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ON
THE PORTRAITS
OF
English Authors on Gardening,
WITH
BIOGRAPHICAL NOTICES OF THEM.
_Lately published, by the same Author, price 3s._
GLEANINGS ON GARDENS;
Chiefly respecting those of the Ancient Style in England.
PRINTED BY LOWE AND HARVEY, PLAYHOUSE YARD, BLACKFRIARS.
ON THE
PORTRAITS
OF
ENGLISH
AUTHORS ON GARDENING,
WITH
BIOGRAPHICAL NOTICES.
_Your painting is almost the natural man.--Timon of Athens._
_A snapper-up of unconsidered trifles.--Winter's Tale._
_I will make a prief of it in my note-book.--M. W. of Windsor._
BY S. FELTON.
SECOND EDITION, WITH CONSIDERABLE ADDITIONS.
[Illustration]
LONDON: 1830.
PUBLISHED BY EFFINGHAM WILSON, ROYAL EXCHANGE; AND JOSEPH ONWHYN,
CATHARINE STREET, STRAND.
PREFACE.
The following pages apply only to those English writers on gardening who
are deceased. That there have been portraits taken of _some_ of those
sixty-nine English writers, whose names first occur in the following
pages, there can be no doubt; and those portraits may yet be with their
surviving relatives or descendants. I am not so presumptuous as to apply
to the following most slight memorials, some of which relate to very
obscure persons, who claimed neither "the boast of heraldry, nor the
pomp of power," but whose
----useful toil,
Their homely joys and destiny obscure
benefited society by their honest labour;--I am not so vain as to apply
to these, any part of the high testimony which Sir Walter Scott has so
justly paid to the merit of Mr. Lodge's truly splendid work of the
portraits of celebrated personages of English history. I can only take
leave to disjoint, or to dislocate, or copy, a very few of his words,
and to apply them to the following scanty pages, as it must be
interesting to have exhibited before our eyes _our fathers as they
lived_, accompanied with such memorials of their lives and characters,
as enable us to compare their persons and countenances with their
sentiments:--portraits shewing us how "our ancestors looked, moved, and
dressed,"--as the pen informs us "how they thought, acted, lived and
died." One cannot help feeling kindness for the memories of those whose
writings have pleased us.[1]
What native of the county of Hereford, but must wish to see their
town-hall ornamented with a life-breathing portrait of Dr. Beale,
embodying, as it were, in the resemblance of the individual, (to use
the words of a most eloquent person on another occasion), "his spirit,
his feelings, and his character?" Or what elegant scholar but must wish
to view the resemblance of the almost unknown Thomas Whately, Esq., or
that of the Rev. William Gilpin, whose vivid pen (like that of the late
Sir Uvedale Price), has "realized painting," and enchained his readers
to the rich scenes of nature?
Dr. Johnson calls portrait painting "that art which is employed in
diffusing friendship, in reviving tenderness, in quickening the
affections of the absent, and continuing the presence of the dead."
The horticultural intercourse that now passes between England and
France, induces one to express a wish, that the portraits of many of
those delightful writers on this science, whose pens have adorned
France, (justly termed from its climate _la terre classique
d'horticulture_), were selected and engraved; for many of their
portraits have never yet been engraved. If this selection were
accompanied with a few brief notices of them and their works, it would
induce many in this country to peruse some of the most fascinating
productions that ever issued from the press. Amongst so many, whose
portraits and memoirs would interest us, I will mention those of
Champier, who distinguished himself at the battle of Aignadel, and who
published at Lyons, in 1533, Campus Elisius Galliae amenitate referens;
Charles Etienne, who, in 1529, produced his Praedium Rusticum; and who
with Leibault published the Maison Rustique, of which upwards of thirty
editions have been published, (and which our Gervase Markham calls _a
work of infinite excellencie_); Paulmier de Grenlemesnil, a most
estimable man, physician to Charles IX., and who died at Caen in 1588,
and wrote a treatise de Vino et Pomaceo; and the only act of whose long
life that one regrets is, that his great skill was the means of
re-establishing the health of Charles, who, with his mother, directed
the horrid Massacre of St. Bartholomew; Cousin, who died in the prison
of Besancon, and wrote De Hortorum laudibus; that patriarch of
agriculture and of horticulture, Olivier de Serres, whose sage and
philosophic mind composed a work rich with the most profound
reflections, and whose genius and merit were so warmly patronized by
"le bon Henri," and no less by Sully;[2] Boyceau, intendant of the
gardens of Louis XIII., who, in 1638, published Traite du Jardinage,
selon les raisons de la nature, et de l'art, avec divers desseins de
parterres, pelouses, bosquets, &c.; Andre Mollet, who wrote Le Jardin de
plaisir, &c.; Claude Mollet, head gardener to Henry IV. and Louis XIII.,
who, in 1595, planted the gardens of Saint Germain-en-laye, Monceau,
and Fontainbleau, and whose name and memory (as Mr. Loudon observes),
has been too much forgotten; Bornefond, author of Jardinier Francois, et
delices de la campagne; Louis Liger, of consummate experience in the
florist's art, "auteur d'un grand nombre d'ouvrages sur l'agriculture,
et le jardinage," and one of whose works was thought not unworthy of
being revised by London and Wise, and of whose interesting works the
Biographie Universelle (in 52 tomes) gives a long list, and mentions the
great sale which his Jardinier fleuriste once had; Morin, the florist,
mentioned by Evelyn, and whose garden contained ten thousand tulips; the
justly celebrated Jean de la Quintinye, whose precepts, says Voltaire,
have been followed by all Europe, and his abilities magnificently
rewarded by Louis; Le Notre, the most celebrated gardener (to use Mr.
