-THK COTTAGE GARDENER AND COUNTRY GENTLEMAN’S COMPANION. —Septcjiber 30.1836. ATI 
you can conceive. Running round these, and extending 
farther to right and left, are the scroll-beds, and they 
,1 are tilled with the best purple, and the best light blue 
j Verbenas, the latter being more for showing the distinct¬ 
ness between the different purples when you are close 
j at them, and for relieving the sameness made by the 
purples when you are “up above ; ” but any respectable 
l person may see the whole any Friday in the season by 
merely asking leave of tho Baronet in writing. 
The Fountain Garden I have often told about. It is 
' not so good as I have seen it, because, during the 
! great works, thousands of plants which used to figure in 
“ heights and colours ” were allowed to perish, and it 
' will be two or three years before they will he able to 
i regain their steps here and on both sides of the con- 
i servatory wall. All my beautiful Tacsonias and other 
climbers, my African bulbs, and no matter what, are 
j no more. The destruction and loss were awful to 
I think of. 
In advance of the conservatory wall is the “ Refuge 
i for the Destitute,” as Lady Middleton calls it. A great 
i number of different styles of beds, with costly edgings 
! in iron, wood, and stone, had to be taken up iu different 
! parts where the new improvements reached to, but 
were too good and unique to be lost or thrown aside, 
and the “ Refuge ” was designed for their sole use and 
occupation. Not their sole use, by the-by; because 
other new beds and figures had to be designed on pur¬ 
pose to work in the “Destitute" into one whole pattern; 
and here is the best place in all Shrubland to see beds 
which one might carry in the head to imitate at home, 
both as patterns of designs and of planting; but I 
should never get over it if I were to give the plantings 
iu full. 
Below this is the new Rosary, with a system of arched 
iron-work over the walks for pillars and climbers, and 
climber-covered alcoves at each end. Farther down 
the slope is a whole system of Italian rustic or cottage 
gardening, with climbing Gourds as in Italy, and other 
and more durable climbers to represent the Vines of 
that country. Ponds and pools, with taller worts and 
smaller worts growing round the margins, which are 
alive with tingy worts and slimy worts, which, with their 
games and running about after each other, make the water 
blister with bubble worts; tent beds, mounds on which 
to grow Howdieworts, banks, and blocks, and trailers, 
; festoons, pitching, paving, and goodness knows how 
much more besides; for I could not get to the end or 
outside “ at any price,” back again, and up to the 
hanging basket, where collections of Diadem*, and 
j Quercifoils, and other such-like Geraniums, are wont to 
be grown; and from this very spot the Golden Chain 
takes its name, having first been used here in the chain 
which encloses the pattern outside a tesselated square 
pavement, on which drips the drainage from the “ hang- 
i ing basket,” which is suspended above between four 
i pillars, against which Roses climb. The “ basket ” 
is a square box four feet on the side, and is planted with 
Scarlet Geraniums. The dandified “ slip,” or outer 
1 case, to hide the box, cost only fifteen guineas; but 
i then it has stood seventeen or eighteen years, so you 
see hanging baskets are not so new as you “ might 
i think for,” from having first seen them at Sydenham. 
Up a few steps, and you are on the “ Specimen 
Terrace,” where standard Geraniums of the scarlet kinds 
| are grown, alternating with Cypress-trees ( Cupressus 
sempervirens). Rise another flight of steps, and you 
are on the finest Box terrace in England—unbordered 
Box-work on gravel, with flower-beds along the centre. 
Four of them were planted with Giant des Batailles Ver- 
bena, an excellent dark, dwarf, purplish-red kind, with 
a strong constitution. From this another flight of steps 
lands you on the grand central terrace, with a long bank 
of Dahlias on the other side. The hanging basket is 
now level with the eye, and is a unique scene amidst so 
many fine things. Turn to the right along tho grand 
terrace, and you are soon at the Swiss Cottage and 
Garden, where all the novelties are first “ proved.” 
Here tho Alma Variegated Geranium promises to be tho j 
best of that class; Lantanas, Linvms, and all such “ tit | 
bits ; ” Mrs. Bloomer, a very dwarf Scarlet Geranium, like I 
Glowworm, is very bright. On the opposite side of the 
terrace is a half-moon-shaped, sunk panel for the different J 
kinds of Verbenas, and beyond is the half-moon hedge of 
Gloire deRosamtne, of which you have often heard. Round 
one of the horns of the moon, and you are on one of 
seven walks which meet in one point, being a six or 
seven-sided large bed, with a vase of Scarlet Geraniums 
at each of the points, one pointing to the centre of each 
walk, and each walk having a distinct accompaniment 
of flowers or handsome shrubs within a tall Laurel fence. 
One of the walks leads down by two flights of steps to 
the Labyrinth, with an Edgington tent, a table, and seats 
in the centre. A gate allows the sedate, the grave, and the 
aged to pass straight on to the tent, while the gay, the 
giddy, and the more thoughtless must try their good 
iuck and who will get first married among the mazes 
which lend to the turning point in the fortunes of the 
chase. Another of the seven walks leads to the ht^rgiug j 
basket. This is guarded on either side the whole way by j 
the “ household troops ”—rows of Irish Yews at “ quarter \ 
distances.” Another of them has broad bands of Bcrheris I 
aqui/olia, kept down to a plane surface by pruning; j 
auother with Swedish Junipers; another with Mar¬ 
vels of Peru; and the rest with other marvels, which 
I forget just now. The centre mass to which these tend 
is of common Yew, ten feet high, and perhaps fifteen 
feet in diameter. A belt of Laurestinus surrounds the 
Yew, and another belt of the Variegated Mint finishes 
the group. 
Blow it high or low, or from any one point of the com¬ 
pass, but let the sun shine, and one has here a sheltered 
walk out of the seven to bask in on a wintry day. 
Up on the hill, above the Swiss cottage, is the Chinese 
summer-house and garden. When Colonel Malcolm re¬ 
turned from the Chinese war under Sir Henry Pottinger, 
he said this and its accessories were much like what 
one meets with in China, only that all the windows in 
China are oval, this being square after our fashion. 
Mr. Rucker was more struck with two rows of standard 
Fuchsia corymbiflora, six feet high in the stem, one down 
each side of the borders of theChiqese garden, than with 
all the rest in Shrubland. The Fuchsia gracilis does better 
in Shrubland as hedges next the shrubberies than I ever 
saw it elsewhere, and 1 should think they have miles 
of it. They have quantities of promenade beds of Savin, 
whore flowers would not come in the picture; and if they 
were to alternate the Savin with Junipents prostrata, 
which is of a lighter tinge, that feature would he 
heightened considerably. The first Paulownia imperialis 
which was imported into England stands here without 
having yet offered to bloom. The Pinetum is in “the i 
woods,” where I did not go, but they have sufficient room 
within the garden now to plant specimens of the whole | 
tribe. They could not, or would not, tell me how many j 
men were employed in these gardens; but sixteen 
of them were then absent at their harvest. Perhaps : 
twice sixteen could bo mustered in the grounds. Tho 
management of the conservatory is quite unique, and I 
shall give an account of it some of these days. 100,000 
is the number of plants now used for the flower-garden : 
and decorations. D. Beaton. 
NEGLECTED ESPALIER FRUIT-TREES. 
There is no way in which information is more use¬ 
fully acquired than by making inquiries and obtaining 
a public answer to them, as it often happens that the 
