GARDENS OF VARIOUS NATIONS. 



S79 



But at a still earlier period of the Roman history, gardens, existed at 

 Rome. We read in Pliny that the kings used to amu^e themselves by 

 working with their own hands in them, as did the Persian monarchs ; 

 and the same authority also informs us that before most of the 

 houses of the poorer citizens of Rome were little gardens, but 

 this pleasure was in later times denied to them by the necessity of 

 shutting out the robbers that infested the city. These were simply 

 little kitchen gardens, or horti, wherein were grown the vegetals for the 

 consumption of the family ; the keeping of them in proper order was 

 considered to be the province of the wife, and this, if neglected, drew 

 upon her the appellation of being " a bad and careless manager of her 

 family," as she would thereby be obliged "to have recourse to the 

 shambles or herb-market." 



Conservatories and hothouses do not seem to have been known before 

 the Christian era, and for their construction thin plates of talc were 

 formerly used instead of glass. By this means the Emperor Tiberius 

 had cucumbers throughout the year, and roses — a very favourite flower 

 of the Romans — were also forced. This people appear to have been 

 very fond of flowers, which they frequently kept in pots in their 

 windows. Yet the number of varieties of plants with which they were 

 conversant appears to be very limited. Of all trees, the plane was 

 the special favourite : they were generally planted in rows. Sometimes 

 they carried their admiration for this kind of tree to such a ridiculous 

 extent that we read of wine being occasionally supplied to them 

 instead of water. But this inordinate love for the plane was not 

 confined to the Romans, for Herodotus writes that in Lydia Xerxes 

 "found a plane-tree so very beautiful, that he adorned it with chains 

 of gold, and assigned the guard of it to one of the Immortal 

 Band." 



Many fruit-trees were introduced into Italy by the Romans, among 

 which were cherries, pomegranates, figs, almonds, citrons, peaches, and 

 apricots. In the time of Pliny the Elder a physician of the name of 

 Antoninus Castor, who lived to be an hundred years old, kept a kind of 

 botanical or physic garden. Pliny visited this garden, and asserts that 



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