West Park and Kew y 1841-1865. Ivii 
week-day afternoons throughout the year ; of which privilege 
upwards of 9,000 persons availed themselves during the re- 
maining nine months of the year 1 . The next, in 1842, was 
that the permission of Her Majesty should be asked to add 
a few acres of the Pleasure Ground to the old Arboretum for 
the purpose of opening a new entrance 2 to the Gardens from 
Kew Green. This was graciously granted, as were the far 
larger areas from time to time asked for, of which the next 
(in 1843) was for forty-eight acres, to afford sites for a new 
Pinetum, and for the erection of a Palm House far exceeding 
in dimensions any previously constructed. 
In 1846 the Royal Kitchen Gardens, which had remained 
under Mr. Aiton’s management, were annexed to the Botanic 
Gardens. They occupied an area of about fifteen acres skirt- 
ing the Richmond Road. A good-sized building used as 
a storehouse for fruit stood on this site, together with a large 
vinery and several forcing-houses, frames, melon and other 
pits. The vinery and some of the latter were in such dis- 
repair as to be condemned, others were retained ; but a con- 
siderable area being provided with excellent garden soil was 
devoted to the formation of a new collection of hardy her- 
baceous plants arranged according to the Natural System. 
This, according to a printed catalogue drawn up by Mr. Niven, 
foreman of the department, in 1853, contained about 5>5°° 
species, a number no doubt swollen by the admission of half- 
hardy plants, varieties, and synonyms. The first hardy 
herbaceous collection in the Royal Gardens was formed in 
1760, near the Temple of the Sun. It was an acre in extent, 
contained 2,71 2 species, and was called the Physic Garden. 
According to the first edition of Aiton’s Hortus Kewensis 
(1789), there were about 2,824 hardy herbaceous plants culti- 
vated in the Royal Botanic Gardens, and in the second 
edition (1810-1813) 3,946 species. 
1 In the last year of his Directorship (1865), Sundays having in the interim 
been included with the open days, 73,307 persons were admitted. In 1883 the 
numbers had risen to 1,240,489. 
2 The noble gates erected on this spot in 1845 are from designs by Decimus 
Burton, F.R.S. 
e 