Loudon's words) that perhaps ever existed, and of whom the Biographie
Univer. observes, that whatever might have been the changes introduced
in whatever Le Notre cultivated, "il seroit difficile de mettre plus de
grandeur et de noblesse;"[3] Charles Riviere du Fresnoy "qu'il joignot a
un gout general pour tous les arts, des talens particuliers pour la
musique et le dessein. Il excelloit sur-tout dans l'art de destribuer
les jardins. Il publia plusieurs _Chansons et les Amusemens serieux et
comiques_: petit ouvrage souvens re-imprime et pleins de peintures vives
et plaisantes, de la plupart des etats de la vie. On remarques dans
touts ses productions une imagination enjouee et singuliere;"
Pontchasteau, who wrote on the cultivation of fruit trees, whose
penitence and devotion were so severely austere, and whose very singular
history is given us in the interesting "Lettres de Madame la Comtesse de
la Riviere;" Linant, to whom Voltaire was a warm protector and friend,
and who, in 1745, wrote his poem Sur la Perfection des Jardins, sous la
regne de Louis XIV.; and of whom it was said that "les qualites du
coeur ne le caracterisoient pas moins que celles de l'esprit;" Le Pere
Rapin;[4] D'Argenville; Le Maistre, curate of Joinville, who in 1719
added to his "Fruitier de la France," "Une Dissertation historique sur
l'origine et les progres des Jardins; Vaniere, who wrote the Praedium
Rusticum;[5] Arnauld d'Andilli, in so many respects rendered
illustrious, who retired to the convent of Port Royal, (that divine
solitude, where the whole country for a league round breathed the air of
virtue and holiness, to quote Mad. de Sevigne's words), and who sent
each year to the queen some of that choice fruit which he there with
such zeal cultivated, and which Mazarin "appelloit en riant des fruits
benis." This good man died at the age of eighty-six, and the letter of
Mad. de Sevigne, of the date of Sept. 23, 1671, will alone consign him
to the respect of future ages;[6] Jean Paul de Ardenne, superior of the
congregation of the oratory of Marseilles, one of the most famous
florists of the period in which he lived, and who devoted great part of
his time in deeds of charity; Francis Bertrand, who, in 1757, published
Ruris delicae, being poems from Tibullus, Claudian, Horace, and from many
French writers, on the pleasures of the country; Mons. de Chabanon;
Morel, who assisted in laying out Ermenonville, and who wrote, among
other works, Theorie des Jardins, ou l'art des Jardins de la Nature; the
animated Prevost; Gouges de Cessieres, who wrote Les Jardins d'Ornament,
ou les Georgiques Francoises; he, too, whom the Prince de Ligne calls
----_enchanteur_ De Lille!
_O_ Virgile _moderne_!
and whose generous invocation to the memory of Captain Cook must endear
his name to every Englishman;[7] the Viscount Girardin, who wrote De la
Composition des Paysages, who buried Rousseau in his garden at
Ermenonville, and who kept a band of musicians to perambulate those
charming grounds, performing concerts sometimes in the woods, and at
other times on the water, and at night in a room adjoining his hall of
company;[8] the venerable Malherbes, the undaunted defender of the
oppressed, who throughout his life lost no opportunity of drying up the
tears of the afflicted, and never caused one to flow; whose whole life
had been consecrated to the happiness of his fellow-creatures and the
dignity of his country, but whose spotless reputation could not save him
from the guillotine at his age of seventy-two;[9] Schabol; Latapie, who
translated Whately's Observations on Modern Gardening, to which he
added a discourse on the origin of the art, &c.; Watelet, who wrote
Essai sur les Jardins, and whose name has given rise to some most
charming lines in De Lille's poem, and whose biography is interestingly
drawn in the Biog. Univers.; Lezay de Marnesia, whose poems de la Nature
Champetre, and le Bonheur dans les Campagnes, have passed through many
editions, and of whom pleasing mention is made in the above Biog.
Univers.; M. de Fontaine, author of Le Verger; Masson de Blamont, the
translator of Mason's Garden, and Whately's Observations; Francois
Rosier; Bertholan, the friend of Franklin.
I am indebted, in a great measure, for the above list of French authors,
to that immense body of diffuse and elaborate information, the
Encyclopaedia of Gardening, by Mr. Loudon.
Those who are more conversant with the literature of France, than my
very limited researches have extended to, can, no doubt, easily
enumerate many very distinguished persons of that country, many talented
men, who though they may not have written on the subject of gardens, yet
evinced an ardent attachment to them, and became their munificent
patrons. Let us not then omit the name of Charles the Great, or
Charlemagne, in one of whose Capitulaires are _Directions concerning
Gardens, and what plants are best to set in them_. He died in 814, after
reigning forty-seven years over France: "Quoiqu'il ne sut pas ecriere
(says the Nouv. Diet. Hist.), il fit fleurer les sciences. Aussi grand
par ses conquetes, que par l'amour des lettres, et en fut le protecteur
et la restaurateur. Son palais fut l'asyle des sciences. Le nom de ce
conquerant et de cet legislateur remplit la terre. Tout fut uni par le
force de son genie." De Sismondi calls him "a brilliant star in that
dark firmament." Mr. Loudon, in p. 40 of his Encyclopaedia, says, that
"The Abbe Schmidt informs us (_Mag. Encyc._) that this monarch, who had
domains in every part of France, gave the greatest encouragement to the
eradication of forests, and the substitution of orchards and vineyards.
