170 
JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 
[ August 21, 188t. 
has such a gardener. And a fine old English welcome he accorded io 
his guests—not a mere ceremonial bow and gentle lisping how-do-je-do ; 
but a hearty rollicking “ Glad to see you, my boys ! come along. Friend 
Turner here is no stranger ; but Barron, here once more after sixteen years ! 
and Dick, Douglas Dick, come at last? I’Jl show him a ‘Douglas’ 
by-and-by, that I will ; and these gents—we shall not be strangers long. 
One a private detective, did you say ? Good, very good ; eh, Barron ? and 
the great provider at the Healtheries and the Palace, Mr. Roberts ; and 
the other ”—well, no matter, he is not worth naming ; but there we all 
Fig. 29.—Pollen-beariug cone of Araucaria. 
were, trooping to the Conifers, the thermometer nearly 90° in the shade, 
and perhaps 140° in the sun, the guide leading the way so briskly that 
we were glad when he paused to give the history of some tree, or recount 
an event of the days of his youth. 
And what stories of the past—episodes of sixty or seventy years ago-- 
we listened to, the day of the month and year of each occurrence being 
ready to hand. This memory for dates is astonishing ; of all the surprises 
at Dropmore it was felt perhaps as the greatest. We pass a long range 
of porcelain-fronted apiaries, a stretch of old-world glass structures 
with Vines and climbers half a century old, a row of Peach and Nectarine 
trees more modern, trained espalier fashion along the front of one of 
them bearing wonderful fruit; on the terrace huge bushes of the true 
old Tom Thumb Geranium, all ablaze ; beds on gravel and beds on grass 
in the true bedding style, which it may not be generally known 
originated here, and that the Duchess of Argyle sent her gardener to 
see it in 1823 ; then “ Donald Beaton and that party” thought it started 
at Argyle Lodge, but the author was Lady Grenville. On we go past 
herbaceous borders and come to the first Conifer, a truly grand Cedar 
of Lebanon, planted by Lord Grenville in 1794. We leave the lawn and 
enter the wilderness, coming shortly to a clearing—a lawn and flower 
garden among the trees, a charming and secluded spot. But the flowers ; 
well, these are not ordinary flowers, or rather not ordinary flowers grown 
in the ordinary way. This might be called the Fuchsia garden, for 
nearly every bed contains a Fuchsia tree—a real tree, mind, with thick 
and gnarled woody trunk and spreading branches, under which we pass 
and admire the canopy of flowers. “ Why, this is the old Riccartoni, 
Mr. Frost, is it not!” “Yes,” was the response, “it is; I raised it 
from a cutting fifty years ago, and I have planted it out in spring and 
taken up in autumn ever since.” And so with several others, one a 
telling example of F. corymbiflora, with spreading branches and pendent 
coral-like racemes swaying in the breeze. On the shaded side of the 
lawn in places where the ground is damp the most diminutive of Cam¬ 
panulas nestles in the grass, producing myriads of pretty blue flowers, 
quite a carpet of them. This is Campanula hederacea, which grows 
about an inch high, and is rarely seen so plentiful and thriving so well. 
No time for lingering, however, and along the grassy drives we pass 
between thickets of Rhododendrons and hardy Azaleas, raised from seed 
by Mr. Frost before half the readers of these notes were born ; planted, 
and now and for years past ripening and scattering their seeds, while 
the whole wood is one great nursery seed bed, and plants are springing 
up in millions. What a picture this wood must be in the spring ! but 
it is a picture now. On every hand are masses of orange and red— 
dwarf bushes and big trees of the Mountain Ash, the branches bending 
to the ground with their loads of ripening fruit, imparting a richness— 
even a brilliancy—to the scene that nothing else could approach at this 
period of the year. Amongst the sombre Pines this brightness is most 
effective and indescribable, while it suggests forcibly that the ornamental 
properties of this tree are not half sufliciently appreciated. 
