Perspective View of the Leith Walk Botanic Garden

Jacob More’s view of the newly created Leith Walk Botanic Garden – today’s Royal Botanical Garden Edinburgh – shows the recently reconstructed Botanic Cottage in the foreground, with glasshouse ranges behind. Conceived by Dr John Hope, professor of Botany in Edinburgh, the Botanic Cottage stood at the entrance of the Garden. It was designed to serve as a home for the head gardener, as a classroom and as a place of welcome for staff and the public. The physician treating a stricken traveller in the foreground acts as a reminder that botany formed part of the medical curriculum.