214 
THE FLORIST AND POMOLOGIST. 
without flowers in order to make this great 
display, I have no fault to find with him; all 
I contend for is, that should not be the main 
aim and scope of the Exhibitions of the Hor¬ 
ticultural Society. In one respect the Exhi¬ 
bitions of the present day have produced a 
good result by giving prizes for collections of 
beautiful-foliaged plants, as the culture of 
these plants, which look beautiful all the year 
round, is thus stimulated, and they are a 
great improvement in the garden. 
“ 3. But in other respects these great show- 
cultivators grow very few plants which do 
not flower at the show seasons, and therefore 
leave the flowers which might be cultivated 
with great effect for other seasons of the year 
without much attention. 
“ 4. The true object of Horticulture should 
be, in my opinion, to increase the enjoyment 
derivable from it, and to diffuse it as widely 
as possible; to enable the owners of gardens 
to get the greatest amount of pleasure and 
satisfaction from their possessions; and to 
enable the general public to procure the 
greatest number of fruit, flowers, and vege¬ 
tables in the greatest quantity, of the best 
kinds, and at the cheapest prices. 
“ 5. In order to carry out this, there should 
be something like a continuous exhibition, 
so that a gardener would have no interest 
in forcing his plants unnaturally; but if he 
had a beautiful specimen at any time he 
would know he cculd exhibit it where it 
would be seen and appreciated, and its merits 
rewarded. When the Horticultural Society 
was in its palmy days, one of its great sources 
of benefit and attraction was the fortnightly 
shows at their great room in Regent Street. 
It was then the practice for any gentleman in 
the country, if he had a new plant or a new 
fruit, to send it to one of these exhibitions at 
any time in the year, and the nurserymen 
brought every new plant there from their 
respective establishments. Dr. Lindley ex¬ 
plained the nature and properties of every¬ 
thing as it appeared in each exhibition in his 
lucid and agreeable manner, in which on this 
subject he has no rival, and these meetings 
were intensely fashionable, and often densely 
crowded. 
“ 6. When the Horticultural Society at Chis¬ 
wick were the leading gardens in the country 
for new plants, many gardens were supplied 
thence, and so they were never without great 
interest. They could not trust altogether to 
country gentlemen and nurserymen for plants 
for exhibition, and when the entries were 
deficient the shows were made up of beau¬ 
tiful plants from the Horticultural Gardens, 
though then a certificate of merit from the 
Society meant something, and was prized at 
a high rate; it insured the sale of any plant 
which received it, and often practically repre¬ 
sented a prize of some hundreds of pounds 
sterling, as many nurserymen had orders 
before the exhibition closed for very large 
amounts. It therefore appears to me that 
these fortnightly exhibitions should be re¬ 
newed at once, and every attraction given to 
them; and, considering the increase of com¬ 
mercial transactions relating to Horticulture, 
the facility of carrying anything from a dis¬ 
tance, and the great influx of visitors into 
London in the season for a temporary sojourn 
for the spring and summer months, it would 
be well to try a weekly exhibition without 
the descriptions, which, in point of fact, 
would almost amount to a continual show; 
and they should be held in a place suitable 
for plants, where many nurserymen would 
not mind allowing them to remain all the 
time they were in full flower. One or two of 
the great shows might be still held in the 
Gardens, where the fashionables could attend 
to show themselves and look at each other, 
which they do on these occasions quite as 
much as at the flowers. 
“ 7. It would be too much in a letter of 
this sort to go into details as to how many 
branches of Horticulture have remained stag¬ 
nant for many years past; though it would 
not be irrelevant, it would occupy more space 
and time than I can now afford to give to it. 
But there is one subject that has pressed upon 
me so long, and I am so convinced of its 
damaging effects upon the commercial part of 
the supply of the finer fruits in the public 
market, that I cannot help reverting to it in 
this letter, and that is, the growth of fruits 
for sale by private establishments, in compe¬ 
tition with the market gardeners. Many 
gentlemen keep gardens, partly for their own 
use, and partly for the sale of the produce, 
which they sell to cover part of the gardening 
expenses; and this is done to a very large 
extent, and by some of the highest private 
garden establishments in the country. The 
result is, that fruit, with all the facilities of 
cheap glass and cheap coal all over the 
country (compared with forty years ago) is 
absolutely dearer than it was forty years 
since: while the produce of real market 
gardens is perhaps 50 per cent, cheaper, and 
100 per cent, better, the forced fruits in 
which the private establishments compete 
have made very little progress in goodness. 
If you went to Co vent Garden Market 
between thirty and forty years ago and 
looked at the fruit, you would find the fine 
Grapes were grown by Mr. Andrews, the 
great market gardener at Vauxhall, Mr. John 
Wilmot, of Isle worth, or some other good 
market gardener of the day: whereas, if you 
go there now, the same kind of fruit is from 
some private garden; and supposing a large 
quantity of fruit is wanted for a big party, 
none of the great fruiterers will undertake to 
supply you until they have written or tele¬ 
graphed to some private establishments to 
know what they can get. 
“ 8. The first question that naturally strikes 
you is, How is the public worse off for this 
