president’s address. 
665 
force during the lifetime of Sir James Smith. 1, The whole face 
of the county was rapidly changing to the detriment and 
extinction of the wild flowers ; just as now the making of golf 
links destroys many a botanist’s Paradise. 
The extensive property, owned by James Crowe, at 
Lakenham, was bounded on the east by the River Yare : 
it included the house called “ The Grove,” and stretched 
westward as far as the Ipswich road.' 11 Only a mile beyond 
the city wall toward the south, this land had apparently been 
used, in 1665, as one of the places of interment for victims of 
the Plague, which in that year carried off 2,251 inhabitants 
of the city. In 1796, labourers employed by Mr. Crowe, 
discovered about one hundred human skeletons, and with them 
a Norwich tradesman’s token bearing the name “ Charles 
Reeve, 1664.” ‘ 
The residence, at Old Lakenham, of James Crowe, surgeon, 
was a large white stuccoed house, situated where the ground 
slopes down steeply from the east end of the churchyard to 
the river. The garden was enclosed, except towards the river, 
by a red brick wall, the principal entrance being nearly opposite 
the steep pathway which still leads up, through beautiful 
trees, to the churchyard. From the draw T ing-room windows 
of Tuckswood House there was a pleasant view eastwards 
through an avenue of fine beech, wych elm, walnut, and horse 
chestnut trees, to the river and the meadows beyond it. On 
the north side of the flower garden was the kitchen garden, 
also sloping to the river ; and on the opposite side of the lane 
the house, which is now “ Old Lakenham Post office,” formed 
part of the stable, and the barn was behind it." The garden 
w r as remarkable for the hothouse, in which an American aloe 
blossomed in 1793; and a special feature of the garden was 
the display of wild orchis plants, which Mr. Crowe had been 
successful in transplanting. 
Dr. Smith, having only a small garden at Surrey street, 
used to grow some of his precious plants at Lakenham. 11 As 
early as 1782 he was sending seeds and plants to this garden.' 17 
In the summer of 1781 Mr. Crowe and T. J. Woodward 
