88 Gleanings in Old Garden Literature. 



ripeness, r and they are best, and may be kept to 

 bake or roast ; the other beaten down by the wind, 

 and they must be spent as fruit (not being ripe), else 

 they will wither and come to nothing ; and therefore 

 it is not good by any means to beat down fruit with 

 poles, or to carry them in carts, loose or jogging, or 

 in half filled Sacks, where they may be bruised." 



The practice of variegating the foliage of 

 plants and shrubs was in the time of 

 Charles II. evidently of some standing, 

 for Worlidge devotes a chapter to what he 

 calls " Variegated or Gilded Leafed Plants." 

 He specifies the laurel, the box, the peri- 

 winkle, and rosemary. But he relates an 

 anecdote, which may shew that the process 

 was sometimes accidentally accomplished 

 without human agency: 



"Travelling," he writes, "through some part of 

 Glamorganshire, and discoursing of these Variegated 

 greens, one of that country assured me that in that 

 country was a very large Holly with all its leaves 

 curiously Gilded, growing wild in a wood, which was 

 not unlikely, for from the woods they first came." 



He brings his narrative about variegation 



