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The following letter gives some idea of the scale on which 
Mr. Whittall works as well as of the important industry which he 
has incidentally created :— 
MR. EDWARD WHITTALL TO ROYAL GARDENS, KEW. 
Smyrna, Apri! 28, 1899. 
DEAR SIR, 
OUR winter has been, comparatively speaking, just as mild 
as yours in England. You would have been surprised to see my 
garden at Christmas with the rose trees, geraniums, and even 
cannas in full bloom, the arums in the ponds full of buds and 
the camellias Dee up by the white Roman hyacinths wm 
covered wit wers. It was a pretty sight, and one I n 
witnessed before, Now of course it is wearing its spring pus 
and you could cut roses by the thousand. The water lilies are 
showing their first flowers and the beds are gay with bright 
colours. I will send you later on a few photographs to give you an 
idea of an Oriental garden with an admixture of English and 
Italian idas i in the plan 
note your requirements of small bulbs, and will be only too 
happy to v you all I can on the old conditions. I suppose this 
will mean some 300,000 o 400 ,000 of all varieties. By the bye, 
what did you t think of or new 'snowdrop I sent you? I flowered 
it in my garden and certainly it appears to carry out my first 
description. 
I bum glad m see the bulb trade developing so much with 
England. n I commenced it, I only hoped to give a few 
werd work Wii rae deserving pcor in our village. Now I employ 
hundreds of families, and the blessings you British flower-lovers 
receive should lighten your slumbers as the saying goes in this 
ss n beautiful, tenet nd expressions. I am now opening outa 
rade in vated bulbous plants, such a hyacinths, &c., 
ana Mons shóry ae | bip nota few. As you well know, most of 
er plants came originally from this country ad do well. I am 
roud to see around me the increase in the consumption of flowers, 
nd to feel that it is the result of my efforts to develop the love of 
ihem. Some few years back you scarcely saw a plant outside a 
few European gardens ; now even the smallest cottage plot is bright 
in Spring with flowers. This is the aera I get out of my 
hobby, and, now that my collecting expenses are covered by 
European shipments, I cannot even complain of the cost being too 
heavy. 
I was not carried off by brigands, but a nephew of mine. 
Thank God all is well that ends well. 
Believe me, &c., 
(Signed) EDWARD WHITTALL. 
Sir W. T. Thiselton-Dyer, 
ew, London. 
Jyree Tea.—By the kindness of Mr. G. S. Peterson, of Weston- 
super-Mare, we have received a sample of this so-called tea, and 
find that it 5 made of leaflets apparently belonging to ‘some 
spec of Acacia. Mixed with the leaflets are setae which may 
