The public nurseries are useful seminaries to young gardeners. The overseers of these establishments are ge nerally well informed persons, and dexterous workmen, having been selected on account of possessing these quali ties. Many very useful parts of the profession may here be acquired ; such as the level-digging of ground, and neat finishing off of beds or borders,—apparently simple mat ters, in which, however, many gardeners are extremely de ficient. In some nurseries, extensive collections of hardy and green-house plants are kept, and a knowledge of the culture of these may thus be acquired. Nor is the know ledge of the modes of raising from the seed, and rearing in nursery-beds, of the various forest-trees, an inconsidera ble matter : in many places, indeed, the head-gardener is required to maintain a nursery of seedling forest-trees, for the use of his master's estate. In the public nurseries, a knowledge of the processes of grafting and budding may be acquired ; but the gardener, who has studied only in this school, will afterwards discover how much he has to learn as to the proper wood to be used for grafts, as well as to the size and quality of the stocks. Under any of the first rate market-gardeners, a young man may learn many parts of his profession with .great advantage, particularly the raising sorts of pot-herbs and salads, and the forc ing of many of them. But here too he will labour un der disadvantages ; for in few such gardens can he ac quire any knowledge of the management of fruit-trees, particularly peaches, apricots, and the finer sorts of pears.
A young gardener, who has spent his time in places where the proper management of fruit-trees was not at tended to, or where no opportunity of attending to it ex isted, may possibly be willing to accept lower wages, in order to compensate for the defect of his education. But the proprietor of the garden will soon find himself a loser by the injudicious economy of employing him : and if it were a general rule, steadily followed by gentlemen, not to employ, as their gardeners, persons who had not duly sought opportunities of gaining an acquaintance with the .different branches of their profession, young men of merit would, instead of grasping at the situation of head-gar dener immediately upon the expiry of their apprenticeship, be convinced of the necessity of practically studying every department of their " multifarious and numerous employ ment," as Evelyn happily styles it. In Germany, it may be remarked, a gardener has not only to serve a long ap prenticeship, but to pass certain examinations, before he can be recommended to a situation as head-gardener. In this country there is no such regulation ; and the greater necessity, theiefore, for the employer being able to judge of his gardener's qualifications.
24. Scotland has long been distinguished for producing gardeners in greater numbers than any other country of Europe ; and several of them have risen to the highest eminence in their profession. At the present day many of the nobility and gentry of England employ Scottish head-gardeners; while the numbers of those of an inferior order, to be found in every county south of the Tweed, is quite surprising. Some of the causes of the very great number, and of the real excellence, of the Scottish garden ers, have been assigned in the 9th chapter of the " General Report of Scotland." One is to be found in the early edu cation secured to the children of the labouring class in that country, by the ancient and most laudable institution of parish schools : another, in the hardy mode of life and sober disposition of the young men, which have very ge nerally gained them the esteem of English masters ; and a third, in the tendency which struggling with a very va riable climate at home, has to call into action all the pow ers of the mind, and to create a habit of unceasing atten tion to the duties of the station. It may here be mention ed as a striking and very honourable trait in the character of the Scottish master-gardeners of the last age, (already mentioned, § 21 ) that it was a common practice among them to spend a part of the evening in instructing their ap prentices in different branches of education, particularly arithmetic, mensuration, drawing of plans, and botany.
Even at this day, there are still in some places of Scotland to he found the remains of this praiseworthy custom. A turn for reading and study was thus created among young ope rative gardeners ; and to this, their rise in life might in many instances be traced. The taste for reading was per haps never more .prevalent among gardeners than at this day. Nor do they entirely neglect geometry, though it must be admitted that this kind of knowledge is on the de cline among them. It is not, indeed, now nearly so neces sary as formerly to the professional gardener, grounds be ing no longer planned into regular mathematical figures, and topiary work being altogether exploded.
25. We have little fear of being accused of partiality when we give a favourable report of the character of Scot tish gardeners, the justness of their claim of merit being universally recognized : but, without enlarging farther on the topic, we proceed to give some very general account of the different kinds of gardens now existing in Britain. All of them, we think, may be arranged under one or other of the following divisions. a. Royal gardens, and public botanic gardens. b. The gardens of noblemen and gentle men of great opulence. c. Villa gardens. d. Cottage gardens. e. The public nurseries, which, especially near London, may without impropriety be ranked as gardens. f. Market gardens. On each of these heads, a few examples and observations seem necessary for illustra tion, and at the same time they may prove not unentertain ing._ — 26. The Royal Gardens at Kew, on the banks c" the Thames near London, are perhaps the first in the world for variety of plants. They were originally planned by that distinguished character Frederick Prince of Wales, father of King George III. The extent is about 120 acres. The surface is flat ; but owing to the tasteful disposition of trees and shrubs, the grounds exhibit a considerable va riety of scenery. They are nearly surrounded by wood, amidst which rises a pagoda, or Chinese temple, to the height of 160 feet : this was designed by Sir William Chambers, who afterwards published a description of the gardens and palace of Kew, in folio. The exotic garden was established about the year 1760, after the Prince's death, chiefly by the influence of the Marquis of Bute, a great encourager of botany and gardening. Ile placed it under the care of Mr William Aiton, who had long been assistant to the famous Philip Miller at Chelsea. The principal green-house and orangery is 145 feet long, 25 high, and 30 broad. About 1794, a large-green-house, 110 feet long, was erected, for the reception of African and Cape plants only. There are twelve other hot-houses of various descriptions. Adding together the lengths of all the hot-houses, the garden contains no fewer than 839 feet in length of glass ; and besides this, about one-half of the houses have covered borders in front, for the protection of different kinds of bulbs, and alpine plants, during winter. One of the hot-houses is appropriated to the palm and fern tribe, displaying the gigantic species of warm climates al most in their native luxuriance and beauty. Another is devoted to the plants of New Holland, which have a cha racter of foliage peculiar to themselves, so that the bo tanical visitor finds himself suddenly carried, as it were, in to a new world. A third contains chiefly the plants of Chi na, and of these the collection is very rich, a magnificent assortment having some years ago been procured from Canton, accompanied by a Chinese gardener to take care of them. A catalogue of the plants of the garden, entitled " Hortus Kewensis," was first published in 1768 by Dr Hill. A more scientific work, under the same title, was given to the public in 1789, by Mr Aiton, the superinten dant, assisted by Dr Solander ; this extended to three vo lumes octavo. Between 1810 and 1813, an improved and enlarged edition, in five volumes, octavo, was published by Mr William Townsend Aiton, who had succeeded his fa ther : he was assisted in the first three volumes by the late Mr Dryander, and, after the death of that botanist, in the remaining two volumes, by Mr Robert Brown, author of the " Prodromus Flor2e Novx Hollandix," and justly considered as one of the very first botanists of the age.