FOOTNOTES:

"And whan I had a while goon,I saugh a gardyn right anoon,Full long and broad; and every delleEnclosed was, and walled welleWith high walles embatailled.* * * * *I felle fast in a waymentingBy which art, or by what engyneI might come into that gardyne;But way I couthe fynd noonInto that gardyne for to goon.* * * * *Tho' gan I go a fulle grete pas,Environyng evene in compas,The closing of the square walle,Tyl that I fonde a wiket smalleSo shett that I ne'er myght in gon,And other entre was ther noon."

"And whan I had a while goon,I saugh a gardyn right anoon,Full long and broad; and every delleEnclosed was, and walled welleWith high walles embatailled.

* * * * *

I felle fast in a waymentingBy which art, or by what engyneI might come into that gardyne;But way I couthe fynd noonInto that gardyne for to goon.

* * * * *

Tho' gan I go a fulle grete pas,Environyng evene in compas,The closing of the square walle,Tyl that I fonde a wiket smalleSo shett that I ne'er myght in gon,And other entre was ther noon."

Romaunt of the Rose.

This square enclosure was bounded either by a high wall—"circummured with brick," "with high walles embatailled,"—or with a thick high hedge—"encompassed on all the four sides with a stately arched hedge." These hedges were made chiefly of Holly or Hornbeam, and we can judge of their size by Evelyn's description of his "impregnable hedge of about 400ft. in length, 9ft. high, and 5ft. in diameter." Many of these hedges still remain in our old gardens. Within this enclosure the garden was accurately laid out in formal shapes,[343:1]with paths either quite straight or in some strictly mathematical figures—

"And all without were walkes and alleyes dightWith divers trees enrang'd in even rankes;And here and there were pleasant arbors pight,And shadie seats, and sundry flowring bankes,To sit and rest the walkers' wearie shankes."

F. Q., iv, x, 25.

The main walks were not, as with us, bounded with the turf, but they were bounded with trees, which were wrought into hedges, more or less open at the sides, and arched over at the top. These formed the "close alleys," "coven alleys," or "thick-pleached alleys," of which we read in Shakespeare and others writers of that time. Many kinds of trees and shrubs were used for this purpose; "every one taketh what liketh him best, as either Privit alone, or Sweet Bryer and White Thorn interlaced together, and Roses of one, two, or more sorts placed here and there amongst them. Some also take Lavender, Rosemary, Sage, Southernwood, Lavender Cotton, or some such other thing. Some again plant Cornel trees, and plash them or keep them low to form them into a hedge; and some again take a low prickly shrub that abideth always green, called in Latin Pyracantha" (Parkinson). It was on these hedges and their adjuncts that the chief labour of the garden was spent. They were cut and tortured into every imaginable shape, for nothing came amiss to the fancy of the topiarist. When this topiary art first came into fashion in England I do not know, but it was probably more or less the fashion in all gardens of any pretence from very early times, and it reached its highest point in the sixteenth century, and held its ground as the perfection of gardening till it was driven out of the field in the last century by the "picturesque style," though many specimens still remain in England, as at Levens[344:1]and Hardwicke on a large scale, and in the gardens of many ancient English mansions and old farmhouses on a smaller scale. It was doomed as soon as landscape gardeners aimed at the natural, for even when it was still at its height Addison described it thus: "Our British gardeners, instead of humouring Nature, love to deviate fromit as much as possible. Our trees rise in cones, globes, and pyramids; we see the mark of the scissors upon every plant and bush."

But this is a digression: I must return to the Elizabethan garden, which I have hitherto only described as a great square, surrounded by wide, covered, shady walks, and with other similar walks dividing the central square into four or more compartments. But all this was introductory to the great feature of the Elizabethan garden, the formation of the "curious-knotted garden." Each of the large compartments was divided into a complication of "knots," by which was meant beds arranged in quaint patterns, formed by rule and compass with mathematical precision, and so numerous that it was a necessary part of the system that the whole square should be fully occupied by them. Lawn there was none; the whole area was nothing but the beds and the paths that divided them. There was Grass in other parts of the pleasure grounds, and apparently well kept, for Lord Bacon has given his opinion that "nothing is more pleasant to the eye than green Grass kept finely shorn," but it was apparently to be found only in the orchard, the bowling-green, or the "wilderness;" in the flower-garden proper it had no place. The "knots" were generally raised above the surface of the paths, the earth being kept in its place by borders of lead, or tiles, or wood, or even bones; but sometimes the beds and paths were on the same level, and then there were the same edgings that we now use, as Thrift, Box, Ivy, flints, &c. The paths were made of gravel, sand, spar, &c., and sometimes with coloured earths: but against this Lord Bacon made a vigorous protest: "As to the making of knots or figures with divers coloured earths, that they may lie under the windows of the house on that side on which the garden stands they be but toys; you may see as good sights many times in tarts."

