srXPPLKMENT  TO  THE  "JOURNAL  OF  HORTIOULTXTRE,"  MARCH  13,  1!KI'3. 
£oui)oii:  /tttf)er  of  Dorticuflurttf  Ooimiafism.  ” 
By  Caledonian. 
"Jn  E  are  fortunate  in  possessing  an  admirable  memoir 
of  Jolm  Claudius  Loudon,  written  immediately 
after  his  death  in  1843  by  Jane  Webb  Loudon, 
his  wife.  This  was  published  as  an  integral  part 
of  “  Self-Instruction  for  Young  Gardeners,” 
which  was  the  last  book  the  great  litterateur 
and  horticulturist  was  engaged  with,  and  which 
was  unfinished  at  the  moment  of  his  sudden 
death.  Mrs.  Loudon’s  biography  of  her  accomplished  and  inde¬ 
fatigable  husband  was  sketched  while  the  great  charm  and  win¬ 
someness  of  Loudon’s  personality  was  still  fresh  and  powerful 
upon  her,  and  in  every  page  of  that  most  interesting  memoir 
one  can  trace  a  jealous 
regard  for  the  glory  of  his 
name.  In  many  ways  Mr. 
Loudon  was  one  of  the  most 
remarkable  characters  of 
the  Nineteenth  Century. 
His  early  associations  were 
not  directly  conducive  to 
the  path  of'  literature  or  of 
art,  yet  in  the  horticultural 
phase  of  the  former  domain 
the  name  of  Loudon  stands 
unrivalled  ;  and  though  his 
success  as  an  artist  was  not 
great,  he  yet  had  one  or  two 
of  his  paintings  hung  in  the 
Royal  Academy. 
His  career  opens  at 
Kerse  Hill,  near  Gogar,  now 
a  district  of  Edinburgh,  in 
1782,  the  year  before 
America  declared  war 
against  George  HI.  and  the 
Mother  Country.  His  father 
was  a  farmer,  but  this  son. 
the  eldest  of  a  family  of 
nine,  had  unmistakeablei  pre¬ 
dilections  for  plant  culture 
and  garden  designing.  Un¬ 
fortunately,  I  must  refrain 
from  repeating  some  of  the 
stories  told  of  Loudon’s  boy¬ 
hood,  and  reader  and  writer 
both  must  be  content  with  a 
mere  skeleton  outline  of  Mr. 
Loudon’s  life  and  works. 
Passing  over  his  earlier 
years,  at  sixteen  years  of 
age  he  had  been  apprenticed 
as  a  draughtsman  to  a  Mr. 
Dickson,  the  nurseryman 
and  “  planner,”  of  Leith 
Walk,  Edinbxu’gh.  The 
times  but  recently  prior  to 
his  nativity  had  witnessed 
that  great  revolution  in  the 
character  of  garden  design 
fi’om  the  formal  or  architec¬ 
tural  to  the  landscape  gar¬ 
dening  style — a  style  said  to 
be  evolved  from  the  Chinese  pattern,  and  intended  to  produce 
the  choicest  portions  of  Nature’s  most  beautiful  examples  by 
art  (yet  art  concealed)  in  any  spot  wheresoever  chosen.  Before 
Switzer,  Pope,  Addison,  and  Walpole’s  time,  in  the  earlier 
decades  of  the  Eighteenth  Century,  formal  designing  had  reached 
to  the  stage  of  chronical  insipience,  and  the  minds  of  practi¬ 
tioners  were  totally  warped.  Reaction  occurs  sooner  or  later  in 
every  instance  where  the  extreme  has  been  verged  upon  and 
there  maintained.  And  so  it  was  that  one  after  another  there 
arose  a  new  school  of  garden  and  landscape  designers,  whose 
names  and  works  are  familiar  to  many,  and  in  Loudon’s  very 
early  years  some  of  the  more  renowned  of  the  reformers  were  at 
the  height  of  their  fame.  As  a  draughtsman  of  estate  and  garden 
plans  Loudon  was  naturally  brought  into  line  with  the  professors 
of  these  days.  He  sat  up  for  study  two  nights  each  week  while 
in  his  youth,  and  used  then  to  drink  strong  green  tea  to  main¬ 
tain  himself  acute  and  wakeful.  While  a  boy  he  seems  to  have 
become  acquainted  with  the  garden  plants  then  grown.  In  1803 
we  find  he  has  reached  London.  Here  he  met  Sir  Joseph  Banks 
and  a  coterie  of  learned  gentlemen  and  eminent  naturalists  of 
the  day.  Possibly  it  was  in  their  company  that  he  imbibed  some 
of  the  great  ideas  and  suggestions  which  he  soon  afterwards  gave 
to  the  world  in  his  books.  I  am  proud  to  have  a  copy  of  the  first 
book  that  Loudon  produced.  This  was  published  in  1804,  en¬ 
titled,  “Observations  on  the  Formation  and  Management  of  Use¬ 
ful  and  Ornamental  Plantations;  on  the  Theory  and  Practice  of 
Landscape  Gardening;  and  on  Gaining  and  Embanking  Land 
from  the  Sea  ” ;  and  indicates  the  direction  of  his  studies  in  the 
immediate  past .  He  was  then  only  twenty-one  years  of  age,  and  the 
technical  erudition  he  was  possessed  of  even  then  is  conspicuously 
noteworthy.  The  embanking  of  sea-land  was  unsuccessful. 
