We are happy in having a opportunity of figur- 
ing a few of the most superior of the hardy aquatic 
plants, doubting not, but some of our readers w iH 
avail themselves of such advantages as they possess 
for the culture of this neglected class of floral or- 
naments. If, in the garden or shrubbery, water be 
present, to adopt some portion of it to aquatics is 
but carrying out the general design of the whole. 
To neglect this, is to leave one space to nature, 
whilst the hand of the cultivator is sedulously em- 
ployed around it. Water is universally acknow- 
ledged to be one of the most interesting features of 
a landscape. It yields its degree of pleasure even 
on the smallest scale. Our inimitable Milton could 
not even picture Eden without water — 
‘ Which through veins 
Of porous earth with kindly thirst up drawn, 
Rose a fresh fountain, and with many a rill 
Watered the garden.’ 
Again, how brilliant a picture this element con- 
tributes to make, when flowing into its composition 
from the mental fountain of the same admirable poet. 
‘ From that saphire fount the crisped brooks, 
Rolling on orient pearl and sands of gold, 
With mazy error under pendent shades 
Ran nectar; visiting each plant, and fed 
Flowers worthy of Paradise, 
Both where the morning sun first warmly smote 
The open field, and where the unpierc’d shade 
Imbrown’d the noon-tide bow’rs. — Thus was this place 
A happy rural seat of various view.’ 
The Aponogeton distachyon should be planted 
in clay, immersed in water, about eighteen inches. 
Hort. Kew. 2, v.2, 331. 
