dam (fig. 99. a.), an excellent waterfall or cascade might be formed, and a forcing pump, on the plan of that of Ilam near Ashbourne, in Derbyshire,

(See Mech. Mag. Vol. IV.) might raise water to the house and flower-garden. The former is at present supplied by a forcing pump, from a very deep well, with considerable manual labour. The valley in which this piece of water lies abounds in bog earth, and being sheltered, is admirably adapted for American shrubs. In short, Lyne Grove might be made a most beautiful residence; and with little pecuniary loss, as the greater part of the soil is too poor to pay for being kept in a state of aration. It is at present occupied by W. A. Manning, Esquire, a gentleman of elegant taste, and much attached to rural life and agriculture.

Fan Grove, Sir Herbert Taylor, May 12. 1826. A small place formed on an elevated situation on thin gravelly soil, lately covered with heath. No expense has been spared in forming walks and planting trees and shrubs, and the result is as good as the place admits of; but as there is no striking natural feature, unless we except one, viz., a hill, well adapted for a prospect tower, the general effect is not interesting. In this respect Lyne Grove is exactly the opposite of Fan Grove: in the former, the situation for a house is decidedly indicated by nature, or, which is nearly the same thing, the house, plantations, and water, are so placed as to convey that idea; in the latter there seems no particular reason why the house is placed where it is: as far as a stranger can see, it might have been placed either to the right or to the left, or higher, or lower, and still have appeared the same sort of thing; but looking from a distance at Lyne Grove, the house appears exactly where it ought to be, and could not be moved either to the right or left, backwards or forwards, without deranging the

effect. The study of these two residences is well calculated to show the
advantages of natural features in the ground-surface; with how little art
an effect may be produced where good features exist; and how far the ut-
most efforts of art alone, fall short of the effect of art and nature united.
American plants thrive remarkably well here; Rhododendrons, Azáleas,
and Kálmias, rise up from self-sown seeds. A part of the wall of the
kitchen garden is built on the waving or serpentine plan, by which a height
of twelve feet is attained with a thickness of only nine inches. The fruit-
trees in this garden are remarkably well trained and pruned; the ground
seems judiciously cropped, and the whole place is kept in very neat order
Mr. Latour's Villa, Craven Hill,
April 25. The house has been re-
modelled, and now presents an ele-
gant exterior. It contains on the
ground floor seven living rooms
and a conservatory en suite, arranged
with the greatest taste, and combin-
ing the best features of both the
English and French styles of deco-
ration and furniture. What we no-
tice it for, is on account of the

follemode of hanging the roof sashes of
the conservatory, which is worthy
of imitation. It is on the princi-
ple of a self-balanced chandelier.
A cord from each sash passes over
a pulley (fig. 100 a) and is join-
ed under the stage (c), where a
weight (b) is attached to them by
another pulley, and may either be
limited in its descent by the ground
(d), or by the length of line. By this
arrangement, easily understood,
either or both sashes may be open-
ed to any extent by a very slight
motion of the line, and without the
least derangement of the plants, or
unsightly fastenings of the cord.
The immense domical hothouse
erected by Messrs. Bailey for Mrs.
Beaumont, at Bretton Hall, is venti-
lated on the same principle.

100

d

In the garden there are some standard Rose Acacias, from Brussels, such as have been lately imported from Paris by some of the nurserymen.

Kensington Nursery, Messrs. Malcolm and Gray, April 7. One of our objects in the Gardener's Magazine is to bring into notice plants and trees of remarkable interest and beauty, more especially those of the shrubby kind which endure the open air in our climate. There are a number of noble Chinese and American trees and shrubs in the country, which are very imperfectly known, and consequently not half so common as they ought to be. Among these, may be mentioned the Magnólia conspic'ua, which, when in flower (fig. 101), is one of the finest objects in the vegetable creation; yet Messrs. Loddiges remark (Bot. Cal. Part. cxix. Gard. Mag. p. 334) that it has been comparatively neglected for the last twenty years. The Kensington Nursery contains one of the finest specimens of this tree in the neighbourhood of London, and the plant deserves the more attenVOL. II. No. 7.

B B

tion, because every one who has a few yards of ground may for a trifle, and a very few years' patience, have one equally handsome. The Magnólia in the Kensington Nursery is a shoot from the centre of a stool of about seven years' growth; it is nine feet high, and about the same width, and at

this moment is covered with 1100 tulip-like blossoms, as white as snow, and highly odoriferous. There are fine specimens of the same tree at Lee's nursery, Harringay, Eastwell Park, Wormleybury, (G. M. vol. i. p. 154.), and a few other places. Good plants in pots cost 7s. 6d. each. No person who has the slightest pretension to a love of plants, and a garden, ought to be without it, and the following: Magnólia purpúrea, and Photínia glábra, in pots,

2s. 6d. each; Glycine sinensis, in pots, 21s.; Lonicéra japon'ica, flexuósa, pubéscens, and fláva, 2s. each; Chimonanthus frágrans, 5s.; Cydónia japonica, 28.; Pæónia moútan, 5s., all hardy, and plants well worth purchasing. For a south wall, any front of a house but the N. E., or a sheltered situation in a shrubbery, Magnólia grandiflóra, Eriobótrya japon ́ica, Vibúrnum rugósum, and odoratíssimum, 38. each, and the Caméllia, 5s. each, are noble evergreen and free-flowering plants. Glycine, 218., will be seen in magnificent style in the H. S.'s garden about the 7th of May. These plants may be had from, or through, any nurseryman.

