348 Garden of the London Horticidtural Society. 



hardy shrubs, which are doing remarkably well. A number of green-house plants 

 have also been turned out into the borders, where they will make fine plants 

 in the course of the summer, and may be taken up and repotted in autumn. 

 Wherever there are green-house plants to spare, they cannot be used to better 

 purpose than turning them out into the open borders or against walls; because, 

 even if they live only one season, they form more rare, and consequently 

 interesting, objects to the botanists than any other open ground plants what- 

 ever. The magnificent architectural conservatory was stocked with Australian 

 and Cape shrubs about this time last year. They are all in boxes, tubs, or 

 large pots, and they have thriven so remarkably well that they already appear 

 rather crowded. The beauty of all large plants in a conservatory depends 

 much on their isolated appearance, by which alone can be displayed their 

 individual character ; and, to produce this effect, they should never touch one 

 another. Hence the great advantage of growing conservatory plants in boxes or 

 pots, so as to admit of their being moved more or less apart from one another 

 as they increase in size, or die down, or become mutilated by age or accident. 

 This large conservatory forms a very handsome Grecian temple, externally, 

 about three times as long as it is broad; but in the interior it is much disfigured 

 by two rows of cast-iron columns without creepers or climbers around them, 

 and which distract the eye in looking on the plants. The columns are just so 

 far from the path as to be seen along with the plants, and, being painted white, 

 they attract the eye more than the green of the leaves ; whereas, had they 

 been close to the path, the plants would have been seen between them, without 

 interruption or distraction. A single row of slender columns along the centre 

 of the house would have been quite sufficient to support the roof, and would 

 not in the slightest degree have interfered with the effect of the plants; but 

 even there they ought to have been so contrived at the base as to allow 

 climbers to be trained round them. Some of the banksias and dryandras in 

 this house are now in flower, and of singular beauty. 



A number of specimens in the arboretum and in the botanic garden have 

 been recently named with handsome cast-iron tallies. We suggested the pro- 

 priety of this some years ago (see Vol. I. p. 352.; II. p. 315. ; VII. p. 687., 

 &c.), but it was not till Mr. Glenny took up the subject that our suggestion 

 was carried into effect; a proof that with some minds something more than 

 mere suggestion is required to produce action. This is a fact not very credit- 

 able to human nature ; but it would appear that, in certain stages of the 

 progress of society, abuse is more effective than fair words or sound reasons. 



The opening of the Kent Zoological and Botanical Gardens, the progress of 

 the Royal Horticultural Society's Garden, Structures at Stafford House under 

 the direction of Mr. Hakewell, Mr. Corstein's Hyacinth Show, Mr. Groom's 

 splendid Tulip Show, and a number of other matters, want of room prevents 

 us from noticing at present. — Cond. 



Aut. II. The Garden of the London Horticultural Society. * 



Circumstances prevented us from visiting the Horticultural Society's 

 Garden this year till April 24., when we devoted the greater part of that 

 and the two succeeding days to looking through every part of the grounds, 

 and all the houses, pits, and frames, as far as they are shown to strangers. We 

 never saw the grass and the gravel looking better, if so well. The walks are 

 filled to the brim, firmly and smoothly rolled; and the edges are neither deep, 

 nor showing a harsh line of earth between the trass and the gravel, as is too 

 frequently the case, but shallow, while the leaves of the grass grow down, and 

 come in close contact with the gravel. These, it may be said, are small mat- 

 ters ; but they contribute much to the beauty and enjoyment of a garden ; and 

 their absence is almost always symptomatic of general bad keeping and want of 

 taste. 



In the arboretum a number of clumps have been thinned out, and the 



