Gardens of Versailles. g 



of book-making gardeners was honestly and freely expressed. 

 On our asking for an explanation, we were told of a writer, 

 who affirmed that pine-apples in Cayenne attained the weight 

 of 30 lbs. each ! ! It is almost needless to add, that M. Lem- 

 priere had no garden library. 



The forcing department of the Versailles kitchen-garden 

 is not without interest. It is coeval with the palace, and 

 occupies nearly two English acres, originally chiefly covered 

 with substantially built Dutch pits, with stone copings, &c. 

 During the time of the Revolution, of Bonaparte, and of 

 Louis XVIIL, till 1819, it was entirely neglected ; and the 

 light downy seeds of the black poplars and willows of the 

 neighbouring woods had sprung up from the ground, and 

 from the crevices of the walls of the pits, and attained even a 

 timber size. We saw the remains of some of these trees, and 

 they reminded us of Moscow, where, in 1814, we saw spring- 

 ing up every where, from the ashes of those ruined houses 

 and churches which had not been rebuilt, plants of the native 

 black poplar. Had Moscow been left to itself, that immense 

 city would by this time have become (what the forcing-ground 

 at Versailles actually was till the year 1819) a natural forest. 

 About the year 1819, the trees in this forcing-ground were 

 felled ; and preparations made for forcing culinary vegetables 

 and fruits, and growing pine-apples. The charge of this depart- 

 ment is committed to M. Massey ; who happening to be from 

 home, we were conducted through it by his foreman ( jyremier 

 garcon), M. Grisson, a young man brought up in the neigh- 

 bourhood, and who, as he informed us, never saw a pine- 

 apple in any other garden. The descriptions of forcing-houses 

 here used are three : first, the old massive-walled pits, imme- 

 diately within the walls of which, and above the bark bed, is an 

 earthen tube, about 4 in. in diameter, serving as a smoke flue ; 

 second, pits with walks behind, in imitation of Baldwin's [Enc. 

 ofGard,, 2d edit. § 2649.), and which were built from a MS. 

 translation of Baldwin's pamphlet ; and third, common pine" 

 ries, not unlike those of Kensington Gardens. The sorts of 

 pines cultivated are chiefly the Queen obtained from Hol- 

 land, and the Knville from England ; but there is a number 

 of other sorts; and M. Massey was in London, in 1829, in 

 search of new ones, and also in order to learn the mode of 

 heating by hot water. This French invention was actually 

 applied to the hot-houses in the Jardin des Plafites before the 

 Bevolution ; and is now, we understand, after being so many 

 years forgotten, on trial both at Versailles and Paris. There 

 are now under M. Massey's care about 1000 fruiting plants, 

 with a due proportion of succession stocks. In one house we 