He was on terms of friendship with the Saracenic prince Haroun al
Raschid, and by that means procured for France the best sorts of pulse,
melons, peaches, figs, and other fruits."
Francis I. when he built his palace at Fontainbleau, introduced into its
gardens, much of what he had seen in those of Italy, and when he
completed St. Germains, its style of grandeur may be guessed at from its
rocks, cascades, terraces and subterraneous grots.
Henry IV.'s attachment to agriculture and to gardens, is well known. The
magnificent improvements he made at St. Germains, and the attention he
paid to his gardens at la Fleche, Vendome, and the Thuilleries, shew
this. Indeed, his employing Claude Mollet, and Jean Robin, are
sufficient proofs.[10]
Louis XIV. magnificently rewarded La Quintinye, that original writer,
who conducted the fine gardens of Tambourneau, and whose precepts Mons.
de Voltaire tells us were followed by all Europe. The zeal of Louis for
the decorations of gardens, met with an able assistant when he
patronized Le Notre, to do justice to whose name, I can only refer my
reader to the concise but rich review of the grand efforts of this
singular genius, as they are noticed in p. 35 of Mr. Loudon's
Encyclopaedia, and which "dazzled and enchanted every class of
observers."[11]
Madame de Sevigne's delight in gardens pervades many of her letters:
that of July 1677, paints the charms which one in Paris gave her: "I was
invited in the kindest manner possible to sup at Gourville's with Mad.
de Scomberg, Mad. de Frontenac, Mad. de Coulanges, the Duke, M. de la
Rochefoucault, Barillon, Briole, Coulanges, Sevigne, in a garden of the
hotel de Conde; there were water-works, bowers, terraces, six hautboys,
six violins, and the most melodious flutes; a supper which seemed to be
prepared by enchantment, an admirable bass-viol, and a resplendent moon,
which witnessed all our pleasures." Of her own garden, formed by her own
pure taste, M. de Coulanges thus speaks: "I have spent a most delightful
fortnight here. It is impossible sufficiently to praise the gardens of
the _Rocks_; they would have their beauties even at Versailles, which is
saying every thing." And that she delighted in what she well knew how to
describe, is evident from her letter from _Chaulnes_: "This is a very
handsome house, which carries with it an air of grandeur, though it is
partly unfurnished, and the gardens neglected. There is scarcely any
verdure to be seen, and not a nightingale to be heard; in short, it is
still winter, on the seventeenth of April. But it is easy to imagine the
beauties of these walks; every thing is regular and magnificent; a
spacious parterre in front, bowling-greens opposite the wings, a large
playing fountain in the parterre, two in the bowling-greens, and another
at a distance in the middle of a field, which is well named _the
solitary_; a fine country, beautiful apartments, and a pleasant
prospect, though flat." She in another letter from _Chaulnes_ says; "I
was walking alone the other day, in these beautiful alleys." And in a
subsequent one she says: "It is a pity to be obliged to quit so
beautiful and so charming a place." Her frequent mention in her letters
of _my pretty walks_ at the _Rocks_, sufficiently paints her delight in
her own garden. In compliment to this lady, I cannot help applying to
her the exact words which Petrarch applies to Laura: _une haute
intelligence, un coeur pure, qui a la sagesse de l'age avance, ait le
brilliant de la belle jeunesse_.
Few passed more happy hours in their garden at _Baville_, than the
illustrious Lamoignon, of whom it was said, that "Son ame egaloit son
genie; simple dans ses moeurs, austere dans sa conduite, il etoit le
plus doux des hommes, quand la veuve et l'orphein etoient a ses pieds,
_Boileau_, _Racine_, _Bourdaloue_, _Rapin_, composoit sa petite
cour,"--and whom Rapin invokes, not only in his poem on gardens,
_My flowers aspiring round your brows shall twine,
And in immortal wreaths, shall all their beauties join;_
but in his letters, preserved with those of Rabutin de Bussy, he paints
in high terms the name of Lamoignon, and frequently dwells on his
retreat at _Baville_. Mons. Rab. de Bussy, in a letter to Rapin, says:
"Que Je vous trouve heureux d'avoir deux mois a passer a _Baville_, avec
Mons. le presidant! Il est admirable a Paris; mais il est aimable a sa
maison de campagne, et vous savez qu'on a plus de plaisir a aimer qu'a
admirer." On his death, Rapin thus speaks of him: "Il n'y eut jamais une
plus belle ame jointe a un plus bel esprit. Le plus grand de tous les
eloges est, que le peuple l'a pleure; et chacun s'est plaint de sa mort
comme de la perte d'un ami, ou de celle d'un bienfacteur."
The name of Boileau is too interesting to be overlooked. Many of his
letters and pages discover the delight he took in his garden at
_Auteuil_. In his epistle to _Lamoignon_, he describes his seat there as
his "bless'd abode," his "dear delicious shades," and he then paints the
pleasures of his country seat:
_Give me these shades, these forests, and these fields,
And the soft sweets that rural quiet yields;
Oh, leave me to the fresh, the fragrant breeze,
And let me here awhile enjoy my ease.
