The last
mentioned work contains the best account yet published of the gardens
of the olden time. Britton's "History of Cassiobury" (folio, 1837),
p. 17, also contains some curious particulars of the original
plantations and pleasure grounds of that interesting mansion.
The gardens at Lavington, which are described in the present chapter,
were evidently of the same character with those of Wilton. Chelsey-
garden is very minutely described by Aubrey, but our limits forbid its
insertion, especially as it is irrelevant to a History of Wiltshire.-
J. B.]
O janitores, villiciq{ue} felices:
Dominis parantur isti, serviunt vobis.
MARTIAL, Epigramm. 29, lib. x.
To write in the praise of gardens is besides my designe. The pleasure
and use of them were unknown to our great-grandfathers. They were
contented with pot-herbs, and did mind chiefly their stables. The
chronicle tells us, that in the reign of King Henry the 8th pear-
mains were so great a rarity that a baskett full of them was a present
to the great Cardinall Wolsey.
Henry Lyte, of Lyte's Cary, in Somerset, Esq. translated Dodoens'
Herball into English, which he dedicated to Q. Elizabeth, about the
beginning of her reigne [1578]. He had a pretty good collection of
plants for that age; some few whereof are yet alive, 1660: and no
question but Dr. Gilbert, &c. did furnish their gardens as well as
they could so long ago, which could be but meanly.
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