368 Kew Botafiic Garden. 



many of these deliveries were not entered in the garden-books. There have 

 been also considerable numbers of plants sent to the royal palaces on birth- 

 days, birth-nights, and other grand entertainments, on which occasions many 

 losses have been sustained. 



With this explanation of a great dispersion of plants from the Royal Botanic 

 Garden, and bearing in mind that of the two collectors sent abroad in 1814, 

 one was recalled in 1823, the other in 1830, by the Lords of the Treasury, 

 thereby cutting oiF the usual resources for replenishing the losses, &c., of the 

 garden, and that also within the last 10 years the allowance for keeping this 

 garden being reduced nearly 600/. a year, it is evident that adequate means of 

 late years have not been afforded so as to support a more extensive and more 

 valuable collection ; nor could a greater distribution of plants be reasonably 

 expected by the public, were it generally known that the Botanic Garden at 

 Kew was originally formed at the private expense of the Royal Family, and 

 has been maintained up to the present time in like manner with the other 

 departments of the household establisments, the estimates of the expense 

 being regulated and defrayed by the Lord Steward and the Board of Green 

 Cloth. I am, &c.. 



To Dr. Lindley, S^c. Sfc. ^c. (Signed) W. T. Aiton. 



It is perfectly true that the garden means have been much curtailed for the 

 last 10 years ; but this seems, upon the whole, to have been advantageous to 

 the public ; for of the 483 deliveries in 32 years, 208 have taken place in 

 those last 10 years, and the smallest number occurred in the years 1809, 1810, 

 1811, 1812, 1813, and 1814, when the deliveries did not quite average five a 

 year; in 1811, they amounted only to two, and at this time it may be pre- 

 sumed that the garden possessed the greatest resources. 



After all the explanation that has been offered ; after allowing full weight 

 to the assertion that the Botanical Garden at Kew has always been a private 

 establishment ; admitting, moreover, that a larger number of plants has been 

 given away than is generally supposed, and that in many cases applications for 

 plants have been liberally complied with, which is undoubtedly the fact, it 

 really does seem impossible to say that it has been conducted with that 

 liberality or anxiety to promote the ends of science, and to render it useful 

 to the country, which it is usual to meet with in similar institutions elsewhere. 



So far as the Lord Steward's department is concerned, the Botanical 

 Garden at Kew is a dead weight upon the civil list ; for, unconnected as it is 

 with any of the palaces now occupied as royal residences, it has become a 

 mere magazine of materials, very valuable, no doubt, with which to stock the 

 other royal gardens : it would require a very large outlay of money to render 

 it at all suitable for a royal pleasure-ground, and it does not appear to be 

 wanted, now that Buckingham House has become the London palace, with a 

 fine garden to it : moreover, the public will always expect that the only ex- 

 tensive botanical garden in the country should be available for public purposes. 

 It is therefore recommended that the Lord Steward be relieved from the 

 burden of this garden, unless it should be Her Majesty's pleasure to retain it. 



If the Botanical Garden of Kew is relinquished by the Lord Steward, it 

 should either be at once taken for public purposes, gradually made worthy of 

 the country, and converted into a powerful means of promoting national 

 •science, or it should be abandoned. It is httle better than a waste of money 

 to maintain it in its present state, if it fulfils no intelligible purpose, except 

 that of sheltering a large quantity of rare and valuable plants. 



The importance of public Botanical Gardens has for centuries been re- 

 cognised by the governments of civilised states, and at this time there is no 

 European nation without such an establishment, except England. The most 

 ■vVealthy and most civilised kingdom in Europe offers the only European 

 example of the want of one of the first proofs of wealth and civilisation. 

 France, Prussia, Austria, Bavaria, Russia, Hanover, Holland, not to mention 

 smaller governments, have all botanical gardens, liberally maintained with 



