out sward; at the bottom runs a small rivulet on a bed of the same kind of gravel. The bank and higher grounds were planted with oaks, larch, and Scotch fir, and the sides of the rill with alder and Huntingdon willow. The undertaking was by my neighbours reckoned foolish, and I had to encounter no little obloquy for my presumption. The result, however, has been favourable, the plants on the high ground come away boldly, and in the hollow, which is only about 50 feet above the level of the sea, the Huntingdon willow has made astonishing progress; at four feet above the ground, several of the trees already measure 46 inches in circumference, and in length from 55 to 60 feet, giving fully an inch in diameter, and four feet in altitude for every year they have been in the soil. The plants were about four feet in length, and one-fourth of an inch diameter at planting. Pruning has been regularly attended to, all thick aspiring branches were removed, the leading shoot and numerous small side shoots encouraged for the purpose of producing sufficient foliage to elaborate the sap. One peculiar advantage in the culture of this valuable plant is, that in planting, rooted plants are not absolutely requisite. I have found shoots of from six to eight feet, and about two inches in diameter, succeed better than rooted plants; they require to be put from eighteen inches to two feet deep in marshy soil, which should be drained; the numerous roots sent out in such soil affords abundant nourishment, and shoots are produced the first year more vigorous than when the plants have been previously rooted. "Gar If you think this paper worthy of a place in your dener's Magazine," and if it shall have the effect of turning the attention of any of your readers to the cultivation of a plant which is particularly useful, I shall feel highly gratified. In the mean time I shall conclude by expressing my sincerest wish for the prosperity of your present undertaking; a "Gardener's Magazine" I have long considered as a desideratum in the periodical literature of the day. Your other labours on rural economy I am not unacquainted with. The talent, the zeal, and the perseverance these labours exhibit, produce my cheerful compliance with your request, in becoming a contributor to your Magazine. I am most respectfully, Sir, Annal Garden, Errol, Dec. 6th, 1825. PART II. REVIEWS. ART. I. Garden Botany. 1. The Botanical Magazine, or Flower Garden displayed; in which the most ornamental foreign Plants cultivated in the open Ground, the Greenhouse, and the Stove, are accurately represented in their natural Colours, &c. By WM. CURTIS. Continued by JOHN SIMS, M.D. F.R.S. &c. &c. 1787-1826. 53 vols. 8vo. London. 2. The Botanical Register, consisting of coloured Figures of exotic Plants, cultivated in British Gardens; with their History and Mode of Treatment. The designs by Sydenham Edwards, F.L.S. 1815-1826. Vols. I.—XI. 8vo. Ridgway, London. 3. The Botanical Cabinet, consisting of coloured Delineations of Plants from all Countries, with a short Account of each, Directions for Management, &c. &c. By CONRAD LODDIGES & SONS. 1817-1826. 10 vols 4to. and 8vo. London. 4. Exotic Flora, containing Figures and Descriptions of new, rare, or otherwise interesting exotic Plants, especially of such as are deserving of being cultivated in our Gardens, &c. By W.J. HOOKER, LL.D., F.R.A. & L.S. &c. &c. 29 Parts. 8vo. 1823 -1826. 2 vols. Blackwood, Edinburgh. 5. Geraniacea, or Natural Order of Geraniums. BY ROBERT SWEET, F.L.S. 1820-1826. 3 vols. 8vo. Ridgway, London. 6. The British Flower Garden. By ROBERT SWEET, F.L.S. 1822-1826. 2 vols. 8vo. Simpkin and Marshall, London. 7. Cistinea. The Natural Order of Cistus or Rock Rose. By ROBERT SWEET, F.L.S. 3 Nos. 8vo. 1825. Ridgway, London. 8. Flora Conspicua; a Selection of the most ornamental, flowering, hardy, exotic, and indigenous Trees, Shrubs, and herbaceous Plants for embellishing Flower Gardens and Pleasure Grounds. By RICHARD MORRIS, F.L.S. Drawn and engraved from living Specimens, by WM. CLARK. 6 Nos. 8vo. 1825. Smith, Elder, & Co., London. 9. The Botanic Garden; or Magazine of hardy Flower Plants cultivated in Great Britain, each number containing Four coloured Figures. By B. MAUNd. Nos. 1-7. Small 4to. Baldwin, Cradock, & Joy. Ir is our purpose, under this head, to lay before the public, regularly, an analytical and critical account of such periodical publications, upon the subject of Garden Botany, as are of sufficient importance to deserve attention. In order to fix a definite period from which our observations may be-commenced, we have determined to take the 1st January 1826, the day of the birth of this Magazine; and to occupy in our first Number the space hereafter to be devoted to detailed criticism, with some account of gardening throughout Europe at the present day, as far as it exercises any influence upon botanical pursuits. France, which may be truly called the cradle of science, has long been celebrated for the number and importance of her public botanical institutions, and for the deep interest her government has taken in the prosecution of every department of Natural History. From the days of Tournefort, there has scarcely been an expedition of discovery undertaken, to which a botanist has not been attached, with ample means of prosecuting his pursuits. Resident botanists and collectors have been placed in every colony belonging to the French government, whose foreign possessions have scarcely been less assiduously investigated than its provinces at home. The voyages of Commerson, of Michaux, of Olivier, of Labillardière, of Du Petit Thouars, of Leschenault, of Bory de