FOURTEENTH AND FIFTEENTH CENTURIES. 55 



Within the enclosure all was trim and neat. All round against 

 the wall a bank of earth was thrown up, the front of which was 

 faced with brick or stone, and the mould planted with sweet- 

 smelling herbs. At intervals there were recesses with seats or 

 benches covered with turf, " theck yset and soft as any velvet." 

 Low mounds of earth were also made here and there, in the 

 garden, " on which one might sit and rest," and these "benches" 

 were also " turved with newe turves grene." The little paths 

 throughout the garden were covered with sand or gravel, and 

 kept free from weeds. Lydgate mentions a garden, in which 

 " all the alleys were made playne with sand." ^ 



No garden was considered complete without its arbour, its 

 "privy playing place." They were either set in a nook in the 

 wall, or in a part of the garden sheltered by a thick hedge. The 

 arbour, or " herber," was made of trees thickly intertwined with 

 climbing plants, to screen them from the eyes of the intruder. 

 One is thus described in The Flower and the Leaf : — 



" And at the last a path of little brede 

 I found, that greatly had not used be, 

 For it forgrowen was with grasse and weede. 

 That well-unneth ^ a wighte might it se : 



Thought I, this path some whidar goth, parde, 



And so I followed, till it me brought 



To right a pleasaunt herber well y wrought." 



That benched was and with turfes new 

 P'reshly turved, whereof the grene gras, 

 So small, so thicke, so short, so fresh of hew, 



That most like unto green wool wot I it was : 

 The hegge also that yede in compas % 

 And closed in all the greene herbere 

 With sicamour § was set and eglatere. 



And shapen was this herber roofe and all 

 As a pretty parlour : and also 



* The Cliorle and the Bird. f ^= scarcely, liardly. 



X ^li-'eiii round it. § =^ lioiieysiick/e. 