The old gardening books are full of designs for these knots; indeed, no gardening book of the date seems to have been considered complete if it did not give the "latest designs," and they seem to have much tried the wit and ingenuity of the gardeners, as they must have also sorely tried their patience to keep them in order; and I doubt not that the efficiency of an Elizabethan gardener was as muchtested by his skill and experience in "knot-work," as the efficiency of a modern gardener is tested by his skill in "bedding-out," which is the lineal descendant of "knot-work." In one most essential point, however, the two systems very much differed. In "bedding-out" the whole force of the system is spent in producing masses of colours, the individual flowers being of no importance, except so far as each flower contributes its little share of colour to the general mass; and it is for this reason that so many of us dislike the system, not only because of its monotony, but more especially because it has a tendency "to teach us to think too little about the plants individually, and to look at them chiefly as an assemblage of beautiful colours. It is difficult in those blooming masses to separate one from another; all produce so much the same sort of impression. The consequence is people see the flowers on the beds without caring to know anything about them or even to ask their names. It was different in the older gardens, because there was just variety there; the plants strongly contrasted with each other, and we were ever passing from the beautiful to the curious. Now we get little of quaintness or mystery, or of the strange delicious thought of being lost or embosomed in a tall rich wood of flowers. All is clear, definite, and classical, the work of a too narrow and exclusive taste."—Forbes Watson.The old "knot-work" was not open to this censure, though no doubt it led the way which ended in "bedding-out." The beginning of the system crept in very shortly after Shakespeare's time. Parkinson spoke of an arrangement of spring flowers which, when "all planted in some proportion as near one unto another as is fit for them will give such a grace to the garden that the place will seem like a piece of tapestry of many glorious colours, to encrease every one's delight." And again—"The Tulipas may be so matched, one colour answering and setting off another, that the place where they stand may resemble a piece of curious needlework or piece of painting." But these plants were all perennial, and remained where they were once planted, and with this one exception named by Parkinson, the planting of knot-work was as different as possible from the modern planting of carpet-beds. The beds were planted inside their thick margins with a great variety of plants, and apparentlyset as thick as possible, like Harrison's garden quoted above, with its 300 separate plants in as many square feet. These were nearly all hardy perennials,[347:1]with the addition of a few hardy annuals, and the great object seems to have been to have had something of interest or beauty in these gardens at all times of the year. The principle of the old gardeners was that "Nature abhors a vacuum," and, as far as their gardens went, they did their best to prevent a vacuum occurring at any time. In this way I think they surpassed us in their practical gardening, for, even if they did not always succeed, it was surely something for them to aim (in Lord Bacon's happy words), "to havever perpetuumas the place affords."

Where the space would allow of it, the garden was further decorated with statues, fountains, "fair mounts," labyrinths, mazes,[347:2]arbours and alcoves, rocks, "great Turkey jars," and "in some corner (or more) a true Dial or Clock, and some Antick works" (Lawson). These things were fitting ornaments in such formal gardens, but the best judges saw that they were not necessaries, and that the garden was complete without them. "They be pretty things to look on, but nothing for health or sweetness." "Such things are for state and magnificence, but nothing to the true pleasure of a garden."

Such was the Elizabethan garden in its general outlines; the sort of garden which Shakespeare must have often seen both in Warwickshire and in London. According to our present ideas such a garden would be far too formal and artificial, and we may consider that the present fashion of our gardens is more according to Milton's idea of Eden, in which there grew—

"Flowers worthy of Paradise, which not nice artIn beds and curious knots, but Nature boonPoured forth profuse on hill and dale and plaine."

Paradise Lost, book iv.