Let me Pomona's plenteous blessings crop,
And see rich autumn's ripen'd burden drop,
Till Bacchus with full clusters crowns the year,
And gladdens with his load the vintager._
His celebrated epistle to _Anthony_, his old gardener, not only shews
the kind master, but his own love to his garden. I cannot refrain from
quoting a few lines from Lempriere: "As a poet, Boilieu has deservedly
obtained the applauses of every man of genius and taste. Not only his
countrymen boast of the superior effusions of his muse, but foreigners
feel and admire the graces, the strength and harmony of his verse, and
that delicacy of satire, and energy of style, by which he raised himself
to immortality." Another of his biographers says: "La religion, qui
eclaira ses derniers momens, avoit anime toute sa vie." The author of
the Pursuits of Literature thus speaks of him: "The most perfect of all
modern writers, in true taste and judgment. His sagacity was unerring;
he combined every ancient excellence, and appears original even in the
adoption of acknowledged thoughts and allusions. He is the just and
adequate representative of Horace, Juvenal, and Perseus, united, without
one indecent blemish; and for my own part, I have always considered him
as the most finished gentleman that ever wrote." In his Life, translated
by Ozell, we are told, that "he was full of sentiments of humanity,
mildness, and justice. He censured vice, and sharply attacked the bad
taste of his time, without one spark of envy, or calumny. Whatever
shocked truth, raised in him an indignation which he could not master,
and which accounts for that energy and fire which pervades his satires.
The sight of any learned man in want, made him so uneasy, that he could
not forbear lending money. His good nature and justice did farther
appear in his manner of recompensing his domestics, and by his
liberality to the poor. He gave by his will fifty thousand livres to the
small parishes adjoining the church of Notre Dame; ten thousand livres
to his valet de chambre, and five thousand to an old woman who had
served him a long time. But he was not contented to bestow his
benevolence at his death, and when he was no longer in a condition of
enjoying his estate himself, he was, all his life long, studious in
seeking opportunities of doing good offices." Part of this is confirmed
by another biographer: "Une piete sincere, une foi vive et une charite
si grande, qu'elle ne lui a presque fait reconnoitre d'autres heritiers
que les pauvres." The Lettres of Mad. la Comtesse de la Riviere, and
those of de Sevigne, frequently mention the charm which attended the
visits of Boileau.[12] Rabutin du Bussy thus speaks of him, in a letter
to the Pere Rapin, after eulogizing Moliere: "Despreaux est encore
merveilleuse; personne ne'crit avec plus de purete; ses pensees sont
fortes, et ce qui m'en plait, toujours vraies."
The above is a very cursory and brief allusion to what might be gathered
respecting those superb gardens in France, whose costly and magnificent
decorations so charmed many of our English nobility and gentry, when
travelling there, during the periods of Charles II., James II., William,
Anne, and during subsequent reigns. One need recur only to a very few,
as to Rose, who was sent there by Lord Essex, to view Versailles; to
George London, who was commissioned to go there, not only by the same
Rose, but who afterwards accompanied the Earl of Portland, King
William's ambassador; but to Evelyn, Addison, Dr. Lister, Kent, when he
accompanied Lord Burlington through France to Italy; to the Earl of Cork
and Orrery (the translator of Pliny's Letters), whose gardens at
_Marston_, and at _Caledon_, and whose letters from Italy, all shew the
eagerness with which he must have viewed the gardens of France, when
passing through the provinces towards Florence; to Ray, Lady M. W.
Montague, Bolingbroke, Peterborough, Smollet, John Wilks, John Horne
(when he met Mr. Sterne, or designed to meet him, at _Toulouse_), to
Gray, Walpole, R. P. Knight, who must have passed through the rich
provinces of France, as, in his work on Taste, he speaks of "terraces
and borders intermixed with vines and flowers, (_as I have seen them in
Italian villas_, and in some old English gardens in the same style),
where the mixture of splendour, richness, and neatness, was beautiful
and pleasing in the highest degree;" and to the lately deceased Sir U.
Price, who must also have passed through France, to view (with the
eagerness with which he did view) the rich and magnificently decorated
gardens of Italy, "aided with the splendour and magnificence of art,"
their ballustrades, their fountains, basons, vases and statues, and
which he dwells on in his Essays with the same enthusiasm as when he
there contemplated the works of Titian, Paul Veronese, and other great
masters. Indeed, those pages where he regrets the demolition of many of
our old English gardens, and when he dwells on the probability that even
Raphael, Giulio Romano, and M. Angelo, (which last planted the famous
cypresses in the garden of the Villa d'Este) were consulted on the
decorations of some of the old Italian ones; these pages at once shew
the fascinating charms of his classic pen.[13]
England can boast too of very great names, who have been attached to
this art, and most zealously patronized it, though they have not written
on the subject:--Lord Burleigh, Lord Hudson, Sir Walter Raleigh, Lord
Capell, who honoured himself by several years correspondence with La
Quintinye; William the Third,--for Switzer tells us, that "in the least
interval of ease, gardening took up a greater part of his time, in which
he was not only a delighter, but likewise a great judge,"--the Earl of
Essex, whom the mild and benevolent Lord William Russell said "was the
worthiest, the justest, the sincerest, and the most concerned for the
public, of any man he ever knew;" Lord William Russell himself, too, on
whom Thomson says,
_Bring every sweetest flower, and let me strew
The grave where Russell lies_,
whose fall Switzer feelingly laments, as one of the best of masters, and
encouragers of arts and sciences, particularly gardening, that that age
produced, and who "made _Stratton_, about seven miles from Winchester,
his seat, and his gardens there some of the best that were made in those
early days, such indeed as have mocked some that have been done since;
and the gardens of Southampton House, in Bloomsbury Square, were also of
