On each event of the kind, when seventy years of human life have passed away, they may perhaps say, what! another hour already gone! how the time flies!”—­From Balfour’s Phyto-Theology.

Some of the natives of India who possess extensive estates might think it worth their while to plant a LABYRINTH for the amusement of their friends.  I therefore give a plan of one from London’s Arboretum et Fruticetum Britannicum.  It would not be advisable to occupy much of a limited estate in a toy of this nature; but where the ground required for it can be easily spared or would otherwise be wasted, there could be no objection to adding this sort of amusement to the very many others that may be included in a pleasure ground.  The plan here given, resembles the labyrinth at Hampton Court.  The hedges should be a little above a man’s height and the paths should be just wide enough for two persons abreast.  The ground should be kept scrupulously clean and well rolled and the hedges well trimmed, or in this country the labyrinth would soon be damp and unwholesome, especially in the rains.  To prevent its affording a place of refuge and concealment for snakes and other reptiles, the gardener should cut off all young shoots and leaves within half a foot of the ground.  The centre building should be a tasteful summer-house, in which people might read or smoke or take refreshments.  To make the labyrinth still more intricate Mr. Loudon suggests that stop-hedges might be introduced across the path, at different places, as indicated in the figure by dotted lines.[110]

[Illustration of A GARDEN LABYRINTH with a scale in feet.]

Of strictly Oriental trees and shrubs and flowers, perhaps the majority of Anglo Indians think with much less enthusiasm than of the common weeds of England.  The remembrance of the simplest wild flower of their native fields will make them look with perfect indifference on the decorations of an Indian Garden.  This is in no degree surprizing.  Yet nature is lovely in all lands.

Indian scenery has not been so much the subject of description in either prose or verse as it deserves, but some two or three of our Anglo-Indian authors have touched upon it.  Here is a pleasant and truthful passage from an article entitled “A Morning Walk in India,” written by the late Mr. Lawson, the Missionary, a truly good and a highly gifted man:—­

“The rounded clumps that afford the deepest shade, are formed by the mangoe, the banian, and the cotton trees.  At the verge of this deep-green forest are to be seen the long and slender hosts of the betle and cocoanut trees; and the grey bark of their trunks, as they catch the light of the morning, is in clear relief from the richness of the back-ground.  These as they wave their feathery tops, add much to the picturesque interest of the straw-built hovels beneath them, which are variegated with every tinge to be found amongst the browns and yellows, according