None of us probably would now wish to exchange the straight walks and level terraces of the sixteenth century for our winding walks and undulating lawns, in the laying out of which the motto has been "ars est celare artem"—

"That which all faire workes doth most aggrace,The art, which all that wrought, appeareth in no place."

F. Q., ii, xii, 58.

Yet it is pleasant to look back upon these old gardens, and to see how they were cherished and beloved by some of the greatest and noblest of Englishmen. Spenser has left on record his judgment on the gardens of his day—

"To the gay gardens his unstaid desireHim wholly carried, to refresh his sprights;There lavish Nature, in her best attire,Poures forth sweete odors and alluring sights:And Arte, with her contending, doth aspireTo excell the naturall with made delights;And all, that faire or pleasant may be found,In riotous excesse doth there abound.* * * * *There he arriving around about doth flie,From bed to bed, from one to other border;And takes survey, with curious busie eye,Of every flowre and herbe there set in order."

* * * * *

There he arriving around about doth flie,From bed to bed, from one to other border;And takes survey, with curious busie eye,Of every flowre and herbe there set in order."

Muiopotmos.

Clearly in Spenser's eyes the formalities of an Elizabethan garden (for we must suppose he had such in his thoughts) did not exclude nature or beauty.

It was also with such formal gardens in his mind and before his eyes that Lord Bacon wrote his "Essay on Gardens," and commenced it with the well-known sentence (for I must quote him once again for the last time), "God Almighty first planted a garden, and indeed it is the purest of all human pleasures; it is the greatest refreshment to the spirits of man, without which buildings and palaces are but gross handiworks; and a man shall ever see, that when ages grow to civility and elegance, men come to build stately sooner than to garden finely, as if gardening were the greater perfection." And, indeed, in spite of their stiffness and unnaturalness, there must have been a great charm in those gardens, and though it would be antiquarian affectation toattempt or wish to restore them, yet there must have been a stateliness about them which our gardens have not, and they must have had many points of real comfort which it seems a pity to have lost. Those long shady "covert alleys," with their "thick-pleached" sides and roof, must have been very pleasant places to walk in, giving shelter in winter, and in summer deep shade, with the pleasant smell of Sweet Brier and Roses. They must have been the very places for a thoughtful student, who desired quiet and retirement for his thoughts—

"And adde to these retired leisureThat in trim gardens takes his pleasure"—

Il Penseroso.

and they must have been also "pretty retiring places for conference" for friends in council. The whole fashion of the Elizabethan garden has passed away, and will probably never be revived; but before we condemn it as a ridiculous fashion, unworthy of the science of gardening, we may remember that it held its ground in England for nearly two hundred years, and that during that time the gardens of England and the flowers they bore won not the cold admiration, but the warm affection of the greatest names in English history, the affection of such a queen as Elizabeth,[349:1]of such a grave and wise philosopher as Bacon, of such a grand hero as Raleigh, of such poets as Spenser and Shakespeare.

[343:1]These beds (as we should now call them) were called "tables" or "plots"—"Mark out the tables, ichon by hem selveSixe foote in brede, and xii in length is besteTo clense and make on evey side honest."Palladius on Husbandrie, i. 116."Note this generally that all plots are square."—Lawson'sNew Orchard, p. 60.

[343:1]These beds (as we should now call them) were called "tables" or "plots"—

"Mark out the tables, ichon by hem selveSixe foote in brede, and xii in length is besteTo clense and make on evey side honest."

Palladius on Husbandrie, i. 116.

"Note this generally that all plots are square."—Lawson'sNew Orchard, p. 60.

[344:1]For an account of Levens, with a plate of the Topiarian garden, see "Archæological Journal," vol. xxvi.

[347:1]Including shrubs—"'Tis another's lotTo light upon some gard'ner's curious knot,Where she upon her breast (love's sweet repose),Doth bring the Queen of flowers, the English Rose."Browne'sBrit. Past., i, 2.

[347:1]Including shrubs—

"'Tis another's lotTo light upon some gard'ner's curious knot,Where she upon her breast (love's sweet repose),Doth bring the Queen of flowers, the English Rose."

Browne'sBrit. Past., i, 2.

[347:2]For a good account of mazes and labyrinths see "Archæological Journal," xiv. 216.

