July, i pi6 
21 
And much came back in return—tulips, car¬ 
nations, ‘nails, calico, Russia linen and 
clothes for my boys.’ ” 
Collinson’s enthusiasm for the strange 
new trees and flowers thus received runs 
through a thick volume of letters: 
“August 28, 1736.—Send more Black 
Walnuts, Long Walnuts, both sorts of 
Hickory, Acorns of all sorts, Sweet Gum, 
Dogwood, Red Cedar Berries, Allspice, 
Sassafras. . . . More of those fine Laurels 
and Rhododendrons, the most elegant trees 
yet discovered in your province.” 
“June 30, 1763.—O Botany, delightfull- 
est of all sciences! There is no end to thy 
gratifications! All botanists join me in 
thanking my dear John for his unwearied 
pains to gratify us. I have sent Linnaeus 
a specimen and one leaf of Tipitiwitchet 
Sensitive; only to him would I spare such 
a jewel. Pray send more specimens. I am 
afraid we can never raise it. Linnaeus will 
be in rapture at sight of it.” 
One letter says that Peter was careful 
even of the earth shaken from the roots of 
the plants received, “Because I have raised 
from it many strange plants which you 
would never think to send.” 
But danger attended the work of our 
early gardeners by sea as well as land. Bar- 
tram, on his own initiative and expense, 
had made a plant-collecting journey as far 
north and west as Lake Ontario. He kept 
on the way a journal, which he sent to 
Collinson but which was held up by the 
French. In 1763 there was a great time of 
concern about some boxes of seeds that the 
Spanish had captured on the high seas. 
Later in life, when he was near seventy, 
Bartram was appointed Botanist to the 
King of England for the provinces, with 
a salary of fifty guineas a year! Soon after 
this appointment, with his son William, he 
made an exploring and collecting trip to 
Florida, bringing back with him many bril¬ 
liant-flowered new plants, insects, reptiles 
and an accurate map of St. John’s river. 
All this greatly pleased the King; he had 
the map published for the benefit of the 
Drawng of the Hydrangea Quercifolia, 
discovered by John and William Bartram. 
From William Bartram’s “Travels 
Through North and South Carolina,” 1791 
colonists. Bartram himself published his 
record of this journey, but it is not so full 
and interesting as the record of that first 
long journey to Ontario. The “Observa¬ 
tions” in this tell of the cheerful bustle of 
preparation, the packing of paper and 
boxes for specimens, the books, apparatus, 
camping outfit, insect nets. “Hominy and 
bacon were stuffed in saddle-bags, huge 
flint-lock pistols swung to the saddle-bow; 
wife and daughters wept; sons grasped 
their father’s hand in silence; negroes 
grinned over the fine show master made on 
the grey mare.” Reaching Onondaga, after 
many days’ travel through dense thickets, 
the Indians received them kindly and 
feasted them on “green corn dumplings, 
John Chapman, alias “Johnny Appleseed,” 
was not prepossessing, but he burned with 
a beautiful zeal to plant frontier orchards 
a hundred years ago. This is the only 
portrait known 
LI) .-LL. 
From the nature of this note and the 
style of handwriting no one can question 
the sincerity or the literacy of Johnny 
Appleseed 
venison and wild beans wrapped in leaves.” 
In the midst of the garden to-day stands 
the quaint old Bartram house, bearing 
several devout inscriptions carved in the 
grey stone by its builder. The southern 
wing, with large windows, was the conser¬ 
vatory where rare plants, collected on his 
journeys and destined to cheer the whole 
earth, bloomed always. The grand old trees 
of the garden, a world-wide collection, many 
of them giants, deserve all the care the Bart¬ 
ram Association is giving them. 
TO BE SOLD, 
By WILLIAM PRINCE, 
At Flu (hing-Landing, on Long-I(land, rear New-Vork, 
The following Trees and Plants, viz. 
O NE hundred and ten large Carolina Magnolio flower 
trees, the fined and mod beautiful that grow in' 
America, and are all raifed from the feed in a dry foil, and 
are very apt to live when tranfplantcd, and are from three 
feet and a half to four feet high, price 4s. per tree. Fifty 
large Catalpa flower trees about the thieknefs of a man’s 
leg, and are about eight or nine feet high to the under 
part of the top, very firaight and thrifty, price is. per 
tree. Thirty or forty large almond trees, that begin to 
bear as they fland in the nurfery.and are very apt to bear, 
price is. 6d. per tree ; and fifty fig trees that begin to 
bear, price 2s. per tree. Two thoufand white, red and 
black currant bufhes, price fid. per plant. A number of 
goofeberry plants of different forts, price fid. per plant. 
Grapevines, viz. The large Lifbon white grapes, white 
and purple Madeira grapes, price 6d. per plant. Five 
thoufand of the following firawberry vines, viz. The' 
hautboy, the chilli, and the large Englifh and American 
white draw berries, price is. per dozen plants. Fifteen 
hundred white mulberry trees, and one thoufand black 
mulberry trees, price is. 6d. per tree, by the fmall parcel, 
but they will be fold for lefs by the quantity. Ail forts 
of fruit trees to be fold as ufual. 
The first nursery advertisement published 
in America extolled the trees raised by 
William Prince of Long Island 
The Princes and Parsons of Old 
Long Island 
I N those old days the wonderful flora of 
North America was well appreciated. 
Our botanists and gardeners ranked with 
commanding generals and kings of com¬ 
merce. The service they did the world was 
doubtless as great. At Flushing, L. I., 
near the same time that John Bartram was 
laying out his garden, the Princes, Robert 
and son William, took up the theme and 
established the first commercial nursery in 
America. The idea, at first, was to stock 
the orchards and vineyards of the colonists, 
but, inevitably, with culture, came the in¬ 
troduction of flowering trees and shrubs. 
“The Old American Nurseries,” as they 
were later called, grew rapidly in import¬ 
ance and exerted a profound influence upon 
the development of American horticulture. 
Even the American Revolution handled 
carefully the fine house William built and 
his stock of trees and plants. Washington 
occupied the house at one time and, when 
the British took possession of Flushing, 
General Howe placed a guard around house 
and nurseries. Through ensuing years 
American patriots had a sterner duty than 
the planting of orchards and gardens. But 
when the American eagle soared supreme, 
the resources of the nurseries were taxed 
to keep up with the rebound of trade. The 
orchards and gardens laid waste, or neg¬ 
lected through wars, must be restocked; 
foreign army officers during their invasion 
had been fascinated with our American 
flowers. Many boxes and bales were con¬ 
signed to homes in England, Germany and 
France, where travelers still are shown 
ancient trees and shrubs that came from the 
Prince nurseries. 
Meantime successors to John Bartram 
continually pushed westward their expedi¬ 
tions. To the Prince Nurseries the beauti¬ 
ful things they discovered were brought for 
care and propagation. The Lewis and 
(Continued on page 56) 
