We are reminded in a magic page of our own immortal 

 poet, of those of Julius Caesar, and of 



his walks, 



His private arbours, and new-planted orchards, 

 when the noble Antony invokes the Romans to 



kiss dead Caesar's wounds, 



And dip their napkins in his sacred blood. 



Horace's incomparable lines on the happiness and delight 

 of a country life, his country granges, his woods, his garden, 

 and his grove; and many of the other Roman writers, abund- 

 antly shew their attachment to gardens, as accompaniments 

 to their splendid villas. There was scarcely a romantic val- 

 ley that was not crowded with their villas. 



Martial and Juvenal ridicule the clipped box trees, cut 

 dragons, and similar grotesque fancies, at some of their villas, 

 both admiring the nobler grace with which nature adorned 

 each spot.* 



The Romans were perhaps the first who introduced that 

 art into Britain, meagerly as they did introduce it. The 

 earliest account I can find of an English writer on Garden- 

 ing, is, 



Alfred, an Englishman , surnamed the Philosopher, much 

 respected at Rome. He died 1270, and left four books on 

 the Meteors of Aristotle ; also one on Vegetables, and five 



* Nearly eight pages of Mr. Loudon's Encyclop. are devoted to a very 

 interesting research on the gardens of the Romans. Sir Joseph Banks has 

 a paper on the Forcing Houses of the Romans, with a list of Fruits culti- 

 vated by them, now in our gardens, in vol. 1 of the Hort. Trans. 



