THE GARDEN-CRAFT OF SHAKESPEARE 
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London garden more than a thousand species of hardy plants; 
and Bacon’s famous “ Essay on Gardens ” not only shows what 
a grand idea of gardening he had himself, but also that this 
idea was not Utopian, but one that sprang from personal 
acquaintance with stately gardens, and from an innate love of 
gardens and flowers. Almost at the same time, but a little 
later, we come to the celebrated “John Parkinson, Apothecary 
of London, the King’s Herbarist,” whose “Paradisus Ter- 
restris,” first published in 1629, is indeed “a choise garden of 
all sorts of rarest flowers.” His collection of plants would 
even now be considered an excellent collection, if it could be 
brought together, while his descriptions and cultural advice 
show him to have been a thorough practical gardener, who 
spoke of plants and gardens from the experience of long- 
continued hard work amongst them. And contemporary 
with him was Milton, whose numerous descriptions of flowers 
are nearly all of cultivated plants, as he must have often seen 
them in English gardens. 
And so we are brought to the conclusion that in the passages 
quoted above, in which Shakespeare speaks so lovingly and 
tenderly of his favourite flowers, these expressions are not to be 
put down to the fancy of the poet, but that he was faithfully 
describing what he daily saw or might have seen, and what no 
doubt he watched with that carefulness and exactness which 
could only exist in conjunction with a real affection for the objects 
on which he gazed, “ the fresh and fragrant flowers,” “ the pretty 
flow’rets,” “ the sweet flowers,” “ the beauteous flowers,” “ the 
sweet summer buds,” “ the blossoms passing fair,” “ the darling 
buds of May.” 
II.—(Barfcens. 
(1) It standeth north-north-east and by east from the west corner of thy 
curious-knotted Garden.— Love’s Labour’s Lost , i. 1, 248. 
(2) He hath a Garden circummured with brick, 
Whose western side is with a Vineyard back’d ; 
