GLEANINGS ON GARDENS. 23 



'I shall close my observations on this interesting 

 subject with a word of advice, by way of guarding 

 against a pernicious practice which, though hitherto 

 unknown in this county, has lately got some footing 

 in it I mean the infamous custom which pre- 

 vails in some counties of pruning up trees, divesting 

 them of their corner or lateral branches. When a 

 plant is very young, it is sometimes allowable to a 

 certain distance, but should always be done with great 

 caution ; but when trees have begun to form them- 

 selves it is a sort of murder. It stops the growth and 

 produces extreme deformity ; for the sap in the spring 

 of the year being checked in its natural diffusion into 

 the number of branches into which it used to flow 

 becomes distorted 



" As knots, by the conflux of meeting sap, 

 Infect the sound pine, and divert his grain, 

 Tortive and errant, from his course of growth.' 1 ' 



In a large view of London, as it appeared in 1563 

 (and of which there is a reduced copy in Pennant's 

 London, and a neat copy thereof is also sold by Harris, 

 at the corner of St. Paul's), there is a garden adjoining 

 the bull-baiting ground, nearly opposite Queenhithe ; 

 it also exhibits the Strand Gardens, Privy Gardens, 

 and that of the Convent, or Covent, Garden. 



I am indebted to the rich pages of the Encyclo- 



