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GARDENS OF THE BIBLE. 



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Pour'd forth profuse on liill and dale and plain, 



****** 



Groves whose rich trees wept odorous gums and balm, 



Others Avhose fruit burnish'd with golden rind, 



Hung amiable, Hespei'ian fables true, 



If true, here only, and of delicious taste : 



Betwixt them lawns, or level downs, and flocks . 



Grazing the tender herb, were interspers'd. 



Or palmy hillock ; or the flowery lap 



Of some irriguous valley spread her store, 



Flowers of all hue, and without thorn the Rose." 



Among tlie trees of tbis garden was " tbe tree of life," and " the tree of the know- 

 ledge of good and evil." Of the first, in addition to its spiritual import, it is supposed 

 that it was an evergreen tree, flourishing continually with leaves and fruit. It grew 

 nowhere except within the garden ; for it is mentioned as a reason for man's expul- 

 sion therefrom, "lest he should put forth his hand and take of the tree of life." Of 

 the second, we know only that it was appointed to serve as a test of man's obedience. 

 In this garden man was placed, " to dress and to keep it" — that is, to cultivate and 

 to beautify it still further. A high trust and privilege, surely, it was to have charge 

 of such a paradise ! How long Adam held possession of this happy abode, we do not 

 know. How long the trees waved in their glory, and the flowers diff"used their fra- 

 grance, and the soil yielded its return to man's easy labor; how long before the thorn 

 and thistle were seen shooting up from the ground, and frost and blight and untimely 

 storms and burning suns turned that garden into a desert, we are entirely ignorant : 

 but that such a time came, and all too soon, we have abundant evidence. 



The Bible contains but few special notices of the gardening of the Hebrews, or of 

 other contemporaneous nations. In the early ages of the world, when men seem to 

 have led a somewhat migratory life, little was done in the way of tilling the soil 

 beyond what was necessary for the immediate wants of the inhabitants ; and in the 

 climate of Eastern Asia, abounding in so many spontaneous fruits, but little labor was 

 required. When, however, men became established in permanent homes, — as, for 

 example, the Jews in Canaan, — they at once began to cultivate their fields and to 

 plant gardens with much care. 



Jacob had a garden in Hebron, from which at one time his sons gathered " a little 

 balm, and a little honey, spices and myrrh, nuts and almonds," as a present for the 

 Governor of Egypt. Solomon had a garden in Jerusalem, It was situated on the 

 eastern side of the city, just without the walls, between Mount Zion and the brook 

 Cedron. Of its size we have no certain knowledge, though, if we may judge from the 

 number of trees and plants grown within it, it must have been large. It was square, 

 and surrounded by a high wall. Its proprietor was quite a botanist, for his time; 

 and, having immense wealth at his command, stocked his grounds with things rare 

 and beautiful, as well as with those that were simply useful. There was "the Hyssop* 

 which springeth out of the wall;" "odoriferous and showy flowers, as the Rose, the 



* Supposed by many to have been a species of moes. 