his making;" the generous friend of this Lord William Russell, the manly
and patriotic Duke of Devonshire, who erected _Chatsworth_, that noble
specimen of a magnificent spirit;[14] Henry Earl of Danby, the Duke of
Argyle, beheaded in 1685, for having supported the rebellion of
Monmouth; the Earl of Halifax, the friend of Addison, Swift, Pope, and
Steele, and on whom a funeral poem thus speaks,
_In the rich furniture of whose fair mind,
Those dazzling intellectual graces shin'd,
That drew the love and homage of mankind._[15]
Lord Weymouth; Dr. Sherard of Eltham; Collinson, "to whose name is
attached all that respect which is due to benevolence and virtue;"
Grindal, Bishop of London, who cultivated with great success the vine
and other productions of his garden at Fulham; Compton, Bishop of
London, eminent, as Mr. Falconer in his Fulham observes, for his
unbounded charity and beneficence, and who was so struck with the
genius, the learning, and probity of Mr. Ray, that he was almost at the
entire charge of erecting the monument to him; the Earl of Scarborough,
an accomplished nobleman, immortalized by the enchanting pen of Pope,
and the fine pen of Chesterfield; the Earl of Gainsborough; the great
Chatham, whose taste in the embellishment of rural nature has been
exultingly acknowledged by Mr. Walpole, and by George Mason;[16] with
numerous other men of rank and science.[17] These have highly assisted
in elevating gardening to the rank it has long since held, and has
allured multitudes to this delightful science:--no wonder, when _Homer_
=writeth how= _Laertes_ =the olde man, was wont with his travaile in his
Orchards, to drive from his minde the sorrow hee tooke for the absence
of his sonne=. When old Gerarde asks his _courteous and well-willing
readers_--"whither do all men walk for their honest recreation, but
where the earth hath most beneficially painted her face with flourishing
colours? and what season of the year more longed for than the spring,
whose gentle breath enticeth forth the kindly sweets, and makes them
yield their fragrant smells?" When the Lord Chancellor Bacon declares a
garden "is the purest of human pleasures; it is the greatest refreshment
to the spirits of man:" and when this wonderfully gifted man thus fondly
dwells on part of its allurements;--"the breath of flowers is far
sweeter in the air (where it comes and goes like the warbling of music),
than in the hand; therefore, nothing is more fit for that delight, than
to know what be the flowers and plants that do best perfume the air; the
flower, which above all others yields the sweetest smell in the air, is
the violet;[18] next to that is the musk rose, then the
strawberry-leaves, dying with a most-excellent cordial smell; then sweet
briar, then wall-flowers, which are very delightful to be set under a
parlour, or lower chamber window; but those which perfume the air most
delightfully, not passed by as the rest, but being trodden upon and
crushed, are three--that is, burnet, wild thyme, and water-mints;
therefore you are to set whole alleys of them, to have the pleasure when
you walk or tread."[19] Or when Mr. Evelyn, in the joy of his
enthusiasm, exultingly transposed from Virgil:--
O fortunatos nimium, bona si sua norint
_Horticulas_!
and who declared, that the employ and felicity of an excellent gardener
was preferable to all other diversions. When Mr. Addison says that a
garden "fills the mind with calmness and tranquillity, and lays all its
turbulent passions at rest." When Sir William Temple (who infused into
his writings the graces of some of the best writers of ancient times),
thus allures his readers: "_Epicurus_, whose admirable wit, felicity of
expression, excellence of nature, sweetness of conversation, temperance
of life, and constancy of death, made him so beloved by his friends,
admired by his scholars, and honoured by the Athenians, passed his time
wholly in his garden; there he studied, there he exercised, there he
taught his philosophy; and indeed no other sort of abode seems to
contribute so much to both the tranquillity of mind, and indolence of
body, which he made his chief ends. The sweetness of air, the
pleasantness of smells, the verdure of plants, the cleanness and
lightness of food, the exercises of working or walking; but above all,
the exemption from cares and solitude, seem equally to favour and
improve both contemplation and health, the enjoyment of sense and
imagination, and thereby the quiet and ease both of the body and mind."
When the industrious Switzer says:--"'Tis in the quiet enjoyment of
rural delights, the refreshing and odoriferous breezes of garden air,
that the deluge of vapours, and those terrors of hypochondraism, which
crowd and oppress the head are dispelled." When the industrious and
philosophic Bradley observes, that "though the trouble of the mind wears
and destroys the constitution even of the most healthful body, all kinds
of gardens contribute to health." When Pope,[20] who loved to breathe
the sweet and fragrant air of gardens, in one of his letters says, "I am
in my garden, amused and easy; this is a scene where one finds no
disappointment." When that "universally esteemed and beloved man," the
Prince de Ligne, declares, "Je voudrois echauffer tout l'univers de mon
gout pour les jardins. Il me semble qu'il est impossible, qu'un mechant
puisse l'avoir. Il n'est point de vertus que Je ne suppose a celui qui
aime a parler et a faire des jardins. Peres de famille, inspirez la
jardinomanie a vos enfans.[21] When a taste for gardening (as Mr. Cobbet
observes) "is much more innocent, more pleasant, more free from
temptation to cost, than any other; so pleasant in itself! It is
conducive to health, by means of the irresistible temptation which it
offers to early rising; it tends to turn the minds of youth from
amusements and attachments of a frivolous or vicious nature; it is a
taste which is indulged at home; it tends to make home pleasant, and to
endear us to the spot on which it is our lot to live." When Mr. Johnson
forcibly paints the allurements to a love for this art, when concluding
his energetic volume on gardening, by quoting from Socrates, that "it is
the source of health, strength, plenty, riches, and of a thousand sober
delights and honest pleasures."--And from Lord Verulam, that amid its
scenes and pursuits, "life flows pure, and the heart more calmly beats."
