Page:Archaeological Journal, Volume 5.djvu/408

 308 STATE OF HORTICULTURE IN ENGLAND " There sprang the violet all ncwe, And fresh pervinke, rich of hewe, And flowris yellow, white, and rede ; Such plente grew there nor in the mede." — Chaucer. As this plant will flower under the shade of trees or lofty walls, it was well adapted to ornament the securely enclosed, and possibly sombre, gardens of early times. T'rom an early period the nurtm'e of bees had occupied attention in England ; the numerous entries in Domesday in which honey is mentioned shew how much that product was employed for domestic purposes in the eleventh century. Among other uses to which it was applied was the making of beer or ale {cervisia.) When the duke of Saxony visited Eng- land in the reign of Henry the Second, the sheriff" of Hamp- shire had an allowance in his account for corn, barley, and honey which he had purchased to brew beer for the duke's use''. An apiary was generally attached to a medieval garden, and formed })art of the stock which, according to the usage of early days, was sometimes let out to farm. In the fourteenth century an English writer, whom I have before quoted, ob- served that every hive of bees ought to yield, one with another, two of issue, as some yielded none and others three or four yearlyl In some places, he adds, bees have no food given to them during winter, but where they are fed a gallon of honey may suffice to feed eight hives yearly. He estimated that if the honey were taken only once in two years each hive would yield two gallons. It is in accordance with this ancient practice of gardening that Lawson, in his " Country House- wife's Garden," devotes a chapter to the " husbandry" of bees. "Your bees," he observes, "delight in wood, for feeding, esi)ecially for casting; therefore want not an orchard. A Mayes swarme is Avortli a mares foall : if they want wood they be in danger of flying away." It is not probable that much art was shewn in the laying out of gardens or orchards before the fifteenth century. Water being an absolute necessity, every large garden would be supplied with a pond or well, and it appears from ancient illuminations that fountains, or conduits, often of elaborate ^ Madox's Hist, of the Exchequer. lorn, e la ou horn lour douiie a manger si ' " E cliescouue rouche de eez deit res- pount il pestre viij. rouches tot le yver de poundre de deus rouches par an de lour uu galon de mel par an. E si vous nel issue, lun parniy lautre. Kar acoune lie quillez fors en ij. aunz, si averes ij.ga- rent nule, e acoune iij. ou iiij. par an. E louns de mel de chescoune rouche." — en acoun lu lour doune loni a manger rien Add, MS. G159, fo. 220. de tout le ivcr, e en acou ]u lour doune