KEW GARDENS. 



5 



There is hardly a variety of horticultural appetite, unconnected 

 with the orchard and kitchen-garden, which may not be reasona- 

 bly gratified at Kew. It is the Encyclopcedia of such matters, pre- 

 sented to the eye in the shape of facts instead of printed words. 

 Thus, when the Pino-maniac enters the beautiful iron gates — al- 

 most worthy, as was said of those for the Baptistery at Florence, 

 to be the gates of Paradise — instead of proceeding to the attrac- 

 tive architectural conservatory before him, he is arrested, in sum- 

 mer, by two large specimens, in tubs, of the Araucarm Cunning- 

 liami^ or Moreton Bay Pine, on either side of the principal walk. 

 These are to him the pillars of Hercules, which he courageously 

 passes ; and turning sharp to the left, is at once in the Mediterra- 

 nean expanse of the Old Arboretum. Still on his left is a noble 

 specimen of the Pinus Laricio^ or Corsican Pine, something in 

 the way of the Scotch fir, but with a more airy and upright car- 

 riage. By this handsome tree he is reminded of the very cir- 

 cumscribed native home of several of his favourites, and resolves 

 to cultivate them with the greater diligence, from the conscious- 

 ness that if their tribe is by accident brought low in its original 

 habitat, it will utterly perish, unless he aids in disseminating it. 

 Cephalonia, like Corsica, claims a pine to herself — audit bears her 

 name. Another, P. occidentalism not yet in the gardens, is sup- 

 posed to be confined, or nearly so, to Cuba. The true pines have 

 another limit; they are restricted to the northern hemisphere, 

 though coniferous trees are brought from the southern. A fine 

 ruin of a cedar of Lebanon illustrates the former contingency. — 

 There are now in England more individuals of this species, first 

 brought home by Dr. Pococke, than in all the range of Lebanon 

 put together. Next to the P, Laricio is the ever scrubby P. Pu- 

 milio of Carniola ; the P, Pinaster looking not at all at home — 

 (the sea-side might suit it better) : — succeeded by a true Scrub 

 Pine, P. inops, from North America, presenting the curiosity of«a 

 weeping fir. A Deodara Pine, and a species called P. Macrocar- 

 pa^ from California, on either side of the path, are rivals in beauty. 

 Immediately to the right is an unknown tree from Japan, called 

 Taxodium disticJmm^ var, nutans^ with a straight taper stem and 



he frequently omits the time when he received them ; t hese, therefore, are 

 statrd as having been introduced before the doctor's decease — in 1733.' 



Mr. Aiton, and after him his son and editor, did then" best to arrive at 

 more precision in these matters • — but we cannot say much for their success. 

 1^ 



