100 Dojnestic Notices: — England. 



town and village considered as a community, and that community providing for 

 themselves, as a whole, all those rational enjoyments and luxuries which are 

 now only exclusively enjoyed by individuals of rank and fortune. The town- 

 house should be the mansion in which the community should give their splen- 

 did dinners, dejeunes, and other feasts, when they choose to do so ; the public 

 gardens should be their pleasure-ground and park ; and so on. In short, there 

 is nothing worth having, now enjoyed by the wealthiest in the land, that might 

 not be enjoyed by the members of a corporation, where all were considered 

 equal in point of rights. We allude to no fanciful scheme of community of 

 goods, or to Mr. Owen's college system ; our ideas might be carried into ex- 

 ecution by the mere passing of the bill brought into parliament, during the last 

 session, by Mr. Buckingham. — Co7id. 



Building at Northjleet. — A correspondent informs us that 27 acres of ground 

 at Northfleet " are being covered with houses in the London manner, in re- 

 gular streets, with diminutive gardens ; so that the inhabitants will have all the 

 disadvantages of a town, or, rather, of a crowded village, without any of its ad- 

 vantages ; viz. cheapness of provisions, privacy or publicity at pleasure, and 

 choice of study or amusement." He has said a great deal more in favour of 

 open, airy, detached dwellings, with gardens which cannot, like those of a town, 

 be overlooked ; in all of which we entirely agree with him ; lamenting'with him, 

 at the same time, that there should be such a general ignorance, in the great 

 mass of society, of what constitutes health and enjoyment in a dwelling, as to 

 induce them to rent such houses so crowded together. We are persuaded that 

 this will not long be the case, and that the rising generation will grow up with 

 very different ideas on this subject from those of their parents. In Leigh 

 Hunfs London Journaly a twopenny paper, which it would contribute to the 

 happiness and comfort of every human being to read, there have lately been 

 some admirable articles relating to this subject. It is by diffusing the kind of 

 knowledge contained in these articles among all classes, so as to create a de- 

 mand for properly constructed houses, that such houses will be produced, and 

 many that are at present occupied deserted. Whenever we see a builder's 

 speculation going on, and sitting-rooms 8 ft. or 9 ft. in height, and bed-rooms 

 not quite so high, being constructed, we say to ourselves : This will be all very 

 well for a year or two; but who will live in such houses twenty years hence, 

 when railroads in all directions shall have rendered it as easy to go twenty 

 miles from London as it is now to go two ; and when free trade in corn, and 

 all raw materials, shall have rendered labour so cheap, that as good a house 

 may be built for 100/. as now costs 300/. ? — Cond. 



Booker'' s Hoe. (Vol. VIII. p. 558. fig, 115.) We have at length received 

 one of these hoes (a very superior kind of Dutch, or thrust, hoe) from the in- 

 ventor, and we have sent it to Messrs. Cottam and Hallen, who have promised 

 to manufacture some for sale. — Cond. 



The Palo de Vaca, or Cow Tree. — After a variety of efforts, made through a 

 considerable number of years, 1 have at last succeeded in obtaining, through 

 the kindness of Sir Robert Ker Porter, the fruit of that interesting and valuable 

 production of the coast of Venezuela, which has acquired such celebrity fi:om 

 the travels of Humboldt, and which furnishes such an abundant supply of 

 vegetable milk to the thirsty peasants of those burning regions ; I mean the 

 Palo de Vaca, or cow tree, of which, I am inclined to suspect, there are, if 

 not many different genera, at least some diversity of species. I am led to this 

 conclusion from the discrepancy between the account given of the tree, the 

 fruit of which has been now sent to me, and that of the illustrious traveller 

 just mentioned ; as, also, from the accounts formerly received from my valu- 

 able correspondent, of the three milk trees, the Popa, the Lerio, and thei 

 Laule, growing in the forests of the Choro, along the banks of the river, near 

 Citara, or Quibdo,the capital. 



I shall first transcribe the passage relating to the sort now sent, and some 

 other matters, from Sir R. Ker Porter's letter of the 22d of last March, from 

 Caraccas : — 



