524 Horticultural Jottandd 



enough to hold a few barrovvfuls of gravel, and contain two 

 or three fantastic and unmeaning beds of common flowers ; 

 every one laid out somehow different from its neighbour; 

 almost all ugly, and, viewed en masse, producing no effect 

 whatever of harmony or grandeur. 



This taste probably arises from our national churlishness. 

 We are unwilling to yield the smallest private or exclusive 

 right, for the common gratification of ourselves and others. It 

 will probably be said, the damp of our climate is such, that 

 rows of trees would keep the road in bad order and the path- 

 ways constantly wet : the noble lines of lofty elms that dig- 

 nify the quays of Amsterdam and Rotterdam, where there is 

 much traffic, and in a damper climate than ours, are a proof 

 to the contrary. 



Why not, at least, make the trial in some of the new 

 streets laying out about London ? Even if the trees should 

 have to be cut down, their timber would pay the expense of 

 the experiment. 



It is strange the common robinia [R. Pseud- Acacia Z.] 

 is not as much used in England, as a forest tree, as it is in 

 France. None can be more easily propagated. It could be 

 obtained from the Continent yearly, is abundantly hardy, and 

 singularly beautiful. When arrived at twenty or twenty-five 

 years of age, it flowers freely, even in Ireland.* 



It is true, it is brittle while young, but when old enough for 

 the wood to have hardened in the heart of the tree, it will 

 stand the worst storms ; and while young it can be supported, 

 as it always is on the Continent. 



Jardin des Plantes. — There is nothing particularly new at 

 the Jardin des Plantes, and it has been often described, but 

 the discovery by, I think, M. Turpin, of a large quantity of 

 pure oxalate of lime in botryoidal [bunch-of-grapes-shaped] 

 masses, in the centre of an old " Cereus peruvianus," which 

 had been many years in the garden. 



There is a sad want of verdure and leafiness on all the in- 

 side plants in the Continental gardens, arising from the dark 

 houses they are nurtured in, their being indiscriminately put 

 out under a burning sun in summer, and but sparingly and 

 irregularly watered, and fire heat applied the whole winter. 



It will be long ere the gardens of the Continent can vie with 

 those of England in horticultural preservative structures, 

 chiefly owing to their inferiority in the manufacture of iron; 

 but I should think a clever English artisan in this branch 



* The use of this tree for timber has been sedulously recommended by 

 Mr. Cobbett, under the name of " locust tree," its name in America, where 

 the tree is native. See Gard. Mag., vol. iii. p. 363. — J. D. 



