In 1773 Curtis was appointed lecturer of the Chelsea
Garden. The plates of ' The Flora Londinensis ' are lovely
large folio, and most delicately drawn and tinted. The
text is in English, and is descriptive of the wild flowers
and plants growing round London. No doubt the book
was suggested to Curtis by Vaillant's ' Catalogue of Plants
in the Environs of Paris.' It retains strongly the Herbal
character, and the medical details of diseases are weird
and extraordinary. The decision and particularity of
the assurance that every disease to which flesh is heir
will be relieved by the use of certain plants are quite
surprising. The place where the innocent little wild
62 POT-POURRI FROM A SURREY GARDEN
plants are picked is always named, and it is pathetic
to think of the growth of the city, and how the places
mentioned are now densely covered with buildings and
streets. The second edition, in five or six volumes,
finished by Dr. Hooker, is far the more valuable and
complete. Curtis began his 'Botanical Magazine, or
Flower Garden Displayed' in 1778. I have the first
sixty-seven volumes of this lovely and best known of all
the Old English gardening publications. It is purely
horticultural. Every alternate page is an illustration,
with the letterpress on the opposite side describing the
nature of the plant, the country from which it comes,
and its cultivation here. With the same truthful accuracy
with which he tells the home of the wild plant, he names
the nurseryman or amateur who has flowered the exotic.
The best drawings by far are in the early numbers, and
were executed by Sowerby. The two who succeeded
him were Sydenham Edwards and Dr. Hooker. Spode,
the man who perfected the process of mixing bone-dust
into the paste used for china in the early part of this
century, used these illustrations a good deal for his pretty
china dinner and dessert services, with the names of the
flowers or plants marked at the back of the dishes.
1791. ' The Loves of the Plants, in two parts : The
Botanic Garden and the Economy of Vegetation. A Poem
by Erasmus Darwin,' seems to me one of the real
curiosities of literature. It is unique, so far as I know,
in its sincere desire to clothe the latest science in the
garb of the Muse. The frontispiece, by Fuseli, is a
drawing most characteristic of that artist and full of all
his affectations. Flora, attired by the elements, is a
striking example of the fashion and bad taste of the day,
and yet it is full of ingenuity and skill in drawing. This
frontispiece is well worth, by itself, the price I gave for
the whole volume. Another print in the book, by the
MARCH 63
Page 37
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In 1773 Curtis was appointed lecturer of the Chelsea
Garden. The plates of ' The Flora Londinensis ' are lovely
large folio, and most delicately drawn and tinted. The
text is in English, and is descriptive of the wild flowers
and plants growing round London. No doubt the book
was suggested to Curtis by Vaillant's ' Catalogue of Plants
in the Environs of Paris.' It retains strongly the Herbal
character, and the medical details of diseases are weird
and extraordinary. The decision and particularity of
the assurance that every disease to which flesh is heir
will be relieved by the use of certain plants are quite
surprising. The place where the innocent little wild
62 POT-POURRI FROM A SURREY GARDEN
plants are picked is always named, and it is pathetic
to think of the growth of the city, and how the places
mentioned are now densely covered with buildings and
streets. The second edition, in five or six volumes,
finished by Dr. Hooker, is far the more valuable and
complete. Curtis began his 'Botanical Magazine, or
Flower Garden Displayed' in 1778. I have the first
sixty-seven volumes of this lovely and best known of all
the Old English gardening publications. It is purely
horticultural. Every alternate page is an illustration,
with the letterpress on the opposite side describing the
nature of the plant, the country from which it comes,
and its cultivation here. With the same truthful accuracy
with which he tells the home of the wild plant, he names
the nurseryman or amateur who has flowered the exotic.
The best drawings by far are in the early numbers, and
were executed by Sowerby. The two who succeeded
him were Sydenham Edwards and Dr. Hooker. Spode,
the man who perfected the process of mixing bone-dust
into the paste used for china in the early part of this
century, used these illustrations a good deal for his pretty
china dinner and dessert services, with the names of the
flowers or plants marked at the back of the dishes.
1791. ' The Loves of the Plants, in two parts : The
Botanic Garden and the Economy of Vegetation. A Poem
by Erasmus Darwin,' seems to me one of the real
curiosities of literature. It is unique, so far as I know,
in its sincere desire to clothe the latest science in the
garb of the Muse. The frontispiece, by Fuseli, is a
drawing most characteristic of that artist and full of all
his affectations. Flora, attired by the elements, is a
striking example of the fashion and bad taste of the day,
and yet it is full of ingenuity and skill in drawing. This
frontispiece is well worth, by itself, the price I gave for
the whole volume. Another print in the book, by the
MARCH 63