And when M. le V. H. de Thury, president de la Societe d'Horticulture de
Paris, in his Discours d'Installation says: "Dans tous les temps et dans
tous les pays, les hommes les plus celebres, les plus grands capitaines,
les princes, et les rois, se sont livres avec delices, et souvent avec
passion, a la culture des plantes et des jardins." And among other
instances he cites "Descartes, qui se livrait avec une egale ardeur a la
science des astres et a la culture des fleurs de son jardin, et qui
souvent, la nuit, quittait ses observations celestes pour etudier le
sommeil et la floraison de ses plantes avant le lever du soliel."[22]
Petrarch, too, who has enchanted every nation and every age, from his
endeared Vaucluse, thus speaks of his garden: "I have formed two; I do
not imagine they are to be equalled in all the world: I should feel
myself inclined to be angry with fortune, if there were any so beautiful
out of Italy. I have store of pleasant green walks, with trees shadowing
them most sweetly." Indeed, what Cicero applies to another science, may
well apply to horticulture: "nihil est _agriculturae_ melius, nihil
uberius, nihil dulcius, nihil homine, nihil libero dignius." Let me
close with a most brilliant name;--the last resource in the _Candide_ of
Voltaire is,--_cultivate your garden_.
In my transient review of the gardens of ancient times, at the
commencement of the following work, I have not even glanced at those of
the _Saxons_, in this island; when one should have thought that the
majestic name of ALFRED alone, would have made a search of this nature
interesting, even if such search were unavailing. I have also
inadvertently omitted any allusion to those of the _Danes_ and the
_Normans_. I have only then now to say, that Mr. Johnson's researches,
as to these gardens, in pp. 31, 37, 38, 39 and 40 of his lately
published History of English Gardening, with his elegant language and
the flow of sentiment that pervades those pages, would make any search
or review of mine presumptuous. In those pages, he dwells on the
tendency which the then introduction of the christian religion had to
soften the manners of the people, and by thus rendering them more
domestic, gardening became an art congenial to their feelings; and
whilst the country at large was devastated by war, the property of the
religious establishments was held sacred, and varieties of vegetables
preserved, which otherwise would soon have become extinct, if cultivated
in less hallowed ground. He then traces the existence of many gardens,
orchards, and vineyards, belonging to our monasteries, proving, that
even in the time of the _Danes_, horticulture continued "silently to
advance," and that at the time of the arrival of the _Normans_, gardens
were generally in the possession of the laity, as well as of the
ecclesiastics; and he refers to Doomsday Book for his assertion, that
"there is no reason to doubt, that at this period, every house, from the
palace to the cottage, was possessed of a garden of some size." He
concludes with interesting references to the gardens, vineyards, and
orchards, of the Abbot of Ely and other monks.
The above work of Mr. Johnson's is the result of original thought, and
of an ardent and extended scientific research. Mine is a compilation,
"made with a pair of scissors," to copy the words of Mr. Mathias, which
he applies to a certain edition of Pope. I content myself, however, with
the reflection of Mr. Walpole, that "they who cannot perform great
things themselves, may yet have a satisfaction in doing justice to those
who can."
Having alluded at pp. 71 and 120 to Dr. Alison, and having given at p.
211 Dr. Dibdin's tribute to him, I cannot omit reminding my reader, that
the graceful language, the sublime and solemn thoughts, which this
admirable divine has transfused into many of his Sermons on the Seasons,
make one doubly feel the truth and propriety with which he has so
liberally reviewed Mr. Whately's _Observations on Modern Gardening_.
[Illustration]
ON
THE PORTRAITS
OF
English Authors on Gardening.
ON THE PORTRAITS OF ENGLISH AUTHORS ON GARDENING.
The earliest accounts we have of gardens, are those recorded in Holy
Writ; their antiquity, therefore, appears coeval with that of time
itself. The Garden in Eden had every tree good for food, or pleasant to
the sight. Noah planted a Vineyard. Solomon, in the true spirit of
horticultural zeal, says, _I planted me Vineyards, I made me Gardens and
Orchards, and I planted trees in them of all kinds of fruit_. We have
all heard of the grandeur of Nebuchadnezzar's Gardens.
Whether that of Alcinous was fabulous or not, it gave rise to Homer's
lofty strains:--
The balmy spirit of the western gale
Eternal breathes on flowers untaught to fail;
The same mild season gives the blooms to blow,
The buds to harden, and the fruit to grow.[23]
That Homer was all alive to the rich scenery of nature, is evident, even
from his Calypso's Cave:--
All o'er the cavern'd rock a sprouting vine
Laid forth ripe clusters. Hence four limpid founts
Nigh to each other ran, in rills distinct,
Huddling along with many a playful maze.
Around them the soft meads profusely bloom'd
Fresh violets and balms.[24]
The Egyptians, the Persians, and other remote nations, prided themselves
on their magnificent gardens. Diodorus Siculus mentions one "enriched
with palm trees, and vines, and every kind of delicious fruit, by
flowery lawns and planes, and cypresses of stupendous magnitude, with
thickets of myrtle, and laurel, and bay." He paints too the attachment
which some of the ancients had to landscape scenery:--
None of art's works, but prodigally strown
By nature, with her negligence divine.
