A pretty effect is produced at Chiswick by a single lofty tree, the stem of which has been cleared up to the very top, and from beneath which you command a view of the whole garden and a part of the park;--a good hint to landscape gardeners, which I advise you to profit by at M----. The cedars here (which unfortunately will not thrive with us) are celebrated, and grow to the size of old fir-trees. Colossal yew hedges also show how long this estate has been an object of extraordinary care. The new conservatories do more credit to the taste of the present possessor than the pleasure-ground. It is strange enough that orange-trees nowhere reach any great size in England. They are very 'mésquin' here. On the other hand, the flower-gardens are magnificent. The beds are so thinly planted that each separate plant has room to spread, excepting in those beds which are entirely filled with one sort of flower. In them, the chief aim is the perfection of the whole, and they are consequently by far the most beautiful. In the pinery I saw, for the first time, the great Providence pines, specimens of which have been produced of twelve pounds weight. There is a menagerie attached to the garden, in which a tame elephant performs all sorts of feats, and very quietly suffers anybody to ride him about a large grass-plat. His neighbour is a lama, of a much less gentle nature; his weapon is a most offensive saliva, which he spits out to a distance of some yards at any one who irritates him; he takes such good aim, and fires so suddenly at his antagonist, that it is extremely difficult to avoid his charge. Chiswick has unfortunately only stagnant slimy water, which is sometimes so low that the elephant, if he were thirsty, might drink it up at a draught. Passing through a continued series of pretty villas and country-houses of every kind, amid the whirl of horsemen, stage-coaches, travelling-carriages, and coal-wagons drawn by gigantic horses, with occasional pretty glimpses of the Thames, I reached Hyde-Park Corner, after an hour's quick driving, and buried myself anew in the labyrinth of the huge town. The next day I visited the City, accompanied by my 'laquais de place,' a Swiss, who had travelled in Egypt, Syria, Siberia, and America; had published a Russian Post-book; brought the first intelligence of the taking of Hamburg, together with an actual specimen of a live Cossack, to London; bought Napoleon's coronation robes at Paris, and exhibited them here; and speaks almost all the European languages. I think all this is not dear at half-a-guinea a day. He may be useful, too, as a physician, for he has collected so many secrets and recipes in his travels, that he has a domestic remedy for every disorder, and moreover, as he maintains, is in possession of a thousand different receipts for making punch. Under the conduct of this universal genius, I entered the Royal Exchange for the first time.