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bestow; but, in despite of them all, he thus gives it 
as his opinion that the simplest pleasures are the best. 
In the above description of the garden of Alcinous, we 
have all that riches and taste can heap together; but it 
does not require “ this gay profusion of luxurious bliss ” 
to make a garden the source both of healthful employ¬ 
ment and sincere gratification. “ Happy they that can 
create a rose-tree, or erect a honeysuckle,” says the poet 
Gray; “ that can watch the brood of a hen, or see a fleet 
of their own ducklings launch into the water.” 
It is somewhat remarkable that in Virgil’s description 
of the old Corycian’s garden, which it is supposed con¬ 
tains all the fruits and plants common in cultivated 
grounds at that period, the fig, the vine, and the olive 
are not included; an omission accounted for by Sir 
W. Temple on the score that “ these trees were grown 
to be fruits of their fields, rather than of their gardens.” 
This statement every traveller in those delicious climes 
confirms: they adorn the wayside, the fields, the hills, 
as commonly as the oak and the hop do ours. 
What a beautifully vivid picture the poet, lately 
quoted, gives of the route towards Naples ! “The 
minute one leaves his Holiness’ dominions, the face of 
things begins to change from wide uncultivated plains 
to olive groves and well-tilled fields of corn, intermixed 
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