The French and Dutch Schools. 3 5 



the science of sub-division, by which forest- 

 trees, fruit-trees, herbs, flowers, and vegetables 

 were no longer grown side by side, as it 

 were; and the cultivation of the delicate 

 plants introduced from milder climates ne- 

 cessitated systematic precautions for screen- 

 ing them from the weather. The directions 

 for rearing and protecting the melon, which 

 is emphatically termed "the most precious 

 fruit that your kitchen-garden affords," are 

 very elaborate indeed. They seem to have 

 enclosed the ground selected within a palisade 

 of reeds to exclude the wind, and to have 

 dressed the soil freely with horse-dung ; and 

 new sorts were occasionally received from 

 abroad. Only a few days before his trial, 

 Charles I. is said to have ordered some 

 Spanish melons to be planted in his garden 

 at Wimbledon, then still a royal possession 

 and residence. 



In the last century, the fruit had probably 

 attained as great a perfection as possible. 

 A curious note accompanies a copy of Foote's 

 Dramatic Works (1762)^0 the effect that it 

 was Foote who taught the owner's father to 