The splendid gardens at Damascus, were superintended by a native of
Malaga, who "traversed the burning sands of Africa, for the purpose of
describing such vegetables as could support the fervid heat of that
climate." The cities of Samarcand, Balckd, Ispahan, and Bagdad, were
enveloped and surrounded by luxurious and splendid gardens. No wonder
when those countries were partly governed by such celebrated men as
Haroun-al-Raschid, and his son Al-Mamoun, the generous protectors of
Arabian literature, and which son (about the year 813) has been justly
termed the _Augustus_ of Bagdad. "Study, books, and men of letters, (I
am quoting the eloquent pages of De Sismondi _On the Literature of the
Arabians_,) almost entirely engrossed his attention. Hundreds of camels
might be seen entering Bagdad loaded with nothing but manuscripts and
papers. Masters, instructors, translators, and commentators, formed the
court of Al-Mamoun, which appeared rather to be a learned academy than
the centre of government in a warlike empire."
The gardens of Epicurus, and of Pisistratus, Cimon, and Theophrastus,
were the most famous of any in the Grecian empire. Those of Herculaneum
may be seen in the 2nd vol. of the paintings found there. The luxurious
gardens of the affluent Seneca, and the delight with which Cicero speaks
of his paternal seat, (which enraptured his friend Atticus with its
beauty,) and the romantic ones of Adrian, at Tivoli, and of Lucullus, of
Sallust, of the rich and powerful Crassus, and of Pompey, shew the
delight which the old Romans took in them. One may gather this also from
Livy; and Virgil's energy of language warmly paints the
----flowering pride
Of meads and streams that through the valleys glide.
A country cottage near a crystal flood,
A winding valley, and a lofty wood.
* * * * *
Leisure and calm in groves, and cooling vales;
Grottoes and babbling brooks, and darksome dales.
Messaline (says a translation of Tacitus) avoit une passion extreme pour
les jardins de Lucullus, qu'il embellisoit superbement, ajoutant tous
les jours quelque nouvelles beautez a celles qu'ils avoint receues de
leur premier maitre.
We are reminded in a magic page of our own immortal poet, of those of
Julius Caesar, and of
----_his_ walks,
His private arbours, and new-planted orchards,
when the noble Antony invokes the Romans to
----kiss dead Caesar's wounds,
And dip their napkins in his sacred blood.
Horace's incomparable lines on the happiness and delight of a country
life, his country granges, his woods, his garden, and his grove; and
many of the other Roman writers, abundantly shew their attachment to
gardens, as accompaniments to their splendid villas. There was scarcely
a romantic valley that was not crowded with their villas.
Martial and Juvenal ridicule the clipped box trees, cut dragons, and
similar grotesque fancies, at some of their villas, both admiring the
nobler grace with which nature adorned each spot.[25]
The Romans were perhaps the first who introduced that art into Britain,
meagerly as they did introduce it. The earliest account I can find of an
English writer on Gardening, is,
Alfred, an _Englishman_, surnamed the Philosopher, much respected at
Rome. He died 1270, and left four books on the Meteors of Aristotle;
also one on _Vegetables_, and five on the Consolations of Boethius. We
are not _very_ likely to discover _his_ portrait. Nor that of the
following:--
HENRY DANIEL, a Dominican friar, said to be well skilled in the natural
philosophy and physic of his time, left a manuscript inscribed _Aaron
Danielis_. He therein treats De re Herbaria, de Arboribus, _Fructibus_,
&c. He flourished about the year 1379.--N. B. I have copied this article
from Dr. Pulteney's Sketches, vol. 1, page 23.[26]
I believe there are no Portraits engraved, nor perhaps yet discovered,
of the following sixty-nine persons; at least I know of none:--
RICHARD ARNOLDE, who in his Chronicle, printed in 1502, has a chapter on
"The crafte of graffynge, and plantyne, and alterynge of fruyts, as well
in colours, as in taste." The celebrated poem of the Nut-brown Maid
first appeared in this Chronicle. Sir E. Brydges, in vol. 6 of his
Censura Literaria, has transcribed the whole poem as it appears in
Arnolde.
THOMAS TUSSER, whose memory has had the felicity to merit the notice of
Mr. Warton, in his History of English Poetry, from his having published
his poem of "A Hundreth good Pointes of Husbandrie, imprinted at London,
in Flete strete, within Temple barre, at the syne of the Hand and
Starre, by Richard Totell, An. 1577." A copy of this first edition
(probably unique) is preserved in the British Museum. A re-print of this
singular literary rarity is given in Mr. Hazlewood's British
Bibliographer. The subsequent editions of this curious book are
interestingly enumerated by Mr. Mavor, in his edition of Tusser. No
portrait I believe has been discovered of this benevolent man, whose
good sense, impressive maxims, enlightened and philosophic turn of mind
and feeling for the poor, shine through most pages of his poem:--
What better bed than conscience good, to pass the night with sleep,
What better work, than daily care, from sin thyself to keep?
What better thought, than think on God, and daily him to serve,
What better gift than to the poor, that ready be to sterve?
His estimate of life is concise:--
To death we must stoop, be we high, be we low,
But how and how suddenly few be that know;
What carry we then but a sheet to the grave,
(To cover this carcass) of all that we have?
His hospitable heart thus pleads for the desolate, during the
festivities of Christmas, and his love of "mirth and good cheer" makes
him not forget Harvests home:--
At Christmas, the hardness of winter doth rage,
A griper of all things, and specially age;
Then sadly poor people, the young and the old,
Be sorest oppressed with hunger and cold.
At Christmas, by labour there's little to get,
That wanting--the poorest in danger are set:
What season then better, of all the whole year,
Thy needy, poor neighbour, to comfort and cheer.
At Christmas be merry, and thankful withal,
And feast thy poor neighbours, the great with the small:
Yea all the year long, to the poor let us give,
God's blessing to follow us, whiles we do live.
