And first, as to the highest department, Botany. Before the sexual system of Linnæus was fairly established, (though it spread far and wide by the literary labours of Hudson, Lee, Curtis, and several other able contemporary writers, both in England and on the continent,) defects were found in it, and not only as to the terms of distinction, but also to its bringing together, in the classification, plants which appeared, from their [p270] exterior habit and qualities, to have no natural affinity to each other. This Linnæus was aware of himself, and left some fragments of a natural arrangement, but which he did not live to complete. This, or the idea of it, however, was taken up by Jussieu, a French botanist, and completed as far, perhaps, as it can be; and though, in our present botanical publications, both systems are continued, yet it is likely that Jussieu’s simplified system will, in time, supersede the other, though the curious fact on which that of Linnæus was founded will never be forgotten, because of its practical use in the amelioration of fruits. Botanical publications, under the various names of Hortuses, Floras, Monographs, and of every country and district under the skies, and since the promulgation of Jussieu’s system, monographs, under the titles of Geraniaceæ, Cistineæ, &c., flow in periodical floods from the press, crowd the bookseller’s shelves, and thence find their way to every elegant drawing-room in the kingdom.
This additional call on the business of the press, as well as upon the talent of the artist, arises from the fashionable and refined bias of the public taste for this rational and delightful study. To extend botanical collections, and the desire to possess every vegetable beauty, pervaded the whole community: hence expeditions to distant lands by collectors; hence the extension and encouragement of nursery business; hence have sprung up chartered societies and associations for the encouragement of botany and gardening all over the realm; so that vegetable beauties and curiosities are now to be seen in British collections, from every region of the known world.
Neither has the occult subject of botanical physiology been neglected; many curious facts connected with the organisation, structure, functions, and qualities of plants, have been ascertained: but still there remains much for the employment of the naturalist’s mind on this difficult subject.
Landscape gardening is not so much “the rage” as it was twenty or thirty years ago: national circumstances, perhaps, may be the cause; but its principles are much better understood. The errors of Kent and Brown, and their followers, have been corrected by the works and writings of Repton, and the critiques of Knight and Price, whose theories have been [p271] carried into practice by Loudon and others; and nothing will prevent the universal adoption of their principles, but the difficulty of giving the foreground from home walks the extreme degree of ruggedness so much admired, and even indispensable to the painter. Fern, (unless we can introduce some uncommon foreign variety,) burdock, kexes, cannot be admitted into dressed ground; nor have we any plants in cultivation which would well answer the purpose; true, we have the rhubarb, one or two sorts of thistles, eryngiums, palma Christi, and gourds with their ample leaves: but these would only appear intruders, and misplaced: but much may be done by a judicious disposition of our common shrubs, so as to conceal the traces of the spade and line, and give all our combinations of land, wood, and water that flowing character, which is so true to nature, and so pleasing to the refined eye of taste.
Floriculture, which has been imported from France and Holland, is also intensely followed about London, as well as in our manufacturing provinces. Authors have creditably appeared in this line too; and our annual blows of flowers, both home-cultivated and imported, are at once rich and costly. Tulips, hyacinths, narcissuses, ranunculuses, and anemones, are the principal bed flowers: but roses, stocks, dahlias, chrysanthemums, and even poppies, are out of number. Flowering shrubs, both within and without doors, are eminently rich and various, and astonish as much by the splendour of their colours as by their elegant forms and number.
Orcharding has declined during the last fifty years: first, because of the gradual deterioration of the trees, and precariousness of the crops; next, from the improved way of agricultural labourers’ manner of living. This change renders the use of small cider and perry less necessary in a farm-house, causing an increased consumption of malt liquor; and this again, occasioning a greater demand for barley, at once pleases both the farmer and the Chancellor of the Exchequer. Thus the cultivation of orchard fruit (except cherries[50]) has greatly fallen off; and the decayed state of the old, and difficulty of [p272] raising new orchards, has given a check to such exertion, except in places at a distance from the metropolis, where orchards have suffered less from decay, and where the habits of the cider drinkers are more inveterate. Mr. Knight, the President of the Horticultural Society, has written copiously on this subject, and very properly considers the cultivation of orchard fruit as a national object; and by his example has done as much, nay, much more, than any other gentleman in the kingdom, to restore our orchards to what they used to be, and what they may be,—and it is hoped his excellent instructions will not be thrown away.
Kitchen-gardening, the most important and useful branch of the subject, next demands attention; and here we are gratified with a fine display of the efficacy of perseverance, the success of experience, and the triumphs of skill. In every month of the year, in spite of the winter’s frost or summer’s sun, our tables are supplied with wholesome and agreeable vegetables:—of roots we have fourteen sorts; of stems, shoots, and leaf-stalks, seven; of leaves, eight; of flowers, four: of culinary fruits we have sixteen; of seeds and pods, six; of condimental herbs we have twenty-nine; and of herbs and seeds for confections there are seven, besides various fruit: of roots, leaves, flowers, and fruit, for salads, there are in cultivation twenty-two kinds; and various sorts of plants for medicine and distillation.
Of table-fruit there are above twenty different species, and of these numberless varieties, extending to several hundreds, or even thousands, of various excellency and value.
A few tropical and foreign fruits, not included in the above, have been cultivated in tolerable perfection in Europe within these few years, viz. the Chinese loquat and litchee, the custard apple, mangosteen, and mango, &c.; and there is no doubt, if these fruits could be worked on some hardier kindred stock, and a suitable place formed for them in a stove, they might be cultivated with the same success as the anana.
In the forcing department of gardening, wonders have been accomplished. By this application of art, we appropriate to ourselves an almost perfect imitation of any of the warmer [p273] climates: heat, that powerful agent in the development of vegetation, we can have in any degree, by stoves, by fermenting substances, and from the steam of boiling water: light, a no less necessary agent in the maturation of fruits, we combine with the former, by glazed houses and frames.