St. Vincent, and of a host of other scientific travellers, and the large collections formed by Dombey, Aublet, and others of less note, have supplied the French botanists with stores of knowledge more ample than have been possessed in almost any other country. The importance of these is shown by the extent of the advantage derived to the French botanists by the acquisition of them, by the multitude of new species and genera, with which the publications of Jussieu, of Lamarck, and his successors, of Desfontaines, and more recently of Decandolle, are replete. Of private means applied to the prosecution of investigations in natural history, the expedition of Humboldt to South America is a splendid example. The various scientific publications in illustration of its results, are a noble monument of the zeal, and knowledge, and well applied resources of the most illustrious traveller now existing. The public gardens of France are numerous; but, with the exception of Paris and Montpellier, have not much celebrity. They are generally ill managed and inadequately supported. That of Montpellier, which has successively been under the direction of Magnol, Gouan, Decandolle, and Delile, all botanists celebrated in their day, has acquired a high degree of reputation; the Jardin des Plantes at Paris is also an establishment of great celebrity, and numbers of the rarest plants have been reared within its walls: but as a botanic garden, it is inferior to some of other countries of Europe. The private gardens in France, in which botanical objects occupy a principal place, are many. They all, however, belong to nurserymen, or private gentlemen, who traffic in the produce of their gardens in order to maintain them. That of Cels, at Paris, is celebrated by the labours of Ventenat; Noisette, another Paris nurseryman, possesses a large collection of botanical rarities; and among the amateurs, the establishments of Parmentier at Enghien, of Soulange-Boudin at Fromont, and of Boursault at Paris, deserve honourable mention. Some efforts have lately been made to establish an horticultural society at Paris, but we know not with what success. Botany in Spain, like all the other liberal sciences, may be said to have at present no existence in that unhappy country; its professors are banished, its gardens desolate, and all that mighty support, which was once bestowed upon them, withheld, as much, perhaps, from the ignorant recklessness of the reigning sovereign as from the exhausted state of his treasury. But the time has been when Spain was the most powerful patroness botany ever experienced; as the numberless scientific expeditions, undertaken by that country at enormous cost, and its splendid public gardens abundantly testify. The former have ever been unparalleled for the unlimited resources with which they have been prosecuted. Not to mention the fruitless expedition of Hernandez to Mexico, in the reign of Philip II., which is said to have cost the large sum, for the time, of 50,000 crowns; the reign of Charles III. was, beyond all others, fruitful in voyages undertaken by order of the Spanish government for the purposes of instituting remarks on the botany and natural history of the New World. In that reign Joseph Celestino Mutis, the well-known correspondent of Linnæus, was appointed to investigate New Grenada; John Cuellara was sent to the Philippines; Martin Sessé and others were commissioned to explore Mexico, and to the same expedition was joined Vincentio Cervantes, an experienced gardener, who was specially provided for the purpose of founding a botanic garden at Mexico, now existing. To circumnavigate the globe, and to enrich their country with the productions of every other part of the world, another voyage was carried into execution, to which Antonio Pineda, Luis Née, and Thaddeus Hænke, all assiduous and enterprising naturalists, were attached. But the best arranged, and to science the most important of all the Spanish expeditions, that of Don Hippolito Ruiz, and of Don Joseph Pavon, to examine Chili and Peru, remains to be enumerated. These celebrated travellers, together with Joseph Dombey, a French botanist, and an ample retinue of attendants, among whom were two draughtsmen, reached Lima in April 1778. The results of this famous enterprise are too well known to require repetition here. Suffice it to say, that the advantages which have accrued to botany from it have been almost without parallel, notwithstanding the miserable shipwreck of a large part of their collection in fifty-three cases on the coast of Portugal. These various expeditions, exclusive of the ancient one of Hernandez, are said to have cost the Spanish government more than five hundred thousand pounds. The public gardens of Spain may be said to have received a corresponding degree of attention, but they are less known than those of other countries, from the little intercourse which Spain has maintained with the rest of Europe. At Aranjuez a famous garden was formed by Philip II., another at Cadiz, by Philip V., and the botanic garden of Madrid, one of the most celebrated in Europe, was established by Ferdinand VI. Besides these a public garden was formed at Carthagena, by the orders of Charles III. In Germany, the various states have all considered botany an important part of the endowment of any university; whence the number of botanical gardens in that part of Europe is very numerous; they are generally rich in such plants as require no artificial protection, but poor in stove and greenhouse plants; but the gardens of Berlin and Schönbrunn are noble instances of perfection in all the departments of a useful and scientific |