FLORICULTURE 
shrubbery through the lawn, as already 
mentioned. The finest effects can be 
made by the judicious border planting, 
leaving aS much open space forming vis- 
tas from the house piazza or views from 
the various windows, so that the grounds 
will, in reality, look much larger than 
they really are. 
History and General Principles of Land. 
seape Gardening 
L. P. JENSEN 
History 
The history of the gardens of the an- 
cients is more or less fabulous. 
The Jewish paradise is supposed to have 
been situated in Persia, of great extent, 
watered by a river and abounding in tim- 
ber and woods. Paradise seems to have 
borne some resemblance to a pleasure 
ground of the modern taste The gardens 
of the Hesperides were situated in Africa 
near Mt. Atlas, or according to some, near 
Cyrenaica. They are described as lying 
in places eighteen fathoms deep, steep 
on all sides, two stadia in diameter and 
covered with trees of various kinds plant- 
ed very close together. The principal 
Jewish garden was King Solomon’s. This 
garden is said to have been quadrangular 
and surrounded by a high wall. It con- 
tained a variety of plants, such as “the 
hyssop which springeth out of the wall,” 
odoriferous and showy flowers as the rose, 
lily of the valley, calamus, camphire, 
spikenard, saffron and cinnamon; trees as 
the cedar, pine and fir, and fruits, as the 
fig, grape, apple and pomegranate. It 
contained water in wells, and in living 
streams. The situation of the garden was 
probably near to the palace 
The gardens of Cyrus, at Babylon, 2,000 
years B. C., were of square form and ac- 
cording to Strabo, each side was 400 feet 
in length, so that the area of the base was 
nearly four acres. They were distin- 
guished by their romantic situations, 
great extent and diversity of uses and 
were reckoned in their day among the 
wonders of the world. They were made 
to rise with terraces constructed in a curi- 
ous manner one above the other in the 
form of steps, and supported by stone pil- 
lars to a height of more than 300 feet, 
975 
gradually diminishing till the area of the 
upper surface was reduced considerably 
below that of the base. The garden of 
the Phacacian King, Aelianus, was situated 
on the island of that name, probably an 
Asiatic island. It is minutely described 
by Homer in his “Odyssey,” and may be 
compared to the garden of an ordinary 
farm house in point of extent and form, 
but in respect to variety of fruits and 
vegetables was far inferior It embraced 
the front of the palace, containing less 
than four acres surrounded by a hedge 
and interspersed with three or four sorts 
of fruit trees, some beds of vegetables and 
some borders of flowers. It contained two 
wells, one for the garden, and the other 
for the palace. 
The Persian and Grecian gardens of 
this period seem to have been nearly of 
the same description as those mentioned 
We know little of the gardens of the 
Augustan age of Horace and Virgil, gen- 
erally thought to be that in which taste 
and elegance were eminently conspicuous. 
From the descriptions of the villas Laur- 
entinum and Thusculum, by the younger 
Pliny, we gain a general idea of the gar- 
dens of the Romans. The Laurentinum 
was a winter residence on the Tiber, be- 
tween Rome and the sea, now called San 
Lorenza, seventeen miles from Rome. The 
garden was small and is but slightly de- 
scribed. It was surrounded by hedges of 
box and rosemary, and there were plat- 
forms and terraces; figs, mulberries and 
grapes were the fruits. Pliny’s Thuscu- 
lan villa was situated in a natural amphi- 
theater of the Appenines whose lofty sum- 
mits were clothed with forests of oak and 
their fertile sides covered with cornfields, 
vineyards and villas. Pliny’s description 
of this villa is of importance as showing 
what was esteemed as good taste in the 
gardens and grounds of a great Roman 
nobleman of the first century, under the 
reign of Trajan, when Rome was still in 
her glory. 
The Thusculan gardens may have con- 
tained from three to four acres and lay 
around the palace. The terrace is de- 
scribed as in the front of the portico and 
near the house; from this descended a 
