294 IN A GLOUCESTERSHIRE GARDEN 



plant-life, as was done some years ago most successfully 



by Mr. Henslow, and also by Mr. Dawes, the Dean of 



Hereford, who gave object-lessons in his garden at 



King's Somborne ; but this requires a special knowledge, 



and these two men were specially gifted with great 



knowledge, and with the happy power of imparting 



their knowledge to others. 



There is one way in which I am sure the country 



parson might make his garden useful to himself in his 



ministerial work : — 



'I am not in the least ashamed' (says the Rev. John 

 Laurence in The Clergyman's Recreation in 1714) 'to say and 

 own that most of the time I can spare from the necessary 

 care and business of a large parish, and from my other studies, 

 is spent in my garden, and I cannot but encourage and invite 

 my reverend brethren to the love of a garden, having myself 

 all along reaped so much fruit both in a figurative and literal 

 sense.' 



The figurative fruits are the spiritual lessons he had 



learned from his flowers and garden ; and I think the 



old writers and the old gardeners were more alive to 



these lessons than we are now. St. Francis de Sales 



was very fond of drawing his illustrations from flowers, 



and his notices of flowers and their lessons have been 



collected into a 'Mystical Flora.' Joachim Camerarius, 



an excellent botanist, published in 1590 a Centuria of 



Emblems from plants ; and with its pretty plates and 



