PARIS. o77 



be purchased cheaper than at London ; but that camellia* 

 and other plants of China, New Holland plants, and Cape 

 heaths, may be procured much better and cheaper in the 

 nursery-gardens around the English capital. 



At Paris fashion regulates every thing, exerting its do- 

 minion over the productions even of the Marche aux 

 Fleurs. Every year some particular kind of flower comes 

 into fashion, and is bought up with avidity, frequently at 

 high prices. It is the business of the cultivators to mark 

 those caprices, and to gratify them. The demand natural- 

 ly increases the production of the favourite plant, all the 

 cultivators directing their attention to its propagation. 

 The market is glutted, the price falls, the flower is sported 

 by the bourgeoisie, and it forthwith goes out of fashion. 

 A very few retain their popularity ; such as the pervenche 

 (periwinkle or Vinca major), the favourite of Rousseau ; 

 the capucine or Indian-cress, frequently with large double 

 flowers ; the Neapolitan violet, or var. pallido-plena of V. 

 odorata ; the sweet heliotrope, and the mignonette. 



The view of the Marche aux Fleurs could not fail to re- 

 call to our minds the total want of such a market at Edin- 

 burgh. Our northern capital has, within the last thirty or 

 forty years, so vastly increased in size and in luxury, that 

 such an establishment seems now to be called for. Sales of 

 greenhouse plants sometimes take place in what are called the 

 Agency-Offices, and pots of wall-flower, &c. are frequently 

 hawked through the streets in wheelbarrows. The Edin- 

 burgh flower-market might conveniently be joined with a 

 fruit-market, which is also a desideratum, and one of still 

 greater importance. Some years ago, indeed, the Horticul- 

 tural Society appointed a committee to confer with the Lord 

 Provost and Magistrates of the city on the institution of a 

 " Fruit arid Flower Market ;" and we trust that this imports 



