108 The Botanical Renaissance [ch. 



Rembert Dodoens himself made additions to the English 

 translation. The most important stanza is the following : — 



"Great was his toyle, whiche first this worke dyd frame. 

 And so was his, whiche ventred to translate it, 

 For when he had full finisht all the same, 

 He minded not to adde, nor to abate it. 

 But what he founde, he ment whole to relate it. 

 Till Rembert he, did sende additions store. 

 For to augment Lytes travell past before." 



We now come to John Gerard 1 (Plate XII), the best 

 known of all the English herbalists, but who, it must be 

 confessed, scarcely deserves the fame which has fallen to 

 his share. Gerard, a native of Cheshire, was a "Master 

 in Chirurgerie," but was better known as a remarkably 

 successful gardener. For twenty years he supervised the 

 gardens belonging to Lord Burleigh in the Strand, and 

 at Theobalds in Hertfordshire, besides having himself a 

 famous garden in Holborn, then the most fashionable 

 district of London. In 1596 he published a list of the 

 plants which he cultivated in Holborn, which is interesting 

 as being the first complete catalogue ever published of the 

 contents of a single garden. 



Gerard's reputation rests however on a much larger 

 work, 'The Herball or Generall Historie of Plantes,' printed 

 by John Norton in 1597, but the manner in which this book 

 originated does the author little credit. It seems that Norton, 

 the publisher, had commissioned a certain Dr Priest to 

 translate Dodoens' final work, the ' Pemptades ' of 1583, 

 into English, but Priest died before the work was finished. 

 Gerard simply adopted Priest's translation, completed it, 

 and published it as his own, merely altering the arrange- 

 ment from that of Dodoens to that of de l'Obel. He adds 

 insult to injury by gratuitously remarking, in an address to 

 the reader at the beginning of the herbal, that "Doctor 

 Priest, one of our London Colledge, hath (as I heard) trans- 

 lated the last edition of Dodon&us, which meant to publish 

 the same ; but being prevented by death, his translation 

 likewise perished." After the manner of the period, the 

 herbal is embellished with a number of prefatory letters, 



1 The spelling " Gerarde " on the title-page of ' The Herball ' is believed to 

 be an error. See 'A Catalogue of Plants cultivated in the garden of John 

 Gerard,' edited by B. D. Jackson, London, 1876. 



