The principal part of them, however, and those most esteemed, were brought to us from the Levant. Some were carried from that part of the world so early as in the time of the crusades; but most of them have been introduced into Europe from Constantinople since the end of the sixteenth century, particularly the Persian ranunculus, the varieties of which, if I am not mistaken, hold at present the first rank. Clusius describes both the single and the full flowers as new rarities. This flower was in the highest repute during the time of Mahomet IV. His Grand Vizir, Cara Mustapha, well known by his hatred against the Christians and the siege of Vienna, in 1683, wishing to turn the Sultan’s thoughts to some milder amusement than that of the chase, for which he had a strong passion, diverted his attention to flowers; and, as he remarked that the Emperor preferred the ranunculus to all others, he wrote to the different Pachas throughout the whole kingdom to send him seeds or roots of the most beautiful kinds. The Pachas of Candia, Cyprus, Aleppo, and Rhodes, paid most regard to this request; and the elegant flowers which they transmitted to court were shut up in the seraglio as unfortunate offerings to the voluptuousness of the Sultan, till some of them, by the force of money, were at length freed from their imprisonment. The ambassadors from the European courts, in particular, made it their business to procure roots of as many kinds as they could, which they sent to their different sovereigns. Marseilles, which at that period carried on the greatest trade to the Levant, received on this account these flowers very early; and a person there, of the name of Malaval is said to have contributed very much to disperse them all over Europe. Some of our most common flowering shrubs have been long introduced into the gardens: the bay-tree has been cultivated more than two centuries; it is mentioned by Tusser, in the list of garden plants inserted in his work called, “Five Hundred Points of Good Husbandry,” printed in 1573. The laurel was introduced by Cole, a merchant at Hampstead, some years before 1629, when Parkinson published his Paradisus Terrestris, and at that time we had in our gardens oranges, myrtles of three sorts, lauristinus, cypress, phyllyrea, alaternus, arbuttus; a cactus, brought from Bermuda, and the passion-flower, which last had flowered here, and showed a remarkable peculiarity, by rising from the ground near a month sooner, if a seedling plant, than if it grew from roots brought from Virginia. _Crust of the Earth._