506 f LETTERS FROM ENGLAND. 



Opening, like an amphitheatre, in the midst of a fine grove of tregs. 

 An immense palace of glass rises before us. Its curved roof, spring- 

 ing seventy feet high, gleams in the morning sun ; and you would 

 be at a loss to conceive for what purpose this vast structure was in- 

 tended, did you not see as you approached; by the indistinct forms of 

 the foliage,: that it incloses another garden. This is the great con- 

 servatory, which is three hundred feet Ipng, ai|d covers rather more 

 than an acre of ground. Through its midst runs a broad road, 

 over which the Duke and his guests occasionally drive in a carriage 

 and four. All the riches of the tropics are grown Jiere, planted 

 in the'soil, as if in their native climate ; and a series of hot-water 

 pipes maintain^ perpetually, the temperature of Cuba in the heart of 

 Berbyshire. The surface is not entirely level, but there, are rocky 

 hills and steep walks ■winding over them ; and lofty as the roof is, 

 some of the palms of ^outh America have already nearly reached 

 the glass. From the branches and trunks of many of the Jarg^t, 

 hang curious air plants, brilliant, and apparently as little fixed to 

 one spot as summer butterflies. / ' *, 



But I. shall never bring this letter to a close, if I dwell even 

 slightly upon any interesting scene in detail. I must mention, how- 

 ever, in passing, the Moretum- — perhaps a mile long — planted with 

 the rarest trees, and every day becoming richer jand more interest- 

 ing to the botanist and the landscape gardener. The trees are 

 neither set in formal lines, nor grouped in a single scene, but are 

 scattered along a picturesque drive, with space enough for each to 

 develope its natural habit of growth. There are some very grace- 

 ful Deodar cedars here, an«L a great many arauoarias. But the 

 two most striking and superb trees, which I nowherp else saw half 

 so large and in such perfection, were Douglass' fir {Abies .Douff- 

 lassi), and the noble fir (Abies nebilis). They are two of tlie mag-^ 

 nificent evergreens of California and Oregon,' discovered -by Doug- 

 lass, and brought to England about eighteen years ago. These two 

 specimens are now about thirty-five feet high, extremely elegpnt in 

 their proportions, as weU as beautiful in shape and; color. I cannot 

 describe them, briefly, so well as by comparing the first to a gi- 

 gantic and superb balsam fir, with far larger leaves, a luxuriance 

 and freedom always wanting in the balsam, together with the 