Palace and Gardens of Buckingham House, April 9th. Having read in the newspapers of mountains and lakes said to be forming in the grounds attached to Buckingham-house, we embraced an opportunity which offered of viewing the alterations and erections now going forward there. The garden-front of the palace is, to our taste, an unexceptionable piece of architecture; it is grand, and yet elegant; simple and easy to be comprehended in the general masses, and yet sufficiently enriched in detail to mark it as an abode destined for splendid enjoyment. We did not observe any columns or other architectural forms, which should always be, or seem to be, essential parts of a building, placed against walls merely for effect, and to make up a certain show of ornament; as, for instance, in the new buildings at the Treasury, and before the arches of the new entrance to Hyde Park, at the end of Piccadilly, in both which cases the columns have not the slightest pretensions to utility; they are introduced entirely for their effect, and, from being component and co-operating parts essential to high character, are degraded to the rank of ornamental appendages to cover poverty of design. The entrance-front of the palace is not yet in a state fit to be spoken of, but the other, we repeat, is entirely to our taste. The shortest way to give our readers a correct idea of it, will be by an engraving which will be found in a future number.

We wish we could bestow equal approbation on this palace in point of salubrity of situation; but in that respect, we consider it one of the most unfortunate buildings in or about London. Had the problem been proposed to alter Buckingham-house and gardens so as to render the former as unhealthy a dwelling as possible, it could not have been better solved than by the works executed. The belt of trees which forms the margin of these grounds, has long acted as the sides of a basin or small valley, to retain the vapours which were collected within, and which, when the basin was full, could only flow out by the lower extremity over the roofs of the stables and other buildings at the palace. What vapour did not escape in this manner, found its way through between the stems of the trees which adjoin these buildings, and through the palace windows. Now, all the leading improvements on the grounds have a direct tendency to increase this evil. They consist in thickening the marginal belts on both sides of the hollow with evergreens to shut out London; in one place substituting for the belt, an immense bank of earth to shut out the stables, and in the area of the grounds forming numerous flower-gardens, and other scenes with dug surfaces, a basin, fountains, and a lake of several acres. The effect of all this will be a more copious and rapid exhalation of moisture from the water, dug earth, and increased surface of foliage, and a more complete dam to prevent the escape of this moist atmosphere, otherwise than through the windows, or over the top of the palace. The garden may be considered as a pond brimful of fog, the ornamental water as the perpetual supply of this fog, the palace as a cascade which it flows over, and the windows as the sluices which it passes through. We defy any medical man, or meteorologist to prove the contrary of what we assert, viz., that Buckingham Palace is a dam to a pond of watery vapour, and that the pond will always be filled with vapour to the level of the top of the dam. The

only question is, how far this vapour is entitled to be called malaria? We have the misfortune to be able to answer that question experimentally.

So limited a spot, and without distant prospect, admits of but little effect in a picturesque point of view; and the smoke of the neighbourhood precludes all hope of creating much interest from the more rare ornamental plants. It is unfortunate that the high bank of earth, which some of the newspapers compared to the mountains of Westmoreland, should come so near to one wing, and project so much in front of the palace, and that it should not have been thought worth while to vary the outline either of its base or summit. It might have conveyed some distant allusion to an undulating ridge of low hills; but, instead of that, it is merely a lumpish mound of earth, the bank of a great ditch. There is nothing about it which can help the imagination to a single idea belonging to a natural surface; and it is not to be wondered that the writers in the newspapers recalled the idea of the mountains and lakes of Westmoreland as a relief to their minds, since nothing is more natural than to fly from one extreme to the other. Gilpin, however, in his "North of England,” complains of some of the hills about the lakes being hog-backed; and to these the comparison in the newspapers probably alluded. This mound, however, is not completed, and perhaps something may be done in putting in the timber trees. The water is still farther from being finished, and will require a good deal of management. We entirely approve of the manner of grouping and massing the shrubs, and also of most of the minor undulations of the surface. In one part of the mound some large bays and retiring recesses of turf are wanting, to break the uniformity of its planted surface; but with the exception of this part of the work, the putting in of the shrubs and trees has our entire approbation.

It is painful to dwell either on the alterations in the grounds or on the situation of the palace, because it is obvious that the expense of all these improvements is just so much money thrown away. A man must be something less or more than a king to keep his health in that palace for any length of time. It would have been much better to have opened the grounds to the public, united them with the Green Park, and left Buckingham-house as it was, for the use of pensioners or old servants. If it is essential that the king should have a palace in London, we should prefer one raised on the banks of the Thames, in the manner of the palace and gardens of Babylon. The platform of such a palace should be higher than the highest part of Somerset buildings or the Banqueting-house, and should display an acre or more of terraced gardens. One acre of elevated platform, highly enriched with plants and sculpture, and with London and its environs for distant scenery, would afford more splendid and healthier enjoyment than twenty acres laid out in the style of Buckingham Gardens. Recluse enjoyment might be had at some of the country palaces. The idea of the king wandering after it in a dense fog behind Buckingham-house, is not very sublime. But if a Babylonian palace would be too expensive, there is the circular part of the Regent's Park, or, what is naturally the best situation about London, though accidentally the worst, Greenwich Park.

ART VII. Garden Libraries.

Our suggestions as to garden libraries have met with universal approbation among gardeners, and though from various circumstances many are prevented from carrying them into effect, still there are a number who will be able