A watercolour of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert, planting trees at Burghley House, dated in a later hand "November 1844". In the foreground, Queen Victoria standing by a sapling, about to receive a spade; surrounded by many onlookers; Burghley House behind.

On the 14th November, 1844, Queen Victoria planted an oak and Prince Albert a lime tree in the South Gardens of Burghley House, during a three-day visit. A child's wooden spade had to be fetched from the nursery for the Queen, as the silver spade produced for her use proved too heavy.

A landscape and portrait artist, and commissioned to record the events of the Royal visit to Burghley, Henry Bryan Ziegler (1798-1874) worked as drawing master, numbering among his pupils Princess Elizabeth, Landgravine of Hesse-Homburg, Queen Adelaide, Prince George of Cambridge, Prince Edward of Saxe-Weimar and the Marchioness of Exeter.