and Suburban Gardens. 335 



in groups of every imaginable form, interspersed with glades, sometimes with 

 a rough and sometimes with a smooth surface, occasionally with pools, and 

 at other times showing rocks or broken ground, constitutes the great charm 

 of forest scenery ; and the finest recollections which we bear with us of Sweden, 

 of the interior of Poland, and of the south of Germany, are of scenery of this 

 description. Woburn Farm, as it now is, is most interesting as a place to 

 visit ; but, as a place to live in, to us it would be intolerable : it is without 

 movement; though this may be matter of taste. 



Oatlands. — The road from Woburn Farm to this place, through Weybridge, 

 is between meadows bordered by broad ditches, filled with clear water and 

 numerous aquatic plants. The scene, being almost without middle or third 

 distance, is of a very peculiar, but yet peaceful and beautiful kind. Weybridge 

 is a scattered village, made up of comfortable-looking cottages, variously dis- 

 posed, and each appearing to have more garden ground than is usual in similar 

 villages. Except in the growth of the trees, little change has taken place 

 in it since we stopped all night at the inn here, in 1804. We walked down 

 to the kitchen-garden, and learned from Mr. Hayward, the gardener, that the 

 grotto and the terrace walk, the latter of which we were anxious to see, were 

 on no account shown to strangers. The kitchen-garden appeared in good 

 order, and there were abundant crops of ripe grapes in two of the pineries. 



Walton, Lady Tankerville. — We visited this place, in the same month, ex- 

 actly thirty years ago, when our friend Mr. Richardson, the gardener, had 

 only been a few years established as manager. Lady Tankerville's collection 

 of plants was then reckoned one of the best, if not the very best, in the neigh- 

 bourhood of London : it has since been surpassed by others with regard to 

 the number of species, but by none in the manner in which they are grown, 

 or the size to which the palms and other stove plants have attained. The 

 peculiar characteristic of Mr. Richardson's management is, that he never loses 

 a species ; and, consequently, we find here a number of green-house plants of 

 the last century, some of which, as far as we know, are not to be found any- 

 where else, not even at Kew, or at Messrs. Loddiges. The most remarkable 

 exotic specimens are the palms, a date having leaves upwards of 30 ft. long, 

 which, we believe, is larger than their size in their native country, and an 

 jE'late sylvestris, with a stem 20 ft. high, and having larger foliage than we 

 think we have seen elsewhere. There is a Corypha umbraculifera with 

 leaves 12 ft. in length, and a stock 1a ft. in diameter. A banana has abun- 

 dance of fruit ripe at the upper end of the spike, and the terminating blossom 

 just expanding. There is a remarkably large Zamia pungens, with the leaves 

 extending about a yard on every side. Among other curious points in the 

 history of this plant, we were informed that Bonaparte offered a hundred 

 guineas for it for the collection at Malmaison. It is a female, and has 

 borne fruit and ripened seeds, which were, of course, imperfect. The seeds 

 were edible, but not good. A fine drawing of this plant, with sections and 

 details of its flowers and fruit, was made, some years ago, by Mr. Chandler, 

 jun., Mr. Richardson's son-in-law, and engraved on an imperial folio sheet at 

 the expense of Lady Tankerville. Mr. Richardson informed us that one of 

 the ladies of the Tankerville family was the first to cultivate seedling varieties 

 of heartsease, which she did in a small bed in the shape of a heart; and he 

 has since continued to raise new sorts, and to maintain a very excellent col- 

 lection, notwithstanding the singularly dry sandy soil of the whole place. In 

 this soil the common thyme is found to make beautiful edgings to walks; and 

 the asparagus to attain an enormous size and most superior flavour. Passing 

 on to the American garden, we found the azaleas, rhododendrons, andro- 

 medas, &c, of enormous sizes, covered with bloom, and harmonising well with 

 the high trees by which they are surrounded. There are here some large 

 magnolias, a Judas tree between 20 ft. and 30 ft. high, a Pinus Cembra, 35 ft. 

 high, and the largest Halesia diptera (20 ft. high) in the neighbourhood of 

 London. In other parts of the grounds are Juniperus virginiana with a trunk 

 2 ft. in diameter and 40 ft. high ; /Mex opaca, 25 ft. high ; Asimina triloba, 



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