306 Botanical Miscellany. 



appearance as the Dutch botanic gardens ; but is, however, kept very neat, 

 and is well arranged." 



The Botanical Garden at Oxford was originally the burial place of the 

 Jews, till they were banished by Edward I. in 1290. "It is the oldest 

 botanic garden in England, being founded in 1622. It includes five acres ; 

 but is so liable to inundation from the Thames, that the water frequently 

 stands knee-deep above the plants ; and as the lower parts of the garden 

 cannot be sufficiently raised without an immense expense, these portions are 

 left quite uncultivated. The active gardener, who is a Scotchman named 

 Baxter' (Vol. I. p. 490.), devotes his attention chiefly to the Cryptogamia ; 

 partly from mortification at finding it impossible to make the garden such 

 as he could wish. He is preparing a Flora Crijptogdmica of the environs of 

 Oxford ; and he showed us the first number of this work, containing speci- 

 mens very neatly laid out, to which we must invite the attention of our 

 countrymen in Germany. Mr. Baxter also cultivates with zeal the English 

 willows, having a living individual of almost every species, in a proper 

 Salicetum. To the grasses, likewise, he gives much attention ; and, from 

 the experience of several years, he is enabled to decide that Jgrostis verti- 

 cillata, vulgaris, decumbens, fasciculata [Curt.), and stolonifera are dis- 

 tinct species ; which, when subjected to the same culture for a great 

 length of time, still continue to preserve their characteristic marks. This 

 industrious man, with the assistance of three persous, each of whom receives 

 2s. per day, cultivates between 4 and 5000 species of plants in the wretched 

 houses of this garden ; though, in fact, there is only one stove, properly so 

 called, and this is much too small. Those which grow in the open air are, 

 like the plants of Cambridge, arranged agreeably to the Linnean method, 

 and separated into the indigenous and foreign kinds; and both of these are 

 again divided into annual, biennial, and perennial, by which the study of 

 the allied species becomes difficult. They are partly cultivated in beds, 

 partly in separate squares, without any view to the effect which this must 

 naturally offer to the eye." 



When Linnaeus, then a very young man, presented himself at Oxford to 

 Dillenius and Sherard, the former received him coolly, and said to Sherard, 

 " This is the young fellow who is putting all botanists and botany into 

 confusion." They were reconciled to the young reformer, however, before 

 he left Oxford. 



' Much is said of the urbanity of Mr. Don, the librarian of the Linnean 

 Society, and the curator of the herbarium of Mr, Lambert, and with great 

 justice, as every one must allow who has had any thing like our opportuni- 

 ties of judging. ("See Preface to Encyc. of Plants, and Mag. Nat. Hist.) 

 He was delighted with Mr. Lambert's treasures ; but Mr. Brown being at 

 Naples, he could not see the Banksian Library. Mr. Lambert " is to 

 England what Count Sternberg is to Bohemia, Count Hoffmannsegg to 

 Saxony, and Baron de Lessen to France." This is the sort of compliment 

 to which Mr. Lambert is justly entitled ; and we think the translator 

 would have shown a better taste, if he had omitted, in this and other 

 instances, the trifling and very natural errors of a foreigner, in calling Mr. 

 Lambert a Count, and Mr. Brown and Mr. Menzies, Sirs ; unless it is 

 meant that we are to judge of M. Schultes's general accuracy from his 

 accuracy in these particulars ; or, perhaps, it is intended to raise a smile at 

 the expense of this good-natured foreigner. M. Schultes made several 

 excursions with his old friend Senor Lagasca, and among others to 



Kew Gardens. Here he was disappointed, " particularly in the plants 

 which grow in the open air, which are not so accurately named as those in 

 the Gottingen botanic garden, superintended by Schrader; sometimes the 

 same species is marked with two different names. The garden at Kew 

 consists of a fine park, and a large botanical garden of about twenty acres. 

 "What we usually term a park in Germany is like any thing rather than 



