CHAP, xiv ANCIENT HERB-GARDENS 183 



mind to arrange his shells and corals, and still more to 

 watch the growth of new and beautiful plants from the 

 seeds sent to him from many parts of the world. 



The objects which Fothergill had in view in forming a 

 botanical garden were the cultivation of plants and trees 

 which were beautiful, remarkable for their figure or their 

 fragrance, curious to the scientific mind, or useful in the 

 arts, and especially the introduction of new species which 

 might be to the advantage of medicine or serve as articles 

 of food. Botanical or physic gardens had already become 

 common in England. The Barber Surgeons had a herb- 

 garden attached to their hall in Monkwell Street, London, 

 at an early date, and the College of Physicians from 1587 

 onwards had three such gardens in succession, the first 

 under John Gerarde. The Society of Apothecaries' 

 Physic Garden which still flourishes at Chelsea dates 

 from 1673 : in FothergiU's time, under Philip Miller, it 

 was said to excel all the gardens in Europe. The botanic 

 garden in Edinburgh was founded about 1680 : that at 

 Kew was established by the Princess dowager of Wales 

 in 1760, two years before that of Fothergill. In a letter 

 to Linnaeus dated 1774 Fothergill thus describes the 

 origin of his own garden. " Our Collinson," he writes, 

 " taught me to love flowers, and who that shared his 

 comradeship, could do other than cultivate plants ? 

 What manner of man he was I need not say to thee. It 

 was he urged me to form a garden, himself giving me 

 many things, and opportunity favoured the collection 

 of others. Thus has come into being a paradise (Gaza) 

 of plants of small extent, whose master, if slenderly 

 furnished with botanical science, has at least a burning 

 love of botany itself (res botanica}." 1 



Fothergill at first chose a sheltered plot of land on the 

 Surrey side of the Thames, where vegetable growth was 

 luxuriant, and was about to purchase it, when he learned 

 that there was a tenant-at-will settled upon the ground 

 and depending on its produce for the subsistence of his 

 family. At once he gave up the proposal, stating " that 



1 MS. Letter, in Latin, in the Linnean Society's Library. 



