July 18. 
THE COTTAGE GARDENER, 
271 
The good man’s prosperity in that share of this 
world’s goods which is the natural reward of a well- 
ordered life, has been compared by the inspired poet to 
the growth of a tree planted by a river’s side. Hesiod, 
and Homer, and Virgil, the great (though, alas, like 
Balaam, greatly fallen) seers of the religion of nature, 
have many highly poetical allusions to the practice of 
irrigating land with living water. The gentile world, in 
their blindness, transferred their adoration from the 
great Creator to the created thing, and attributed not 
only life, but a oertain divinity to their much-loved 
streams and fountains ; and, as for the rain, descending 
from heaven and fertilizing the earth, they made that 
the symbol of Him, “ in every age, in every clime adored.” 
fi Nocte pluit tota redeunt spectacula mane 
Divisum imperium cum Jove Caesar habet.** 
The fable which is the subject of this extraordinary 
epigram is alluded to in the Apostle’s remonstrance to 
the men of Lystra, who offered worship to him and to 
Barnabas, as Jupiter and Mercurius, bringing oxen and 
garlands, the choicest productions of the soil. 
“Ye should turn from these vanities unto the living 
God who made heaven and earth, and the sea and all 
things that are therein ; who in times past suffered all 
nations to walk in their own ways. Nevertheless, he 
left not himself without witness in that He did good, 
and gave us rain from heaven and fruitful seasons, 
filling our hearts with food and gladness.” 
He who could be all things to all men has left this 
testimony to the beauty, the importance, the univer¬ 
sality, of natural religion; and the exceeding sinfulness 
of the vain idolatrous symbols by which it has been 
overlaid by superstitious men. How thankful should 
not all of us be who are not left to be led into error by 
mysteries and images and symbols; who can drink 
freely of the living waters of the gospel, having the 
Bible itself to verify, or correct, or to refute, the 
expositions of men. And we may add, true religion 
does not require a deep and recondite knowledge of all 
rare and vast treasures of natural science for its illus¬ 
tration. A tree planted by a river’s side; a passing 
shower; the decay of the cotyledons of a seed sown in 
the ground and the renewal of the life in the germ: 
these, and such-like lessons, the field and the garden 
teach the most unsophisticated. J. J. 
Not many years ago, Woking was an obscure place 
which few people ever saw, unless they went on purpose 
to see it; and even a letter through the post might reach 
it with difficulty, unless the Postmaster General was in¬ 
formed that it was “ near Ripley, Surrey.” Now, how¬ 
ever, thanks to the railways, Woking Station, and 
Woking Common, are as notorious as Waterloo Bridge, 
and when in an active state. Chemistry conies to our aid with such 
expressions as, “new elective affinities and attractions; in the nascent 
state ; altered electrical conditions;” and so on ; but such words do not 
quite explain the new actions which result from the constantly changing 
particles of running water, of the blood, and of light; and we are all 
equally in the dark about each. For ourselves, we admire the truly 
Scriptural figure, which attributes a kind of life to each of them. The 
metaphors of the Bible are always suggestive, and the parallels which 
they point out extend farther than we may at first suppose.—J. J. 
or Southampton; and what was formerly a secluded 
rural parish is now all but a suburb of “ the great 
Metropolis.” When first we knew the place, every face 
and form you met were familiar in the neighbourhood, 
a nod of recognition, or a chat over an adjoining hedge 
about the weather, about crops, or prices, were quite a 
matter of course with everybody; but now groups of 
gay holiday-seekers may be seen clambering and chasing 
each other up steeps of the woody knolls, and through 
the furze and fern, but nobody knows them; they are 
“Londoners;” they come and go like butterflies, as 
many of them are, and no one cares whence or whither. 
But although Woking was thus long a secluded and 
unknown spot to the world at large, there was one class 
to whom it has, for many years, been familiar. For 
upwards of a century the nurserymen of this country 
have been dependant on this locality for one of the most 
important branches of their trade. It is here that 
almost all “ the stocks ” which are employed in the pro¬ 
pagation of fruit-trees are raised ; here, also, are regular 
manufactories of the most choice ornamental trees and 
shrubs, and large breadths of young forest-trees for 
timber; indeed, the staple commodity of the parish may 
be said to be nursery stock. Of such nurseries there 
are several, some of small extent,- the produce of which 
is generally bought up by the larger establishments; 
and to give some idea of what these places are, the fol¬ 
lowing account of the old and extensive firm of Donald 
and Son will furnish an excellent example. 
It is now upwards of fifty years since Mr. Robert 
Donald, a native of Aberdeenshire, established himself, 
at Goldworth, near Woking, as what is called “ a 
Surrey nurseryman.” He was one of those clear-headed, 
sound, practical, horticulturists, who, combining active 
business-habits with the most perfect knowledge of his 
profession, soon formed a connection, and made himself 
known throughout the length and breadth of the country; 
and his kindly disposition, and large-hearted philan¬ 
thropy, rendered him to all who had the pleasure of 
his acquaintance an object of esteem and respect. 
After a successful career of nearly lialf-a-century in this 
spot of his adoption, he retired to his rest at the ripe 
old age of eighty-five, and his remains were buried in 
the little rural churchyard, the spot being denoted by 
a marble slab, enclosed within an iron railing, and 
bearing the beautiful, and in this case most appropriate, 
inscription:—“The sun shall be no more thy light by 
day; neither for brightness shall the moon give light 
unto thee; but the Lord shall be unto thee an ever¬ 
lasting light, and thy God thy glory.” 
The nursory which Mr. Donald established, and 
which is now so well conducted by his son, extends 
over fifty acres, and comprises every description of 
nursery stock. Its most prominent features, however, 
are the production of ornamental trees and shrubs, 
fruit-trees, and fruit-tree stocks; for the latter, particu¬ 
larly, it is, perhaps, the largest in the country. Many 
thousands of these are annually transmitted to all parts 
of this country, and large exportations to America have 
for many years formed a great part of the trade. But, 
