II THE GARDEN IN ENGLAND 35 



hold in England — the national tradition was too 

 sober to accept them — for in Bacon's own words 

 they were " nothing to the true pleasure of a 

 garden." And, again, it must be remembered 

 that Bacon's essay can no more be taken as an 

 accurate picture of the average garden of his 

 time than his Essay on Building as a representa- 

 tion of an ordinary Elizabethan house. Both 

 essays are ideal sketches, and Bacon's treatment 

 is purely literary ; with all its wealth of detail 

 it is exceedingly difficult to work out any 

 possible plan to fit the description given. The 

 gardens at Moor Park, told of by Sir William 

 Temple, were said to have been laid out on the 

 lines of this essay — probably the designer was 

 not careful to inform his client how much was 

 due to Bacon, and how much to the designer — 

 for when all is said. Bacon's ideas of design were 

 those of the amateur. Gardens appealed to him 

 only as so much literary material, and he wrote 

 a very charming essay on the subject, knowing 

 probably no more about it than any other 

 gentleman of his time. His most elaborate 

 treatise, the Sylva Syharum^ deals with experi- 

 ments and observations in horticulture, treated 

 as one application of his system of philosophy ; 

 but the book has no relation to garden design 

 at all. 



Bacon, moreover, was not the first in the field 

 with his Essay on Gardens. Borde and Thomas 

 Hill had both dealt with the subject many years 