In harvest time, harvest folk, servants and all
Should make, all together, good cheer in the hall;
And fill out the black bowl of blythe to their song,
And let them be merry all harvest time long.
Once ended thy harvest, let none be beguil'd,
Please such as did help thee--man, woman, and child,--
Thus doing, with alway, such help as they can,
Thou winnest the praise of the labouring man.
Now look up to God-ward, let tongue never cease
In thanking of him, for his mighty increase,
Accept my good will--for a proof go and try;
The better thou thrivest, the gladder am I.
Tusser died about the year 1583, aged about sixty-five, and is buried in
St. Mildred's church, in the Poultry. His epitaph is preserved in
Stowe's Survey of London; and (as Mr. Mavor observes) it is perfectly in
character with the man and his writings; and if conjecture may be
allowed, was penned by himself:--
Here Thomas Tusser, clad in earth, doth lie,
Who sometime made the Points of Husbandry.
By him then learn thou may'st. Here learn we must,
When all is done, we sleep and turn to dust.
And yet, through Christ, to heaven we hope to go:
Who reads his books, shall find his faith was so.
His book exhibits an authentic picture of the state of horticulture
during the time of Mary, and Elizabeth; and, as Mr. Warton observes, his
work "is valuable as a genuine picture of the agriculture, the rural
arts, and the domestic oeconomy and customs of our industrious
ancestors."
Walter Blith says of him:--"As for Master Tusser, who rimeth out of his
experience, if thou delightest therein, thou mayst find things worthy
thy observation."
Sir John Hawkins, in his History of Music, thus writes:--"The life of
this poor man was a series of misfortunes; and is a proof of the truth
of that saying in Holy Scripture, that 'the battle is not to the strong,
nor the race to the swift.' As to the Points of Husbandry, it is written
in familiar verse, and abounds with many curious particulars, that
bespeak the manners, the customs, and the modes of living in the
country, from the year 1520 to about half a century after; besides
which, it discovers such a degree of oeconomical wisdom in the author,
such a sedulous attention to the honest arts of thriving, such a general
love of mankind, such a regard to justice, and a reverence for religion,
that we do not only lament his misfortunes, but wonder at them; and are
at a loss to account for his dying poor, who understood so well the
method to become rich."
From the "Literary Life and Select Works of Benjamin Stillingfleet," I
select a small part of what that worthy man says of Tusser:--"He seems
to have been a good-natured cheerful man, and though a lover of
oeconomy, far from meanness, as appears in many of his precepts,
wherein he shews his disapprobation of that pitiful spirit, which makes
farmers starve their cattle, their land, and every thing belonging to
them; chusing rather to lose a pound than spend a shilling. Upon the
whole, his book displays all the qualities of a well-disposed man, as
well as of an able farmer. He wrote in the infancy of farming, and
therefore I shall give a full account of his practice, especially as his
precepts will be comprised in a narrow compass, and as a sort of justice
done to him as an original writer."
Mr. Mavor observes, "The precepts of Tusser indeed are so excellent,
that few can read them without profit and improvement; he appears to
have possessed such a degree of pious resignation to the will of the
Supreme, of christian charity, and of good humour, under all his
miscarriages, that his character rises high in our esteem, independent
of his merits as a writer. The cultivated and liberal mind of Tusser
seems to have been ill-suited to his fortune, and to his vocation. A
love of hospitality probably kept him from independence; yet if he was
imprudent, we cannot help loving the man and admiring the justness of
his sentiments on every subject connected with life and morals."
Fuller, in his _Worthies of Essex_, says, "he spread his bread with all
sorts of butter, yet none would stick thereon. Yet I hear no man to
charge him with any vicious extravagancy, or visible carelessness,
imputing his ill success to some occult cause in God's counsel."
I am indebted, in some degree, for these several testimonies, to Mr.
Mavor's spirited edition of this book, which he has enriched with a
biographical sketch of Tusser, and with many interesting illustrations
of his poem. He exhibits another instance of the private character of
Tusser, in his concluding remarks on the last page of his work:--"The
moral feeling and the pious resignation which breathe in the concluding
stanzas of this poem, leave a powerful impression on the mind; and
whatever vicissitudes in life the Editor or his Readers may experience,
he wishes for Himself and for Them, the same philosophic and christian
composure, on a retrospect of the past, and the anticipated view of
futurity."
Of Mr. Warton's remarks on Tusser, Mr. Mavor thus partly speaks:--"For
the personal kindness of Warton to me, at an early period of life, I
shall ever retain an affectionate remembrance of him, and for his genius
and high attainments in literature, I feel all that deference and
respect which can belong to his most enthusiastic admirers; but no man
was less a judge of the merits of a book on Husbandry and Huswifry."
Mr. Warton observes, that "Tusser's general precepts have often an
expressive brevity, and are sometimes pointed with an epigrammatic turn,
and smartness of allusion."
In Tusser's poetical account of his own unsuccessful life,
_How through the briers my youthful years
Have run their race_,--
how he was forced from his father's house when a little boy, and driven
like a POSTING HORSE, being impressed to sing as a chorister, at
Wallingford College; his miseries there, and the _stale bread_ they gave
him; the fifty-three stripes the poor lad received at Eton, when
learning Latin; his happy transfer to Trinity College, which to him
seemed a removal from hell to heaven; the generosity of Lord Paget,
_Whose soul I trust is with the just_;
then his
----_good parents dy'd
One after one, till both were gone,
Whose souls in bliss, be long ere this._
His remaining ten years at court, where