Covent Garden Market.- 5 1 S 



Our winter supplies will be necessarily abundant, and of excellent quality, 

 should fine weather prevail during the ensuing autumnal months. — G. C. 



The New Market-Building, referred to in our last (p. 379.), is now nearly 

 completed, and we have a general" plan, elevation of the east front, and per- 

 spective view, in the hands of the engraver, for our next Number. The two 

 conservatories are occupied, the one by Messrs. Cormack, Son, and Sinclair, 

 and the other by Messrs Hockley and Bunney. They are well stocked with 

 showy green-house plants, as is the terrace with hardy flowers, and shrubs 

 in pots. The whole forms a delightful promenade, open to every body ; 

 and if the plants were conspicuously named with small lead labels, as in the 

 stoves of the Horticultural Society, this scene would be almost as good as 

 a botanic garden in promoting a taste for plants ; for the first step towards 

 the knowledge of things is to know their names. In a small room, also 

 open to every body, Messrs. Cormack, Son, and Sinclair have, or ought to 

 have, like M. Vilmorin and Co. of Paris, a collection of the newest botanical 

 and horticultural publications, a series of models of fruits, a herbarium of the 

 grasses and herbage plants indigenous or cultivated in Britain : they have 

 specimens of the best grass seeds for different specific purposes ; plans for 

 laying out flower-gardens, for garden structures, and for laying out resi- 

 dences of every variety of extent, from the street garden upwards ; and 

 various new implements, and other matters. Taking it altogether, these 

 conservatories, the terrace, and their accompaniments, surpass any thing 

 which has hitherto been attempted in London ; and, as they become known, 

 they will improve, in consequence of artists, artisans, and others sending 

 their productions for exhibition. We should wish to see all Mr.. Peake's 

 vases and flower-pots, the terra-cotta statues of Flora, Pomona, Ceres, 

 Venus, Apollo, the busts of naturalists, poets, and philosophers, &c, which 

 we hope he has in hand, as well as the vases and orange tubs of Jones of 

 the Vauxhall Road, and the sundials, pedestals, and therms of these and 

 other ingenious potters. 



The architectural beauty of this structure, no less than the very superior 

 accommodation and comfort which it affords to the sellers and also to the 

 purchasers, does the greatest honour to the public spirit of the Duke of 

 Bedford. When we think of Woburn, what it is, and how it is kept up, 

 and of the Duke's public and private character, the absence of all that 

 display of feudal pageantry which in the present day is the never-failing 

 sign of a barbarian or mean understanding, we must take the liberty of 

 saying, even at the risk of giving offence, that we do not know a nobleman 

 of the same rank who has so entirely our approbation. The architect of 

 the market is Mr. Fowler, an artist of exquisite taste in his profession : but 

 the original plan of this gentleman, an engraving of which is now before us, 

 was entirely remodelled, agreeably to the suggestions of Mr. Charlwood, 

 and certainly greatly improved ; a circumstance not at all astonishing, 

 considering Mr. Charlwood's great experience as clerk of the market. We 

 shall take this opportunity of observing that, in all cases in which architects 

 are called upon to devise plans out of their common line, they ought to 

 begin by consulting those who are to manage or use the building to be 

 planned, and thus make themselves masters of all the various uses to which 

 the edifice is or may be applied. Were this done generally in the case of 

 horticultural and agricultural buildings in the country, we should be spared 

 the view of many crudities and absurdities. We should have been spared 

 the Chiswick Garden. We shall in due time give an example, in which a 

 gardener, having first made his plan of a plant structure, Mr. Fowler gave it 

 an architectural dress, so as to render it the noblest thing of the kind in the 

 world ;.. perfectly fitted for growing plants, and clothed with the beauty of 

 refined architectural design. 



Supposing this vegetable market to be considered as the central one, we 

 should next wish to see other markets arising all round the metropolis, and 



Vol, VI. — No. 27. l l 