His  first  contribution  ta 
literature,  however,  had 
been  given  the  previous 
_  year,  when  he  wrote  to  a 
Publication  named  “  The 
iterary  Journal,”  deprecat¬ 
ing  the  sombreness  of 
London  squares  and  gar¬ 
dens,  which  were  then 
graced  with  weirdly  Scotch 
Pines  and  subdued  by  the 
blackness  of  funereal  Yews. 
And,  list  ye !  he  advised  the 
planting  of  Oriental  and 
Occidental  Planes,  with¬ 
out  which  the  Thames  Em¬ 
bankment  and  handsome 
Piccadilly  would  stand 
blank,  bare  and  bald  at  the 
present  day.  Further  than' 
this,  it  was  Loudon  in  his 
youth  who-  suggested  a 
great  wide  breathing  zone 
for  the  mighty  metropolis, 
on  which  theme  a  hubbub 
soared  high  a  year  ago. 
When  this  first  book  of 
Loudon’s  was  published  he 
was  busy  with  the  lands  of 
the  Earl  of-  Mansfield  at 
Sbone,  near  Perth,  and  did 
not  return  to  England  till 
the  following  year — ^that  is, 
the  year  in  which  Lord  Nel¬ 
son  so  utterly  defeated  the 
French  at  Trafalgar.  Be¬ 
fore  leaving  Edinburgh  on 
this  occasion,  Mr.  Loudon 
had  finished  another  smaller 
work  on  the'  subject  of  im¬ 
provements  in  glass  houses. 
The  glass  houses  of  this- 
period  were  exceedingly 
cumbrous,  ill  -  ventilated, 
badly  heated,  and  poorly 
glazed.  Saving  for  a  few 
species  of  Orchids,  chiefly 
comprising  Cypripediums,. 
Epidendrums  and  Onci- 
diums,  together  with  Be¬ 
gonia  nitida  and  B.  acuminata,  Nelumbium  speciosum  (which' 
had  been  introduced  from  Jamaica  by  Sir  Jos.  Banks  the  year 
after  Loudon  was  bom) ;  and  such  other  exotic  plants  (the  Heaths 
excepted)  as  Gloxinia  maculata,  Plumbago  rosea,  Ixora  coccinea 
and  I.  alba,  Allamanda  cathartica.  Cyclamen  latifolium. 
Gardenia  florida,  G.  radicans,  and  one  or  two  species  of  Dipla- 
denias,  Clerodendrons,  and  Bougainvilleas,  the  glass  houses  at 
the  beginning  of  last  century  contained  few  other  subjects  that 
were  attractive. 
We  may  form  a  more  complete  idea  of  the  paucity  of  variety 
in  our  gardens  as  regards  trees,  shrubs,  and  plants  at  this  time 
when  we  recall  the  fact  that  Australia  was  not  discovered  by 
Captain  Cook  till  1770  (twelve  years  before  Loudon’s  birth)  in 
his  return  voyage  from  Tahati.  The  shores  of  Japan  were  sur¬ 
veyed  for  the  first  time  in  1785  by  the  French  voyager,  La 
Perouse;  the  Hudson  Bay  Company  and  the  North-West  Com¬ 
pany  of  Montreal  were  only  beginning  their  explorations  along 
the  courses  of  the  great  Canadian  rivers;  aiid  Mackenzie,  in 
1793,  was  the  first  to  descend  the  mighty  river  that  now  bears^ 
