ix 



bon Henri," and no less by Sully ;* Boyceau, attend- 

 ant of the gardens of Louis XIII., who, in 1638, pub- 

 lished Traite du Jardinage, selon les raisons de la 

 nature, et de Tart, avec divers desseins de parterres, 

 pelouses, bosquets, &c; Andre Mollet, who wrote 

 Le Jardin de plaisir, &c. ; Claude Mollet, head gar- 

 dener to Henry IV. and Louis XIIL, who, in 1595, 

 planted the gardens of Saint Germain-en-laye, Mon- 



* It has often struck me (perhaps erroneously), that the attach- 

 ment which the great Sully evinced for "gardens, even to the last 

 period of his long-protracted life, (eighty-two), might in some de- 

 gree have been cherished or increased from the writings of the 

 great Lord Bacon. When this illustrious duke retired to his coun- 

 try seats, wounded to the heart by the baseness of those who had 

 flattered him when Henry was alive, his noble and honest mind in- 

 dulged in the embellishment of his gardens. I will very briefly 

 quote what history relates : — " The life he led in his retreat at Vil- 

 lebon, was accompanied with grandeur and even majesty, such as 

 might be expected from a character so grave and full of dignity as his. 

 His table was served with taste and magnificence; he admitted to it 

 none but the nobility in his neighbourhood, some of the principal gen- 

 tlemen, and the ladies and maids of honour, who belonged to the 

 duchess of Sully. He often went into his gardens, and passing through 

 a little covered alley, which separated the flower from the kitchen 

 garden, ascended by a stone staircase (which the present duke of 

 Sully has caused to be destroyed), into a large walk of linden trees, 

 upon a terrace on the other side of the garden. It was then the 

 taste to have a great many narrow walks, very closely shaded with 

 four or five rows of trees, or palisadoes. Here he used to sit upon 

 a settee painted green, amused himself by beholding on the one 

 side an agreeable landscape, and on the other a second alley on a 

 terrace extremely beautiful, which surrounded a large piece of wa- 

 ter, and terminated by a wood of lofty trees. There was scarce 

 one of his estates, those especially which had castles on them, 



b 



