Transactions of the London Horticultural Society. 505 



drained J and the undoubtedly hardy habits of Aponogeton distachyon, and 

 Richardia africana, have secured to us two additional handsome aquatics, 



" The low southern latitudes o£ Soutti America have furnished a few acces- 

 sions to hardy collections, among which the Araucaria Dombeyi is the most 

 interesting for the possessors of parks and large gardens, and it has now be- 

 come an object of some national importance to procure supplies of seeds of 

 this plant from Valparaiso ; for to introduce in abundance so remarkable a 

 vegetable production as this is when old, with columnar ti'unks often 100 feet 

 high, surmounted by a p3'ramid of grotesque branches, would be an object 

 scarcelj' less than national, even if the plant did not furnish excellent timber, 

 and an abundance of valuable resin. It also appears that Aristotelia Macqui, 

 and the Escallonias, rubra and glandulosa, all beautiful evergreens, are about 

 as hardy as a Laurustinus, that the graceful little Berberis empetrifolia is 

 regardless of cold, and that Colletia horrida, Duvaua ovata, and Heimia sali- 

 cifolia, also seem likely to bear this climate. The preservation of herbaceous 

 plants is less important ; but it is satisfactory to know that some at least of 

 the Alstromerias may be henceforward regarded as hardy border flowers. 



" The number of Califomian and Mexican plants in our gardens, which have 

 been the subject of. experiment, is inconsiderable. Of these it is found that 

 the species from California are more tender than those from Mexico : a cir- 

 cumstance doubtless to be explained by the Californian species having been 

 taken indiscriminately from warm valleys and mountain sides, while no one has 

 thought of naturalizing any Mexican species except from the cold mountain 

 ridges. What is most important is that all the beautiful pines and firs from 

 these regions, of whose habits so little was previously known, prove to be per- 

 fectly hardy wherever they have been tried, with the exception of Pinus 

 insignis and P. leiophylla. 



" The winters of Nort/i America are usually so rigorous north of the districts 

 warmed by the Gulf of Mexico, that to state that a plant is from the United 

 States, is usually equivalent to saying it is hardy. There are, however, some 

 exceptions to that rule, and it was requisite to possess the experience of such 

 a winter as this, in order to judge whether the plants from the British posses- 

 sions on the Pacific would be as hardy as those from the Atlantic side of the 

 Rocky Mountains. The latter seems now to be well established, for of all 

 the numerous valuable plants introduced by the Society from North»west 

 America, not one of any importance, with the exception perhaps of Arbutus 

 procera, proved tender ; and what is of the utmost practical importance, it is 

 now clear that Abies Douglasii, a species that grows as fast as the larch, 

 which has much better timber, is evergreen, and grows to an enormous size, is 

 perfectly suited to the climate of Great Britain. Yuccas also resisted the 

 frost so very generally, that they may be safely introduced into gardens as 

 hardy endogenous shrubs ; and the same observation applies to Vaccinium 

 ovatum, one of the handsomest of evergreens. That Pinus palustris should 

 have so generally perished may be a matter of regret, but can excite no sur- 

 prise considering that it is exclusively a native of the southern states of the 

 North American union. 



" Not the least interesting of the facts observed during this winter was this ; 

 that in those places where the cold was very severe, the more plants were ex- 

 posed the less they suffered, and that on the contrary, the more they were 

 sheltered without being actually protected artificially, the more extensively 

 they were injured. Thus in the Garden of the Horticultural Society, in a 

 warm soil, and much sheltered by other trees, old plants of the common Ar- 

 butus were killed to the ground, or entirely destroyed, while in my own gar- 

 den, in a cold wet soil, the Arbutus did not suffer at all ; and in like manner, 

 cistuses of all descriptions were in the former case totally destroyed, while in 

 the latter, C. Cyprius, and C. corboriensis were scarcely injured. At Kew, 

 in the warm Botanic Garden, and sheltered Uy mats and a wooden frame, a 

 fine old plant of the Chilian Araucaria perished at the extremities, and at 

 Highclere, the seat of the Earl of Carnarvon, that plant suffered in a sheltered 



1840. Sept. l l 



