394 HORTICULTURAL TOUR. 



most extensive compartment in the garden, occupying alto- 

 gether between two and three acres of ground. It forms by 

 far the most complete botanical arrangement of living- 

 plants which we ever beheld. The plants are divided into 

 classes, families or orders, genera and species ; and the re- 

 pective boundaries of these divisions are marked by tallies 

 of different sizes, with the name of the class, the order, or 

 the genus inscribed. There are 15 classes, 102 families, 

 1428 genera, and 7268 species, at this time in the arrange- 

 ment. Here the principles of association adopted, require 

 that trees and shrubs should be intermixed with herba- 

 ceous plants ; perennials with annuals ; hardy plants with 

 those which require the greenhouse, or even the stove du- 

 ring winter ; such tender plants being adopted only in 

 cases where a hiatus would otherwise occur in the arrange- 

 ment. Many plants must of course be yearly supplied in 

 the months of April and May. All the specimens of ar- 

 boreous plants are young ; when they get too large for 

 their station here, they are transplanted to the buttes or 

 hillocks, situate in the ample space which intervenes be- 

 tween the hot-houses of the garden and the dwelling- 

 houses of the Professors, next to the Rue de Seine St Vic- 

 tor. The tender plants are retained in their flower-pots, 

 these being merely sunk in the ground. In some cases 

 pans with water, containing aquatic plants, are introdu- 

 ced into the arrangement, to render it more complete. 

 Plants which flower very early in the spring, or very late 

 in the autumn, many exotic plants, and many alpine rari- 

 ties, are not introduced. All plants which have not pro- 

 duced their flowers, and the appropriate place of which in 

 the system is of course unknown, are necessarily excluded. 

 The collection of species of live plants now in the gar- 

 den, may therefore be estimated as considerably exceeding 

 10,000. 



