568 Summary View of the Progress of Gardening, 



It is scarcely necessary to remind our readers, that but a very 

 small proportion indeed, of the new agents of culture that are 

 yearly brought forward, is likely to come into general use. 

 Many of them are the inventions of persons who know little or 

 nothing of gardening ; but who, being tradesmen, think they can 

 produce a better article out of the materials with which they are 

 most conversant, than the gardener can out of those to which he 

 has been long accustomed. As an example of this, we may give 

 the metallic wire, offered as a substitute for ties made of bast 

 matting. Cast-iron flower-pots or vases, cast-iron frames as well 

 as sashes for growing cucumbers, cast and wrought iron wheel- 

 barrows, &c. One of the latest attempts of this kind is what the 

 inventors call the seed-protector; being a bottomless box of cast- 

 iron, from 3 in. to 6 in. on the side, to be put down over a patch 

 of seeds, and covered with a pane of glass, and, of course, a small 

 stone to prevent this pane from being blown off, to protect the 

 seeds from sparrows and snails. All this expensive affair is 

 meant as a substitute for a common garden pot, which, where- 

 ever there is danger from slugs or sparrows, need only be 

 whelmed over a patch of seeds, and taken off as soon as the 

 plants are fairly above ground. Many kinds of plant-labels 

 have been brought into notice, during the last ten or twelve 

 years. The last of these, that we recollect, is what the inventors 

 call the menogramme, which is a substitute for the common 

 wooden name-stick, cut by gardeners with their knives out of 

 common laths, and rubbed over on the part to be written on 

 with a little white lead, before using the pencil. To recommend 

 such articles is to recommend an expensive mode of doing that 

 which has hitherto been done equally well, and much cheaper, 

 with common materials which every gardener has always at 

 hand. Nevertheless, it is not advisable to prevent all attempts 

 at improvement, even though some of them should be of the 

 most preposterous nature; because it may happen, that amongst 

 numerous failures, there may be one successful result, which may 

 stand the test of ages. Head's syringe is an example. 



Landscape- Garde7iing and Garden Architecture. — There are 

 but ie\^ papers in the present volume expressly devoted to land- 

 scape-gardening, though, in the descriptive part, there are in- 

 terspersed, among the accounts of different villas, many remarks 

 which we trust will be found useful. On garden architecture, 

 there are some valuable papers, particularly the notice of the 

 new forcing-houses and pits (p. 418.), the article on portable 

 glazed structures (p. 122.), and that on the use of fire and 

 water in forcing (p. 623.). The plan designed for the in- 

 tended Leeds Zoological and Botanical Garden (p. 239.) is 

 elaborate and ingenious ; but, at the same time, we consider 

 it in a great degree impracticable, on account of the strictly 



