KEW GARDENS. 



25 



abridging it. The principal points, at least, shall be selected— 

 though, for our own reasons, not exactly in the order in which Sir 

 "William Hooker, for his, found it expedient to arrange them. 



'The garden is especially intended to be the means of intro- 

 ducing new, rare, and useful plants, and dispersing them through 

 our own and other countries, and to give an impulse to nurseries 

 and persons trading in exotic plants. Perhaps at no period has 

 there been so great a stimulus given to this introduction of new, 

 rare, but more especially useful plants, as during the last ten years ; 

 and the royal gardens of Kew have contributed largely on this 

 head, partly by means of collectors sent out from thence, but still 

 more by the extensive correspondence of the Director with intelli- 

 gent persons in all parts of the globe, aided, as such communica- 

 tion has been, by the pubhc and private services of individuals and 

 companies, more than can be enumerated, in conveying our col- 

 lections to and from the East, and to and from the West, free of 

 expense. 



' It were impossible here to notice a tithe of the rare, or useful, 

 or ornamental plants which these Gardens have imported and dis- 

 tributed. A few of those quite recently received may be men- 

 tioned — such as the Tussack grass from the Faulkland Islands, 

 proved to be already of the highest consequence to the West of 

 England, Scotland, and Ireland, particularly to the Orkneys and He- 

 brides, and analogous climates ; the Park grass (inti'oduced by 

 Earl Grey), now transmitted to various tropical and sub-tropi- 

 cal colonies ; the deciduous and evergreen beeches of Tierra 

 del Fuego ; the lace bark-tree of Jamaica ; the jute of India ; 

 the Chinese grass, as it is called, which affords the best material 

 for calico, and which has latterly been cultivated in the British 

 territories abroad; the African teak, long celebrated in ship-build- 

 ing, yet till now unknown to science ; the best caoutchouc (Sipho- 

 nia elastica) ; the cow-tree of South America ; the double cocoa- 

 nut (Lodoicea Sechellarum), that rarest of all palms ; the Huon 

 pine, from Van Diemen's Land — which proves hardy — [and is 

 among the most beautiful of conifers]; the Chinchona bark 

 (through Mr. Pentland) ; a hardy palm from China, &c. &c. The 

 Victoria regia^ introduced through our means, is perhaps one of 

 the most remarkable plants ever reared in Europe ; and the num- 

 ber of new and extraordinarily beautiful Rhododendrons sent to 

 us by Dr. Hooker from India, has excited the astonishment of 

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