128 OLD-FASHIONED GARDENING 
brought to a reservoir wherein they were enriched 
with old lime, ashes, manure, etc. “Twice a week,” 
to use his own words, “I let it run, thus impregnated.” 
Also he explains that he regularly spreads “on this 
ground, old hay, straw and whatever damaged fodder 
I have about my barn.” Under this system his land 
was remarkably fruitful, at which those who had 
known it before he developed it, marveled greatly. 
A popular flower of to-day came to America, it 
would seem, through his hands, for in 1735 a letter 
from P. Collinson in England contains this interest¬ 
ing paragraph; “The China Aster is the noblest and 
finest plant thee ever saw of that tribe. It was sent 
per the Jesuits from China to France; from thence to 
us; it is an annual. Sow it in rich mould immedi¬ 
ately” (the letter dated February 12 would reach 
Bartram about the first of April, under favorable con¬ 
ditions), “and when it has half a dozen leaves, trans¬ 
plant in the borders.” 
Gardens were of course growing common by this 
time, and nearly every writer of either a journal or 
travels has something to say about them. Several 
places are mentioned by Brissot, who journeyed about 
here in the year 1788. One item tells of a visit to 
“the country house of Mr. Temple Franklin. He is 
the grandson of the celebrated Franklin. . . . 
His house is five miles from Burlington, on a sandy 
