1(38 HORTICULTURAL TOUR. 



sins, and now did so to the statue of Laurence Coster. 

 This sort of ceremony in a public place, might have 

 brought ridicule upon us any where else ; but here there 

 is such a continual doffing of the hat to all ladies, known 

 or unknown, and to all strangers, that we could pay our 

 devoirs at the shrine of this Dutch Inventor of the Art of 

 Printing, without incurring that risk. As a piece of sculp- 

 ture the statue has no merit. It formerly stood, we are 

 told, in the Botanic Garden ; and we do not wonder that 

 the Professor of Botany did not object to the transference 

 of this ornament to the market-place. 



Haarlem has, at ono time, been fortified with a strong 

 and high brick wall ; but this wall now bore testimony to a 

 long continued state of peace ; for its exterior was, in many 

 places, covered with large fruit-trees, neatly trained against 

 it, and which presented crops of apples, pears, plums and 

 mulberries. A narrow strip of ground, too, that lies be- 

 tween the base of the wall and the fosse, was occupied 

 every where with crops of kitchen vegetables, intermixed 

 with patches of showy flowers. 



Bloemistries. 

 Aug. 29- — Haarlem has long been noted for its bloemis- 

 tries or flower-gardens, and particularly for the success 

 with which hyacinths and tulips have been cultivated in these. 

 The only season for seeing these bulbous-rooted plants in 

 flower, is the end of April and beginning of May. We re- 

 solved, however, to visit several of the gardens ; flattering 

 ourselves, that we might not only sec the kind of soil pre- 

 ferred, but also perhaps witness the mode of planting; and 

 it was impossible for us to imagine, that florists, who cxcel- 

 led not only in tulips and hyacinths, but in polyanthus-nar- 

 i ., the iris tribe, in anemones and ranunculuses, should 



