44 JOURNAL OF THE ROYAL HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



London was a skilful cultivator of all vegetable produce ; a 

 man of perseverance and industry ; whose labours and works 

 will be an impetus to those who are beginning to flag in the 

 good work in which they are engaged. In the execution of his 

 duties, we are told, he was accustomed to ride fifty to sixty miles 

 a day on horseback. This activity and continued exertion 

 brought on a fever which caused his death after a short illness 

 of a fortnight's duration. 



{Stephen Switzer, though born in the 17th century, did not 

 really become prominent as a horticulturist till about the year 

 1702. He was for many years employed under London and Wise, 

 and in 1706 assisted in laying out Blenheim. He afterwards held 

 several situations as 'gardener, and finally became a general 

 gardener and seedsman at Milbank. During his early years he 

 tells us that cucumbers were seldom seen before the end of May, 

 and melons had rarely been cut before the middle of June ; but 

 still the more industrious were striving to outvie each other as 

 to the earliest date at which these subjects could be obtained. 

 The backward state of horticulture in general in his day he 

 attributed, so we are told, to the ignorance of its practitioners, 

 and that ignorance to the want of encouragement by their 

 employers and the people in general. Many, he says, there are 

 in good places "who never open a book, nor can they either read, 

 spell or pronounce rightly the names of the plants and herbs 

 they every moment have in view." His works and labours are 

 undoubtedly evidences that he was a thoroughly sound and 

 practical gardener. But even in the time of Switzer we find that 

 jealousy and un-English spirit present which is still to be found ; 

 and his opinion of London's abilities as a designer was not very 

 great, nor the abilities of Scotchmen as gardeners, about which he 

 says : " These Northern lads, which whether they have served 

 any time in this art or not, very few of us know anything of y 

 yet by the help of a little learning and a great deal of impudence, 

 they invade these Southern provinces, and the natural benignity 

 of this warmer climate has such a wonderful influence on them, 

 that one of them knows, or at least pretends to know, more in 

 one twelvemonth than a laborious, honest Southcountryman does 

 in seven years." 



The position Philip Miller, author of the " Gardeners' 

 Dictionary," attained is an example of what some of our young 



