[001] Some of the finest _Florists flowers_ have been reared by the mechanics of Norwich and Manchester and by the Spitalfield's weavers. The pitmen in the counties of Durham and Northumberland reside in long rows of small houses, to each of which is attached a little garden, which they cultivate with such care and success, that they frequently bear away the prize at Floral Exhibitions.
[002] Of Rail-Road travelling the reality is quite different from the idea that descriptions of it had left upon my mind. Unpoetical as this sort of transit may seem to some minds, I confess I find it excite and satisfy the imagination. The wondrous speed--the quick change of scene--the perfect comfort--the life-like character of the power in motion, the invisible, and mysterious, and mighty steam horse, urged, and guided, and checked by the hand of Science--the cautionary, long, shrill whistle--the beautiful grey vapor, the breath of the unseen animal, floating over the fields by which we pass, sometimes hanging stationary for a moment in the air, and then melting away like a vision--furnish sufficiently congenial amusement for a period-minded observer.
[003] "That which peculiarly distinguishes the gardens of England," says Repton, "is the beauty of English verdure: _the grass of the mown lawn_, uniting with, the grass of the adjoining pastures, and presenting _that permanent verdure_ which is the natural consequence of our soft and humid clime, but unknown to the cold region of the North or the parching temperature of the South. This it is impossible to enjoy in Portugal where it would be as practicable to cover the general surface with the snow of Lapland as with the verdure of England." It is much the same in France. "There is everywhere in France," says Loudon, "a want _of close green turf_, of ever-green bushes and of good adhesive gravel." Some French admirers of English gardens do their best to imitate our lawns, and it is said that they sometimes partially succeed with English grass seed, rich manure, and constant irrigation. In Bengal there is a very beautiful species of grass called Doob grass, (_Panicum Dactylon_,) but it only flourishes on wide and exposed plains with few trees on them, and on the sides of public roads, Shakespeare makes Falstaff say that "the camomile the more it is trodden on the faster it grows" and, this is the case with the Doob grass. The attempt to produce a permanent Doob grass lawn is quite idle unless the ground is extensive and open, and much trodden by men or sheep. A friend of mine tells me that he covered a large lawn of the coarse Ooloo grass (_Saccharum cylindricum_) with mats, which soon killed it, and on removing the mats, the finest Doob grass sprang up in its place. But the Ooloo grass soon again over-grew the Doob.