CONCERNING ROSE-SHOWS 19; 



flag. No ; give me a thorough florist, fond of all 

 flowers, in gardens, under glass, by the brook, in the 

 field. We should never be weary of talking about 

 our favourities ; and, you may depend upon it, we 

 should grow something. 



In all sobriety, I often wish that we, who, in these 

 locomotive days, frequently find ourselves in our great 

 cities, especially when our exhibitions are open, might 

 have better opportunities from time to time of grati- 

 fying our gregarious inclinations. Why, for example, 

 should not the Horticultural Club in London have 

 a permanent building like other clubs, of course on 

 a scale proportioned to its income, where we might 

 write our letters, read our newspapers, and (dare I 

 mention it ?) smoke our cigars, with every probability 

 that we should meet some genial friend ? Not only 

 in London, but in Edinburgh, in Dublin, in Paris, I 

 would have a horticultural club, where gardeners (a 

 title which every man is proud of, if he feels that he 

 has a right to claim it) might assemble in a fraternal 

 spirit, as brethren of that Grand Lodge whose first 

 master wore an apron of leaves, and whose best 

 members were never yet ashamed if their own were 

 of purple baize.i As time went on we might have 

 a library of horticultural, botanical, geological, and 



^ Since this was written, the * Horticultural Club ' has been success- 

 fully established, and has pleasant meetings at the Hotel Windsor, in 

 Westminster. 



