212 A HISTORY OF GARDENING IN ENGLAND 
of mushrooms artificially is recommended. The process, a 
very lengthy one, of preparing the beds, is described, which 
took nearly a year to complete. Jean de la Quintinye’s work 
is confined to fruit culture, and he is especially minute in 
describing the correct pruning of fruit-trees, standards, and 
espaliers and wall-fruit. The “ History and Origin of Flowers/’ 
which forms a large part of The Retired Gardener , is a disap¬ 
pointing title, as it is merely a collection of the most fantastical 
myths and legends, such as the origin of the foxglove. Juno, 
working one day, lost her thimble. Jove, to pacify her, said 
he had turned it into a flower, and accordingly up came a 
foxglove. Ornithogalum was a spoilt child, fed only on white 
of egg, till he grew feeble and was dying, so Venus, pitying him, 
turned him into the flower which bears his name—and many 
other such stories. London and Wise give a quaint list of how 
some plants are propagated, or are “ vivacious and lasting, 
which are commonly grown in our flower gardens.” Anemo- 
nies are vivacious by their fangs, Asphodils by their tubers, 
Auriculas, Columbine, Gillyflowers, Grenadil or Passion-flower, 
Lavender, Scabious, Sunflower, Thyme, and the like, by their 
roots ; Crown Imperials by the suckers produced from their 
roots, Ranunculus by their claws, Day-lily by its bulb, Daisy and 
Sea-thrift by their tufts, Tuberose by its suckers, and so on. 
The English Gardener , by Leonard Meager, was also a popular 
book, and went through several editions. But little notice has 
been taken of the author, who was much more old-fashioned 
than his contemporaries. This book, in a quiet way, gives a 
great deal of practical information about fruit and kitchen 
gardening, and his “ Catalogue of Flowers,” “ such as are only 
for ornament in their places where they grow, or for nose-gays,” 
reminds the reader more of Parkinson than of Evelyn or London 
and Wise. He calls the flowers by their homely English names 
—such as Coventry Bell flowers ( Campanula medium), Melan¬ 
choly Gentlemen (Hesperis tristis), Goat’s Rue ( Galega officin¬ 
alis), None-such, or flower of Bristol (. Lychnis chalcedonica), and 
King’s Spear, yellow and white (Asphodelus) . Meager, on the 
title-page of the 1688 edition of his book, says he had been 
“ Thirty years a Practitioner in the Art of Gardening.” From 
the dedication, it appears that for many years he was gardener 
