GARDENS OF CELEBRITIES AND 
CELEBRATED GARDENS 
CHAPTER I 
FTER the Romans left Britain, about a.p. 300, the art 
of landscape gardening, in which they had _ instructed 
the islanders, died out, and under the Saxons the garden 
was merely a yard; the word “ yard’’—etymologically derived 
from the Anglo-Saxon geard, t.e., hedges, enclosure—signifying the 
small, enclosed space in which those plants intended for domestic 
use were sheltered. But though neglected in England, the art 
had advanced in France; and when, in 1066, the Normans came 
over, they reintroduced it, bringing with them many plants and 
fruits hitherto unknown in Britain, and an appreciation of flowers 
for their own sake. The author of ‘‘ Gardens Old and New ” tells 
an anecdote that attests this: Christina, Abbess of the famous 
Abbey of Romney, in Hampshire, who was closely allied to the 
former royal house of England, had under her care her young 
niece, Matilda, afterwards Queen of Henry I. She must have 
been considered beautiful, for William Rufus desired to see her, 
and when (his reputation being dubious) the Abbess demurred, 
he pretended that he had only come to see the flowers in the 
convent garden, reported to be worth a visit. 
Henry of Huntingdon, an early authority, tells us that Henry II. 
made a ‘‘ Parke,”’ or chase, at Woodstock, in Oxfordshire. In a 
bower in its leafy groves, approached by a labyrinthine path, 
accessible only to one who had the clew, the King concealed his 
love, fair Rosamund Clifford. It was there his Queen discovered 
her, and offered her the choice of death by the poison bowl or 
the dagger. ‘Tradition has it that she chose the former. 
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