[349:1]Queen Elizabeth's love of gardening and her botanical knowledge were celebrated in a Latin poem by an Italian who visited England in 1586, and wrote a long poem under the name of "Melissus."—SeeArchæologia, vol. vii. 120.

Very little is recorded of the gardeners of the sixteenth century, by which we can judge either of their skill or their social position. Gerard frequently mentions the names of different persons from whom he obtained plants, but without telling us whether they were professional or amateur gardeners or nurserymen; and Hakluyt has recorded the name of Master Wolfe as gardener to Henry VIII. Certainly Richard II.'s Queen did not speak with much respect to her gardener, reproving him for his "harsh rude tongue," and addressing him as a "little better thing than earth"—but her angry grief may account for that. Parkinson also has not much to say in favour of the gardeners of his day, but considers it his duty to warn his readers against them: "Our English gardeners are all, or the most of them, utterly ignorant in the ordering of their outlandish (i.e., exotic) flowers as not being trained to know them. . . . And I do wish all gentlemen and gentlewomen, whom it may concern for their own good, to be as careful whom they trust with the planting and replanting of their fine flowers, as they would be with so many jewels, for the roots of many of them being small and of great value may soon be conveyed away, and a clean tale fair told, that such a root is rotten or perished in the ground if none be seen where it should be, or else that the flower hath changed his colour when it hath been taken away, or a counterfeit one hath been put in the place thereof; and thus many have been deceived of their daintiest flowers, without remedy or true knowledge of the defect." And again, "idle and ignorant gardeners who get names by stealth as they do many other things." This is not a pleasant picture either of the skill or honesty of the sixteenth-century gardeners, but there must have been skilled gardeners to keep those curious-knotted gardens in order, so as to have a "ver perpetuumall the year." And there musthave been men also who had a love for their craft; and if some stole the rare plants committed to their charge, we must hope that there were some honest men amongst them, and that they were not all like old Andrew Fairservice, in "Rob Roy," who wished to find a place where he "wad hear pure doctrine, and hae a free cow's grass, and a cot and a yard, and mair than ten punds of annual fee," but added also, "and where there's nae leddy about the town to count the Apples."

This most interesting passage would almost tempt us to say that Shakespeare was a gardener by profession; certainly no other passages that have been brought to prove his real profession are more minute than this. It proves him to have had practical experience in the work, and I think we may safely say that he was no mere 'prentice hand in the use of the pruning knife.

The art of pruning in his day was probably exactly like our own, as far as regarded fruit trees and ordinary garden work, but in one important particular the pruner's art of that day was a for more laborious art than it is now. The topiary art must have been the triumph of pruning, and when gardens were full of castles, monsters, beasts, birds, fishes, and men, all cut out of Box and Yew, and kept so exact that they boasted of being the "living representations" and "counterfeit presentments" of these various objects, the hands and head of the pruner could seldom have been idle; the pruning knife and scissors must have been in constant demand from the first day of the year to the last. The pruner of that day was, in fact, a sculptor, who carved his images out of Box and Yew instead of marble, so that in an amusing article in the "Guardian" for 1713 (No. 173), said to have been written by Pope, is a list of such sculptured objects for sale, and we are told that the "eminent town gardener had arrived to such perfection that he cuts family pieces of men, women, and children. Any ladies that please may have their own effigies in Myrtle, or their husbands in Hornbeam. He is a Puritan wag, and never fails when he shows his garden to repeat that passage in the Psalms, 'Thy wife shall be as the fruitful Vine, and thy children as Olive branches about thy table.'"

The only point that needs notice under this head is thatthe word "manure" in Shakespeare's time was not limited to its present modern meaning. In his day "manured land" generally meant cultured land in opposition to wild and barren land.[353:1]So Falstaff uses the word—

Hereof comes it that Prince Harry is valiant; for the cold blood he did naturally inherit of his father, he hath, like lean, sterile and bare land, manured, husbanded, and tilled with excellent endeavour of drinking good and good store of fertile sherris, that he is become very hot and valiant.

2nd Henry IV, act iv, sc. 3 (126).

And in the same way Iago says—

Either to have it (a garden) sterile with idleness or manured with industry.

Othello, act i, sc. 3 (296).

