204 1IOKTU ULTUKAL TOUH. 



Upon inquiry, it did not appear, that, during the twenty 

 years of war, in which England had little or no connection 

 with Holland, any one in the last mentioned country had pe- 

 culiarly turned his attention to the raising, from the seed, 

 new varieties of the common fruits, apple, pear, plum, or 

 cherry. Indeed, Holland is not likely to take the lead in such 

 horticultural essays ; the people are proverbially averse to 

 changes, and fond of keeping things in the old style. Mr 

 Kreps informed us, however, that he had some years ago 

 selected a good many apples and pears from the nurseries 

 at Paris, with which he was previously unacquainted ; but 

 that experience had led him to consider only three or four 

 of them as worthy of being retained or classed among the 

 better kinds suited to the climate of Holland. 



We have seen, that a Dutch merchant retiring from busi- 

 ness, may purchase fruit-trees which will yield him their pro- 

 duce the very first year : we found that he may also surround 

 his garden and shrubbery with ready-formed hedges ! We 

 observed many lines of different evergreen and deciduous 

 shrubs usually employed for this purpose, trained hedge-wise 

 in the nursery; and these, like the fruit-trees, being frequent- 

 ly removed from one spot to another, may, almost without 

 hazard of failure, be transferred to a considerable distance, 

 and replanted. We noticed a hedge-row of evergreen pri- 

 vet three feet high, and another of savin-tree (Thuya oc- 

 cidental is) between four and five feet high, which were 

 ready for sale. A i'cw box hedges, trained to particular 

 shapes, with loftier bushes cut alternately to the form of 

 balls and of vases, were still kept in the nursery; and also 

 a few tall and old box plants, tortured into the fancied re- 

 semblance of animals. These were much in demand in for- 

 mer times; but Mr Kreps remarked (what had occurred 

 to OUWelves in the course of our passage from Rotterdam 



