STONEHOUSE 349 



Saffron Garth, a long rectangular strip running north and south 

 for 83 yards, and the orchard. The plans are clearly drawn to 

 scale and are marked with numbers which corresponded to his lists 

 of plants. We have even his notes of the exact dimensions of the 

 garden in terms of his own paces, from which we may infer that he 

 was a man of no great stature. ' 2,624 of my usuall paces made 

 an English mile of 1,056 paces Geometricall : that is 5,280 feete 

 and 1,760 yards. The garden 15 times half round is just a mile; 

 J 6 times is a mile and 57 yards.' 



Though we have their orientation, we have no clue as to how 

 the three parts of his garden were disposed, but may conjecl^ure 

 that the Rectory stood in the angle of the best garden. Plums, 

 Peaches, Apricots and a Pomegranate covered the west and north 

 walls; a vine was trained against a wall, possibly of the house. 

 Several rectangles drawn at the ends of paths may represent garden 

 ornaments ; an arbour or summer house seems to have stood in the 

 north-east corner. 



The beds in the style of the sixteenth century may have been 

 the work of an earlier incumbent. They were laid out in five 

 'knots', perhaps enclosed with tile, stone or Box edgings, which 

 bordered the ' forthrights ', as the broader walks were called. 

 According to the plan the beds in the knots were two and three 

 feet in width, and would, as Parkinson (1629) recommended, have 

 contained the greater part of the herbaceous collection. 



' The Safforn-garth 9 times round wants 50 yards of a mile ; 

 and 10 times about it is a mile and 140 yards. The long streight 

 walke in the Safforn-garth is 82 yards; so that this gone 22 times 

 single, or 11 times double, is a mile and 44 yards.' 



The name recalls the fact that in the sixteenth century ' Crocus ', 

 or Saffron, was perhaps the most paying crop that it was possible 

 to raise in a garden. ' Our English Honey and Saffron,' wrote 

 BuUein in 1588, 'is better than any that cometh from any strange 

 or foreign land.' 



* A little of ground 



brings Saffron a pound,' 



and in 1539-40, Doncaster Saffron was sold at more than ^i per 

 pound weight. Saffron Hill and Saffron Walden recall an extinct 

 British horticultural industry, but Darfield Rectory, as the present 

 Rector informs me, is noted for a Crocus border 170 yards long. 



Most of Stonehouse's fruit was grown in the Saffron Garth and 

 the Orchard, both of which were walled in. In the former he had 

 ^^ wall-trees, planted 6 feet apart, against the walls on the north 



