceed three thousand. Mr. Toward 

 began to collect them in Scotland when an apprentice, twelve years ago ; 

 and, about three years since, wishing to arrange them for reference, and 

 the Duchess having kindly desired him to have them bound at her expense, 

 he classed them according to the Linnean system, fixed them with gum to 

 leaves of drawing cartridge paper, pasting to the back of each leaf a leaf of 

 brown blotting paper, and round the margin of both surfaces of the double 

 leaf so formed strips of cartridge paper. These strips rather more than 

 compensate for the thickness of the dried specimens ; so that when the 

 leaves are bound up, their edges cut, and the book shut close, the external 

 air is excluded, and the appearance as neat as that of any printed volume. 

 A better mode of forming a specimen book we have never before seen. 

 We should have preferred the Jussieuean mode of arranging the specimens, 

 but Mr. Toward very properly preferred that of his time. The truth is, the 

 natural system and its advantages are scarcely yet known even to the very 

 first gardeners. 



