280 Suggestions for a Society for the Improvement of 



manure had been added to the water, and the second bean plant 

 had then refused to grow, the conclusion of the experiments 

 would have been justified, but not otherwise. I do not mean to 

 deny the possibility of the roots of plants having the power to 

 expel deleterious particles : such a power may exist; but even if 

 so, I think its injurious effects, practically considered, have been 

 greatly exaggerated. 

 March 1. 1835. 



Art. III. Suggestions for a Society for promoting the Improvement of 

 the Public Taste in Architectural and Rural Scenery. By W. S. 



The notice (p. 20.) of an American " Ornamental Tree So- 

 ciety " has recalled some ideas which have long floated in my 

 mind as to the great desirableness of having a similar society 

 established in London, where, although a good deal has been 

 done towards its embellishment by trees, so much in this respect 

 remains yet to be accomplished. Who that has a genuine love 

 of nature has not felt, when stumbling, in one of the narrow 

 streets of the city, on an old elm, gracefully even with its soot- 

 encrusted foliage breaking the monotonous and endless vista of 

 brick, almost as a traveller does in the desert when meeting 

 with a spring and its accompanying date trees ? and has not 

 been as much mortified, after another turn, in passing a second 

 churchyard, which, for want of some friendly hand to plant a 

 tree in it, is an eyesore to the passer-by, instead of a relief and 

 refreshment? Who, again, in the western quarter of the metro- 

 polis, can have failed to be struck by the excellent effect of a 

 few trees judiciously planted in the space not wanted for the 

 kitchen area, at the ends of the corner houses of squares and 

 large streets? and to have remarked how forlorn and dis- 

 gusting those very spaces become, even though railed off, as 

 they generally are, when suffered to remain without a tree or 

 shrub ? And, lastly, to omit other instances, who that has been 

 charmed with the aspect of one of the squares judiciously planted 

 and laid out, can help being as much shocked with the bare and 

 tasteless way in which others are still suffered to remain? 



Now, in all these cases, the remarks of an individual would 

 have little or no effect in extending what is praiseworthy and 

 rectifying deficiencies, though in both respects it is evident that 

 public opinion, directed and supported by a numerous society, 

 might accomplish great things, and render London incomparably 

 more ornamented by trees than at present, including the plant- 

 ing of parts of the Regent's Park with a complete collection of 

 hardy exotic trees and shrubs, as you have so often suggested : 

 while, if the objects of the society comprised also, as I should 



