12 ENGLISH PLEASURE GARDENS 



very vague. There were other hanging gardens on a 

 smaller scale at Thebes, Syracuse, and various places 

 of less importance. 



In the fifth century B.C. the Greeks were familiar 

 with the gardens of the Persian satrap, Cyrus the 

 Younger, at Sardis. Xenophon described how Cyrus 

 showed this " Paradise of Sardis," to the Grecian am- 

 bassador Lysander, who was in ecstasies at the " beauty 

 of the trees, the regularity of the planting, the even- 

 ness of their rows, and their making regular angles 

 one to another, in a word, the beauty of the quincunx 

 order in which they were planted and the delightful 

 odours issuing from them." But his admiration was 

 redoubled when, seeing his astonishment at the skill 

 with which all this had been accomplished, Cyrus 

 remarked : " All the trees which you here behold are 

 of my own appointment. I it was who contrived, 

 measured, and laid out the ground for planting these 

 trees, and I can even show you some of them that 

 I planted with my own hand." 



The earliest Grecian gardens, existing before Greece 

 had come into close contact with foreign countries, 

 were characterized by an extreme simplicity, much 

 like that of a modern orchard or kitchen garden. We 

 may draw the conclusion that even the royal gardens 

 were far less elaborate than those described as exist- 

 ing at the same time in the East, from a descrip- 



