CHAP. II. BRITISH ISLANDS. 33 
of orchards; but nothing has reached us respecting the barren 
trees and ornamental shrubs of that period, either in France or 
England. ° 
In the tenth century, monasteries and other religious esta- 
blishments began to abound in the country ; and the monks and 
clergy, who were their principal occupants, were generally either 
natives of foreign countries, or had been educated in Italy. The 
occupants of monasteries have, in all times, been attached to 
gardening ; and, among the plants which those of Britain pro- 
bably introduced from Italy, there can be little doubt that fruit 
trees were included, and probably, also, some trees of ornament, 
and shrubs. The sweet bay and the arbutus, if they were not 
introduced by the Romans, were, in all probability, brought 
over by the monks. It is conjectured by Dr. Walker (Essays 
on Nat. Hist.), that some trees and shrubs were introduced from 
the Holy Land during the time of the crusades; and one of 
these, he thinks, was the English elm. In the dispute already 
noticed (p. 23.), between Daines Barrington and Dr. Ducarel, 
on the question of the sweet chestnut being indigenous, the 
latter refers to a record, dated in the time of Henry IL, by 
which the Earl of Hereford grants to Flexby Abbey the tithe 
of all his chestnuts in the Forest of Dean. It appears highly 
probable that the chestnut, being so productive of human food 
in Italy in the time of the Romans, would be introduced by 
them, wherever they went, as one of the most useful of trees. 
In the beginning of the 13th century, the apple appears to 
have been cultivated to some extent in Norfolk. In the 6th of 
King John (1205), Robert de Evermere was found to hold his 
lordship of Redham and Stokesly, in Norfolk, by petty serjeantry, 
the paying of 200 pearmains, and 4 hogsheads (modios) of wine 
made of pearmains, into the. exchequer, at the feast of St. 
Michael yearly. (Blomfield’s Norfolk, ii. 242. 4to edit., 1810.) 
At the beginning of the 15th century, the rose appears to 
have been not only known, but in extensive cultivation. Sir 
William Clopton granted to Thomas Smyth a piece of ground 
called Dokmedwe in Haustede, for the annual payment of a rose, 
at the nativity of St. John the Baptist, to Sir William and his 
heirs, in lieu of all services, dated at Haustede, on Sunday next 
before the Feast of All Saints, 3 Henry IV. (1402). (Cullum’s 
Hawsted, p.117.) 
In explanation of this deed, it may first be observed that 
ancient deeds are often dated on a Sunday, being executed in 
churches or churchyards, for the greater notoriety: in the 
second place, the rose was then in much more extensive use in 
cultivated society than it is now, when its place is partly occu- 
pied by the great variety of other flowers now in cultivation. — 
The demand for roses formerly was so great, that bushels of 
ef 
