148 A IlIsrORY OF GARDENIXG IN ENGLAND. 



from the Apricot tree. . . . Take away in time all the head 



of your plum tree and so you have gotten many 



Apricot trees out of one." Later on "And. Hill" is quoted 

 again, and his advice is to plant the trees against an east wall, 

 and to protect them with a " course cloth ... in the night or 

 in cold weather." Piatt also mentions, as rather an unusual 

 thing, that "' Sir Francis Walsingham caused divers Apricock 

 trees to be planted against a south Wall, and their Branches to be 

 born up also against the wall, according to the manner of vines, 

 whereby his plumbs did ripen three or four weeks before any 

 other." In 1611, " ;^ioo was paid to William Hogan, keeper of 

 His Magesties still-house and garden at Hampton Court, for 

 planting the walls of the said garden with apricot trees, peach 

 trees, plum trees, and vines of choice fruits." * 



Gerard iigures four varieties of peach. " The white peach 

 with meate about the stone of a white colour ; the red 

 peach with meate of a gallant red colour, like wine in 

 taste and therefore marvellous pleasant ; the D'auant peach 

 with meate of a golden colour ; and the yellow peach, of a 

 yellow colour on the outside, and likewise on the inside 

 . of the greatest pleasure and best taste of all the 

 other of his kinds." He makes no mention of the nectarine, 

 which, however, by Parkinson's time had become well known. 

 Six varieties are described in a chapter to themselves, although 

 he says " they have been with us not many years." He gives 

 twenty varieties of peach, and a woodcut illustrates six of these ; 

 two of them are considerably smaller than the apricot on the 

 same plate. Although Piatt tells us that a peach grafted on a 

 nut will have no kernel, he cannot quite believe — although he 

 gives the recipe — that a peach tree watered three days running 

 with goat's milk, when beginning to flower, will produce pome- 

 granates. Most of his other observations on their culture are 

 practical and correct. They like, he says, a clay soil, and to 

 be water-logged at the root destroys them. They will grow 

 from stones, and bring forth a " kindly peach," but they thrive 

 best when grafted on a plum stock. Bacon mentions nectarines 



* Issue Kollb of the Exchequer, James I. By F. Devon, 1836. 



