Book I. 



GARDENING IN GERMANY. 



43 



ing established the principles of gardening in France, as an art of design and ttiste ; but 

 it does not appear clear that the artists in general have caught their principles. 



SucsECT. 6. French Gardening, as a Science, and as to the Authors it has produced. 



197. The science of gardening is well understood in France among the eminent gar- 

 deners and professors ; perhaps better than in any other country. Quintinyeand Du Hamel 

 applied all the physiological knowledge of their day to the treatment of fruit and forest 

 trees ; and the theory of grafting, of healing wounds, and of artificial excitements to 

 fruitfulness, was explained in their works. Buflbn, Magnal, Parent, and Rosier, Aubert 

 de Petit Tliouars, Bosc, and above all Professor Thouin, have brought tlie whole science 

 of chemistry and of botany to bear on the various parts of gardening and rural economy, 

 which they have treated in various works, but especially in the ISfouveau Cours d' Agricidture, 

 (14 vols. 8vo.) published in 1810. 



198. The court and national gardejiers have, for the last thirty years, been men eminent 

 for scientific and practical knowledge ; who have received a regular education, and rank 

 with other crown officers. It is not there as in England, where the royal situations have 

 always been occupied by mere empirical practitioners, recommended by some court 

 favorite, or succeeding by the common chances of life. 



1 99. Tlie great mass of operative garderiers in France, both as masters and labourers, are 

 incomparably inore ignorant both of gardening, as a science, and of knowledge in general, 

 tlian the gardeners of this country ; few of them can read : and the reason of this ignorance 

 is, that there is no demand for good master-gardeners. The pupils and apprentices of the 

 Jardin des Plantes are mostly sent to manage the provincial botanic gardens, or to the few 

 proprietors who have first-rate gardens. The cliief of them are foreigners, who return to 

 Germany or Italy, Indeed, where there is no forcing, and few plants in pots, scientific 

 gardeners are less necessary; the management of fruit-trees in France being reduced to 

 mere routine. 



200. The French authors on gardening are very numerous, but Quintinye is their most 

 original and meritorious writer on horticulture, Du Hamel on planting, and Girardin and 

 D'Argenville on landscape-gardening. Their works on flowers are chiefly translations 

 from the Dutch. 



- Sect. IV. Of the Rise, Progress, and present Stale of Gardening in Germany. 



201. The Germanic confederation, as arrajiged in 1815, includes the empire of Austria, 

 the kingdoms of Prussia, Bavaria, Saxony, Hanover, Wurtemburg, and Denmark, be- 

 sides various dukedoms and free towns. ITie materials which we have been able to collect 

 for so extensive a field, are exceedingly scanty ; and, indeed, it appears from Hirschfield, 

 that gardening made little progress in Germany till the seventeenth century. At present, 

 the taste for our art there is very considerable, and seems to have received a new stimulus 

 from the recent peace. Gardens," Madame de Stael observes, " are almost as beauti- 

 ful in some parts of Germany as in England ; the luxury of gardens always implies a 

 love of the country. In England, simple mansions are often built in the middle of the 

 most magnificent parks ; the proprietor neglects his dwelling to attend to the ornaments 

 of nature. This magnificence and simplicity united do not, it is true, exist in the same 

 degree in Germany ; yet in spite of the want of wealth, and the pride of feudal dignity, 

 there is every where to be remarked a certain love of the beautiful, which sooner or later 

 must be followed by taste and elegance, of which it is the only real source. Often, in the 

 midst of the superb gardens of the German princes, are placed ^olian harps, close by 

 grottoes, encircled with flowers, that the wind may waft the sound and the perfume to- 

 gedier. The imagination of the northern people thus endeavours to create for itself a 

 sort of Italy ; and during the brilliant days of a short-lived summer, it sometimes attains 

 the deception it seeks." [Germani/, chap. i. ) 



SuBSECT. 1. German Gardening, as an Art of Design and Taste. 



202. The French style of gardening has prevailed in Germany from the earliest period 

 of history or tradition. The German architects, observes Hirschfield in 1777, in making 

 themselves masters of the gardens, as well as of the houses, tended to spread and per- 

 petuate the prejudice. " A singular and deplorable Gallomania pervaded Germany from 

 the prince to the peasant, which neither irony, patriotism, nor productions which sliow 

 the force of our natural genius could destroy ; ' ainsi font les Franqois ; voila ce que jai 

 vu en France ; these words were suflScient to reduce the German to a mere copyist, and 

 in consequence we had French gardens, as we had Parisian fashions. Our nobles gave 

 the first example of imitation, and executed on their estates little miniatures of Versailles, 

 Marly, and Trianon. But now (1777)," he adds, "tlie Aurora of judgmentand good taste 

 begins to arise in our country, and the recitals of the happy changes made in England in 

 the gardents, has prepared the way for the same revolution in Germany. However, we 



