28 A HISTORY OF GARDENING IN ENGLAND. 



The Bishop of Ely's Holbourne vineyard did not stand 

 alone in that locality. Hard by was another belonging to the 

 Earl of Lincoln, from which about fifty gallons of verjuice were 

 sold in one year (1295-6).* A little further on, in Smithfield, 

 a vineyard was planted by Geoffrey, Earl of Essex, on the 

 land belonging to the " Canons of Trinity Church, London," 

 which was restored to that body in 1137.! 



It would be tedious to enumerate all the vineyards belonging 

 to monastic houses which are known to have existed, and of 

 which there is merely the name or some slight record surviving, 

 as at Canterbury, Beaulieu, Ramsey, Abingdon, Spalding, Bury 

 St. Edmunds, and many others. J Enough has been told to 

 show how important an item the vineyard was in the gardener's 

 department. His cares, however, did not quite end there ; as 

 the moat and the ponds were also under his charge. At 

 Norwich the gardener's office bore the expense of cleaning the 

 ditches which divided the various gardens, the Prior's from the 

 chief garden, and so on. At Abingdon we find also he defrayed 

 the cost of cleaning out the moat, and both there and at 

 Ramsey the gardener purchased nets and baskets for catching 

 the fish in the moat and ponds. || 



To get at the details of the management of monastic gardens, 

 we have to -go so constantly to the accounts of the office, and 

 to look so entirely at the business side of the question, that one 

 is apt to forget the other aspect, namely, the pleasure they 

 afforded. But, alas! there are few gardens in existence which can 

 give any idea of what these were really like. A thick hedge or a 



* Duchy of Lancaster account. Bundle i. No. i. 



f Syllabus of Rymer's Feeder a. Vol. I., p. 3. 



{ The total cost of the vintage one year at Abingdon was 45. 4d. !n 1388 -9 the 

 profits from the vineyard were "from wine, 135. 4d., from grapes, 2os. o^d., from 

 verjuice, 2s., from vines, 4d." Accounts of Abingdon Abbey > by R. E. G. Kirk. 



1483-4. " For cleaning the great ditch that goes round the garden with 

 the small ditch which is next the ' scaccarium ' (= exchequer) of the gardener, 

 i8d." (There is an entry, 1516, "for making a window of glass in the 

 ' scaccarium,' 2od.") 



|| Abingdon, 1450-1 : Et in welez emptis pro piscibus capiendis in fossato 

 conventus 45. lod. et in factura unius tronke pro piscibus custodiendis 3d. 



