SCOTTISH GARDENS 



CONCEENING SCOTTISH GAEDENS 

 IN GENEEAL 



[FTER the withdrawal of the Roman 

 legions from Britain in the fifth 

 century, to quote the graphic words 

 of the late Dr. W. F. Skene, "the 

 British Isles seemed, as it were, to 

 retire again into the recesses of that western ocean 

 from which they had emerged in the reign of the 

 Emperor Claudius." 1 In the following century, 

 Procopius, writing from Constantinople a scanty 

 description of the lost Roman provinces of Britain, 

 said that he believed that part of the island 

 nearest Gaul was still inhabited and fertile, but 

 that it was divided from the rest of the island by 

 a wall, beyond which was a region infested by 

 wild beasts, with an atmosphere fatal to human 

 life, wherefore it was tenanted only by the spirits 

 of the departed. Now the wall referred to was 



1 Celtic Scotland, i. 114. 

 A 1 