The trees are thinner now, spaces necessarily wider, and the Conifers 
appearing. The first, like an advanced sentinel to arrest attention, is 
Abies grandis, grand indeed in symmetry and health, but yet young, 
and not perhaps more than 40 feet high. Then we pause, as all must 
pause, at the beautiful A. Albertiana planted in ISGl, and 30 to 40 feet 
high. Messrs. Veitch in their splendid work on the Conifer re scarcely 
do justice to this beautiful Fir, which they say is “scarcely distinguish¬ 
able from the common Hemlock Spruce.” It is strikingly distinct and 
very superior, and, as they go on fortunately to say, is “ one of the most 
ornamental of coniferous trees.” In a young state the dissimilarity 
between A. canadensis and A. Albertiana may perhaps not be great, but 
when developed the commanding appearance of the latter cannot be 
overlooked. The Dropmore specimen, and the larger one at Duneevan 
(Mr. McIntosh’s) are worth going a long distance to see, and especially in 
the spring, when the golden green of the unfolding leaves is so beautifully 
conspicuous. 
The further we go the finer the specimens are. That huge cone on the 
left, some 70 or 80 feet high, is Abies Menziesii. It was planted in 1841. 
It is light green in colour, but not dense. Mr. Van Geeit of Antwerp, 
whose opinions on the subject must always carry great weight, once told 
me he greatly feared that this Fir would not prove equal to anticipations 
either as an ornamental or a timber tree ; and the Dropmore specimens, 
fine as they are, are in accordance with his estimate. Now we come to 
the Deodars, which the lightning and wind have treated cruelly, yet they 
tower aloft to the height of some 70 feet, are perfectly furnished and in 
superb health. The finest, if I remember rightly (for no records of either 
heights or dates were taken) is just fifty years old. Splendid indeed is 
the glaucous form of Cedrus atlantica, perhaps 40 feet high, but its health 
and colour are its principal charm. Now we come to the beautiful Nor¬ 
way Spruce, Abies excelsa, which must be about 80 feet high, of faultless 
form and elegant. If about the same dimensions is A. nobilis, a truly 
noble example, its pronounced bluish tint rendering it additionally attrac¬ 
tive. A. amabilis is not so large, but is not less imposing by its massive 
appearance. Pinus escarena is of commanding appearance ; it is 
apparently a form of P. ponderosa, yet distinct from that species ; and 
P. monticola, planted in 1835, is similarly fine, its height being 50 or 
GO feet. We must, however, pass many, and possibly many of the best; 
but the Sugar Pine, P. Lambertiana, planted in 1841, 50 feet high, cannot 
be omitted ; nor can the still more striking, distinct, and conspicuous of 
all, P. Benthamiana, planted in 1843 and 60 feet high—remarkable by 
the great length of its leaves and brush-like growths. Taxodium sem- 
pervirens is grandly represented, its dark foliage contrasting effectively 
with the soft delicate green of T. distichum. Of Cryptomeria elegans 
there are many noble examples, and exceptionally remarkable is C. Lobbi, 
perhaps the finest example in England, 50 feet high, and figured in the 
“Manual” above mentioned. Then comes P.insignis, previously referred 
to, rich grass green in colour and singularly beautiful. These, with scores 
Fig. 30.—Seed-bearing cone of Araucaria. 
of others, are in the wilderness, rising above Brackens and Heaths ; but 
there is still the “ pinetum ” where the specimens are thinly disposed on 
the smoothest of lawns, and, at least some of them, probably unequalled. 
Here is not the oldest Araucaria in England, for that is at Kew ; but 
perhaps the second oldest, inasmuch as it is one of the plants brought 
from Chili by the Mr. Archibald Menzies towards the end of the last 
century, and presented to Sir Joseph Banks, who sent them to Kew ; but 
in some way the specimen under notice found its way to Dropmore. It 
is only interesting because of its age and as having been the parent of 
