A MEMOIR. 17 



Arrival in America, and First Gardening 

 Experiences. 



It was in tlie spring- of 1843 that he arrived in New 

 York, after a six- weeks' voyage in a sailing vessel, called 

 the Roscius. 



On the threshold of his American career, he met with 

 an experience, for which many a struggling gardener 

 had in after years reason to feel grateful. After 

 landing, he started out to look for work, and, as was the 

 custom in those days, as it is now, called first at a down- 

 town seed-store.* He courteously asked the proprietor^ 

 if he had a situation open for a gardener ? The pro- 

 prietor, who was seated reading a newspaper spread out 

 on the desk before him, did not even take the trouble to 

 look up from his paper, but gave him the surliest kind 

 of a " No," for an answer. The almost brutal manner 

 of his reception made such an impression on the youth, 

 that before he reached the sidewalk, he vowed that if 

 the time ever came when he should be in a position, 

 where men should apply to him for assistance in finding 

 situations, if he could not aid them, he would at least 

 always remember to treat them courteously and kindly. 

 Commonplace as this incident seems, but few have any 

 conception of how fraught it was with good to the mul- 

 titude of private gardeners, who in the past thirty-five 

 years applied to him for situations. Among the many 

 thousands of letters of sympathy and condolence received 

 by Peter Henderson's family?- after his death were hun- 

 dreds from private gardeners; and the burden of their 

 messages nearly always was, " 1 have lost my best 

 friend." 



After his rebuff at the seed store, he at once 

 secured employment in the nurseries of George 

 Thorburn, at Astoria, L. I., where he remained a year. 

 Thence, to broaden his experience, he went to Robert 

 Buist, Sr., at Philadelphia, then the leading nurseryman 

 and florist in the United States. Mr. Buist was at once 



* The seed-store in which lie was so coldly received, has not been in existence for 

 over a quatter of a century. 



