I have just reached home from Canada and the East, and read your letters from ship board and Chester (latest 23d). They are in all respects admirable and give us great pleasure. They show that you were well prepared to profit by the journey; better than I had supposed, & I am now sure that it will be of great profit to you in every way. Your notes are just what I want; full & nothing redundant. I look with great interest for what are to follow. I read them all aloud to the family at breakfast this morning.

My lectures were a farcical failure as far as reaching the people is concerned. The Commissioners thought apparently of nothing but how they could get out the business without incurring expense for which they had no funds. They took the hall at 3 p.m. because it could be had at half price; sent invitations only to the city officials, Common Council &c.; bid no advertizing but only requested editors to inform the public. The hall was a large & fine one with seating for 1200. When mother & I went into it at the hour fixed, the floor had just been washed & it was dark, damp & cold. There were present 3 commissioners, Mrs Nelson & another lady; Ansley, the Engineer and four men whom I did not know; no other member of the city govt nor did the mayor or commissioner of Health or any others come at all. In the course of half an hour the audience increased to 30 or 40. There were 5 reporters. I read my first paper. Of the reports, one had five lines saying that I thought the mountain an unfortunate site, another about the same with—different & equally absurd misstatement. Another had reserved a column for it & filled it up with very injudicious & misprinted selections from my MS. The next day [334] I had a little better & a much more intelligent audience, including Principal Dawson of McGill College &c. & was thanked & complimented, but not one of the papers referred to the lecture or the plan. But it is to go to the City Hall & the lectures are to be printed.

A few days before I went to Montreal I spent several hours with Dr Gray and Sir Joseph Hooker (Supdt. Kew Gardens) (he has lately been knighted & is now President of the Royal Society) on the Central Park. After Montreal I went to Boston & had two days there (partly with Sir Joseph) and Professor Sergeant in the suburbs & at the Botanic Garden. I had a long talk with Sargent & others pretty determined to layout the new arboretum for Harvard (130 acres). The result is that I think under advice that you had better take still another week (adding 2 to the original plan) & if you think necessary one more (adding 3) chiefly to study botanical gardens & arboretums more thoroughly and to visit Waterers.

Profr Sargent especially urges this (Waterer & if practicable some other great nurseries). Profr Norton also wished me to urge you to spend a day or two on the British Museum & the National Gallery which he apparently thinks more important than South Kensington. What you had better do you are now much better able to judge than I. But we are likely to have something to do with Botanic & Gardens & Arboretums & I should be in possession of all that is good & know how to avoid what is bad. You may possibly think best to go to Queenstown by Dublin & visit the Glasnevin Horticultural garden which is one of the best—& the Zoological garden in Phoenix park. But I think you can learn more by close attention to Kew. Sir Joseph sailed yesterday & if you go there call on him. He will welcome you & give you every aid. And I would out of regard to Profr Sargent, see Waterer’s specemin trees & shrubs. Mr. Field may go with you to a great nursery at Worcester. He will probably take you to Birmingham Botanic Gardn. I think it is little more than a public pleasure ground. Derby Arboretum it is not worth your while to go out of your way to see, as I remember it. I forget the name but have had something from it for Brooklyn.—Oh! one thing more, Sargent wants you to visit Dropmore; the earliest of the large collections of new conifers. It is near Windsor, & as you will then be near by also, says you should see Birnham beeches.

It has been suggested to me that the Zoological Society might send me out with Bickman to study the subject of Z. & Bot. gardens. If so it would probably be in November. There is no prospect of additional business. The Boston parks projects are nearly dead. I offered to layout (the walks &c) for the Arboretum at a low price, thinking the connection a very desirable one for you.

The only thing I regret in your change of plan as to Warwick is that the leaves will be off the trees by the time you return from the continent & you will lose the park beauty of Stoneleigh, Charlcote & others there.

[335]

Profr Sargent is particularly anxious to hear what you find about André with whom he has had an experience in many respects identical with mine. He is remarried. I hope you will not have failed to see him.

Someone from Paris expresses the highest opinion of St. Gauden’s recent work.

Mother comes back from the mountains in better health than she has had for years it appears to me. All the rest are well, except that I am worn out & the doctor says in great need of a prolonged rest. I shall try to take things easier for a while.

Wisedell has been very delinquent—overstaied his vacation a week, left everything in the lurch, & has done nothing so far as appears since his return. I shall probably go to Washington tomorrow. Mary Barnett leaves the house tomorrow & Mary Smith has given warning. Mother proposes to try a China man. Chatty is back at her kindergarten & Molly at Miss Errington’s (till Mrs Field.) We think in certain contingencies of sending Rick there. (Henry, Frederick, `Erick’, Rick). Miss Errington, Molly, who is at home today (Sunday) reports to be in better health this fall.

We have all been terribly shocked by the forgeries of Gilman, who though you have seen perhaps nothing of him, was with his wife a close friend of your mother’s, of Godkin’s & of mine. The newspapers will have told you all I know. He was the last man of whom such a crime could have been thought possible & we have all been in deep grief & sympathy for his wife, whom I knew well as a child in Hartford.

I send this through Mr Field, your program having been so changed that I do not know how else to catch you.