350 THE PHILADELPHIA FLORIST. [No. 12 



There are several ancient country seats in the locality, and close to(v 

 Mortlake, about half a mile from the Kew gardens, is the house which \) 

 was in our time appropriated to Sir Wm. Hooker — a mean specimen 

 of government liberality; but old Mr. Aiton was then still alive, and 

 pensioned handsomely on the fund which should have supported the 

 acting and respected Director of the Royal Botanic Garden. We 

 hope Sir William is better treated now. No doubt some of our rea- 

 ders will yet visit this place, and therefore we are a little accurate. — 

 And right on the road to the gardens, by the margin of Kew Green, 

 and over against Kew Church, in which are deposited tablets to the 

 memory of many worthies, and amongst others Ferdinand Bauer, the 

 accurate botanical draftsman, is the chateau (if such a term may be 

 applied to a crowd of low buildings) of the Duke of Cambridge. The 

 late duke was quite a homely man who had a word for every Kew 

 gardener he met in his frequent perambulations through this extensive 

 pleasure ground — for such it was to him, his rear entrance opening 

 into it. Oh, a duke is a great thing in L old England — much more a 

 duke of the Blood Royal — and the unsophisticated countryman from 

 the far north or extreme west, was much pleased to be asked by the 

 old duke where he came from. But the duke is gone ; and so is his 

 elder brother, the King of Hanover, who lived opposite when at Kew, 

 which was might}' Be Idom ; and now the young Duke of Cambridge 

 has "received the benefit of the dying" of another great duke; but 

 they have it all to themselves, and we wish them much joy — that is, 

 the loaves and fishes, and titles and glitter. 



We commenced about gardens, and must end with them. Follow- 

 ing the Richmond road w T e come to a Florist's ground, one Harrison, 

 who once figured away amongst Pansies, Tulips, and all other florists' 

 fancies, as he published the " Floricultural Cabinet,' 1 some copies of 

 which we have seen in this city. Passing through the famous town of 

 Richmond, on whose hill the poet Thomson sat and mused, overlook- 

 ing the waters of the Thames and the pretty village of Twickenham, 

 venerated as the scene of Alexander Pope's labors, and following the 

 Thames, we arrive at Kingston, and find the nursery of Messrs. Jack- 

 son, the most celebrated depot for Cape Heaths within a great dis- 

 tance ; the plants are generally found thrifty and healthy, and in great 

 variety and abundance. We shall not stop to enumerate the Cape 

 HeathS; we hope American gardens will soon be rich in this graceful 

 and elegant genus, and that our experimenting correspondent will be 

 attended to. There are in this neighborhood many fine country seats, 

 such as Richmond House, and Twickenham Lodge, from which two 

 places some of our correspondents learned a little of their horticultural L 

 ^experience ; and they were not inferior schools, as the head gardeners ^\ 



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