124 
WANDERINGS IN CHINA. 
Chap. VIII. 
pots arranged in rows along the sides of narrow paved 
walks, with the houses of the gardeners at the entrance, 
through which the visitors pass to the gardens. There 
are about a dozen of these gardens, more or less exten- 
sive, according to the business or wealth of the pro- 
prietor ; but they are generally smaller than the smallest 
of our London nurseries. They have also stock-grounds, 
where the different plants are planted out in the ground, 
and where the first process of dwarfing their celebrated 
trees is put in operation. These contain large collections 
of camellias, azaleas, oranges, roses, and various other 
well-known plants, which are purchased by the Chinese 
when in flower. The most striking plant in autumn or 
winter is the curious fingered citron, which the Chinese 
gather and place in their dwellings or on their altars. 
It is much admired both for its strange form, and also 
for its perfume. The mandarin orange is also much 
grown at Fa-tee, where the plants are kept in a dwarf 
state, and flower and fruit most profusely, producing 
large, flat, dark, red-skinned fruit. The Chinese have a 
great variety of plants belonging to the orange tribe : 
and of one, which they call the cum-quat — a small oval- 
fruited variety — they make a most excellent preserve. 
But it is of course in spring that the Fa-tee gardens 
possess the greatest attractions. They are then gay with 
the tree pseony, azaleas, camellias, roses, and various 
other plants. The azaleas are splendid, and reminded 
me of the exhibitions in the gardens of the Horticultural 
Society at Chiswick, but the Fa-tee exhibitions were on 
a much larger scale. Every garden was one mass of 
bloom, and the different colours of red, white, and 
