24 
THE FLORIST AND POMOLOGIST. 
[ January. 
- Pince’s Black Muscat Grape, which has in former years 
taken a position as one of the very best of high-flavoured late-keeping Black 
Grapes, has this season kept up its well-won reputation. The samples 
which have been sent to us, were not fully ripe, nor so well coloured as we 
have seen this variety, hut their .quality was, nevertheless, most excellent. 
With this, the Madresfield Court, and the Royal Ascot, we shall have 
acquired three most valuable high-flavoured late black Grapes. 
- ^Testimonials have recently been presented to the following gentle¬ 
men—namely, to Mr. David Mitchell, on his leaving Hamilton to commence 
business as a nurseryman and seedsman in Edinburgh. The present 
consisted of a timepiece in marble, and also a tea and coffee service, with 
tea tray and salver. The fine new garden at Hamilton, with its extensive 
ranges of glass houses, has been formed under Mr. Mitchell’s superintendence. 
To Mr. Daniel Nash, who has held the office of Chairman of the Association 
of Seed Merchants for twenty-one years. The testimonial consisted of a 
silver-gilt dessert service, of four corner pieces with a plateau, on which was 
engraved an appropriate inscription. 
(©bituarp. 
- Science has just lost one of her most worthy sons in the person 
of Dr. Daubeny, the Professor of Botany and Rural Economy in the Uni¬ 
versity of Oxford. He was born in 1795, and was educated at Winchester, 
whence he proceeded to Oxford, and became early attached to chemical 
and geological studies. In 1834 he was elected to the Professorship of 
Botany, and soon began to apply his chemical acquirements to the elucida¬ 
tion of vegetable physiology. In 1836, published an essay on the Action 
of Light upon Plants, which must ever be considered not only as one 
of his most important works, but also as one of the most valuable publi¬ 
cations on the subject of vegetable physiology. In this paper certain facts 
were published which are now so generally assumed to be correct, that 
their discoverer is overlooked except by the curious in matters of scientific 
history. These facts, in brief, are, that the luminous portion of the spec¬ 
trum (the yellow and the green rays), are the most powerful in promoting 
the exhalation of oxygen gas from the green parts of plants, and, indeed, 
in stimulating vegetable life in general. The Oxford Botanic Garden, 
which was under his direction, was greatly indebted to his munificence. 
He died at his residence in the Botanic Garden, on the 13tli ult., and was 
buried in the chapel of Magdalen College, of which he was Senior Fellow. 
- Mx. William McNeill, for many years Gardener at the Chief 
Secretary’s Lodge, Phoenix Park, near Dublin, died on the 26th of 
November last, at the age of forty years, leaving a widow and young 
family. He was trained in the gardens of Taymouth Castle, and has rendered 
the garden of the Chief Secretary famous for the grand collection of specimen 
stove and greenhouse plants which it contains. 