Milton and many other writers used the word in this its original sense; and Johnson explains it "to cultivate by manual labour," according to its literal derivation. In one passage Shakespeare uses the word somewhat in the modern sense—

But generally he and the writers of that and the next century expressed the operation more simply and plainly, as "covering with ordure," or as in the English Bible, "I shall dig about it and dung it."

The various ways of propagating plants by grafts, cuttings, slips, and artificial impregnation (all mentioned in the above passages), as used in Shakespeare's day, seem to have been exactly like those of our own time, and so they need no further comment.

[353:1]The Act 31 Eliz. c. 7, enacts that "noe person shall within this Realme of England make buylde or erect any Buyldinge or Howsinge . . . . as a Cottage for habitation . . . . unlesse the same person do assigne and laye to the same Cottage or Buyldinge fower acres of Grounde at the least . . . to be contynuallie occupied and manured therewith." Gerard's Chapter on Vines is headed, "Of the manured Vine."

The weeds of Shakespeare need no remark; they were the same as ours; and, in spite of our improved cultivation, our fields and gardens are probably as full of weeds as they were three centuries ago.

With this beautiful description of the winter-life of hardy perennial plants, I may well close the "Plant-lore and Garden-craft of Shakespeare." The subject has stretched to a much greater extent than I at all anticipated when I commenced it, but this only shows how large and interesting a task I undertook, for I can truly say that my difficulty has been in the necessity for condensing my matter, which I soon found might be made to cover a much larger space than I have given to it; for my object was in no case to give an exhaustive account of the flowers, but only to give such an account of each plant as might illustrate its special use by Shakespeare.

Having often quoted my favourite authority in gardening matters, old "John Parkinson, Apothecary, of London," I will again make use of him to help me to say my last words: "Herein I have spent my time, pains, and charge, which, if well accepted, I shall think well employed. And thus I have finished this work, and have furnished it with whatsoever could bring delight to those that take pleasure in those things, which how well or ill done I must abide every one's censure; the judicious and courteous I only respect; and so Farewell."

[357:1]"Flowers departTo see their mother-root, when they have blown;Where they together,All the hard weatherDead to the world, keep house unknown."G. Herbert,The Flower.

[357:1]

"Flowers departTo see their mother-root, when they have blown;Where they together,All the hard weatherDead to the world, keep house unknown."

G. Herbert,The Flower.

There's a Daisy.—Ophelia.

Daisies smel-lesse, yet most quaint.Two Noble Kinsmen, Introd. song.

The following Paper on the Daisy was written for the Bath Natural History and Antiquarian Field Club, and read at their meeting, January 14th, 1874. It was then published in "The Garden," and a few copies were reprinted for private circulation. I now publish it as an Appendix to the "Plant-lore of Shakespeare," with very few alterations from its original form, preferring thus to reprint itin extensothan to make an abstract of it for the illustration of Shakespeare's Daisies.

double A with birds and flowers

IALMOST feel that I ought to apologize to the Field Club for asking them to listen to a paper on so small a subject as the Daisy. But, indeed, I have selected that subject because I think it is one especially suited to a Naturalists' Field Club. The members of such a club, as I think, should take notice of everything. Nothing should be beneath their notice. It should be their province to note a multitude of little facts unnoticed by others; they should be "minute philosophers," and they might almost take as their motto the wise words which Milton put into the mouth of Adam, after he had been instructed to "be lowlie wise" (especially in the study of the endless wonders of sea, and earth, and sky that surrounded him)—

"To knowThat which before us lies in daily life,Is the prime wisdom."—Paradise Lost, viii. (192).

I do not apologize for the lowness and humbleness of my subject, but, with "no delay of preface" (Milton), I take you at once to it. In speaking of the Daisy, I mean to confine myself to the Daisy, commonly so-called, merely reminding you that there are also the Great or Ox-eye, or Moon Daisy (Chrysanthemum leucanthemum), the Michaelmas Daisy (Aster), and the Blue Daisy of the South ofEurope (Globularia). The name has been also given to a few other plants, but none of them are true Daisies.

I begin with its name. Of this there can be little doubt; it is the "Day's-eye," the bright little eye that only opens by day, and goes to sleep at night. This, whether the true derivation or not, is no modern fancy. It is, at least, as old as Chaucer, and probably much older. Here are Chaucer's well-known words—

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