JOURNAL  OF  HORTICULTURE  AND  COTTAGE  GARDENER . 
October  3  1901. 
806 
Scliomburgkia  tibicinis. 
Though  not  in  the  first  flight  for  showy  flowtrs,  this  species  is 
very  interesting;  it  flowers,  moreover,  at  a  dull  season  for  Orchids, 
and  is  of  easy  culture.  Some  growers  have  found  it  shy  flowering, 
but  in  some  cases  this  has  undoubtedly  been  due  to  want 
of  proper  consolidation  of  the  growth  in  autumn  and  winter.  Treated 
like  Lselia  superbiens,  to  which  ^fine  plant  it  bears  a  certain 
resemblance,  it  will  flower  regularly.  ^Ample  pot  room  and  a  rough 
compost  suit  it  best. 
A  Fine  Dendrochilum. 
Dendrochilum  glumaceum  is  in  a  small  state  rather  an  insignificant 
looking  plant,  but  when  really  well  grown  into  a  large,  healthy 
specimen  it  is  a  most  beautiful  Orchid.  I  recently  noted  a  large 
plant  suspended  from  the  roof  of  a  tinv  greenhouse  in  one  of  the 
suburbs  of  Bristol,  and  although  growing  among  a  collection  of  Ferns 
and  waim  greenhouse  plants  it  was  in  peifect  health,  the  long  drooping 
racemes  hanging  about  ithe  basket  in  rich  prolusion.  In  the  words 
of  the  cultivator — who,  by  the  way,  is  quite  a  beginner  in  Orchid 
culture — “  the  plant  has  had  no  special  treatment,  and  has  been  in  the 
same  basket  for  three  seasons,  with  only  a  little  top-dressing  every 
autumn.  It  was  purchased  at  a  sale  of  newly  imported  Orchids,  and 
in  the  three  years  has  almost  doubled  itselt  in  size.” 
This  is  another  instance  of  the  satisfactory  way  in  which  plants 
come  away  when  newly  imported,  thougn,  to  judge  from  the  look  of 
the  plant  noted,  it  has  a  long  life  before  it.  Dendrochilums  or 
Platyclinis,  as  they  are  also  known,  like  ample  light  while  growing, 
and  a  warm  house  well  charged  with  moisture.  In  this  connection 
travellers  in  the  Philippines  tell  us  that  the  air  is  so  humid  that 
leeches  inhabit  the  trees  “  as  if  they  were  terrestrial.” — H.  R.  R. 
- •♦•o - 
Early  English  Gardening. 
( Concluded  from  paqe  296.) 
We  have  recorded  all  that  can  be  stated  with  certainty  respecting 
English  gardening  previous  to  the  Conquest  ;  but,  in  the  absence  of 
positive  documents,  much  of  our  information  is,  of  necessity,  either 
inferential  or  conjectural.  But,  coming  now  to  a  period,  the  account 
of  which  has  been  written,  and  of  whic  i  we  possess  some  existing 
records,  we  are  enabled  to  ascertain  with  greater  certainty  the  state  of 
gardening  during  that  period,  and  to  watch,  in  some  measure,  its 
gradual  development. 
During  these  periods,  marked  by  a  continued  series  of  intestine 
broils,  the  continued  invasions  of  the  Danes,  who  finally  established 
their  power  in  the  island,  a.d.  1017,  and  who,  in  their  turn,  were 
succeeded  by  another  conquering  dynasty  in  1066,  in  the  person  of 
William  I.,  horticulture  continued  unimpaired  and  silently  to  advance. 
Nor  is  this  a  matter  of  surprise,  for  the  Saxons  and  Danes,  when  they 
won  a  better  home  than  they  had  left  in  their  native  land,  came  as 
students  in  the  arts  of  civilisation,  which  their  successive  sovereigns 
(Alfred  and  Canute  need  alone  be  instanced)  used  every  means  in 
their  power  to  foster  and  improve.  They  came  not,  as  did  the  Caliph 
Omar  to  Alexandria,  to  destroy  those  acquirements  as  useless  which  he 
did  not  alreaay  possess.  That  the  conquest  of  a  polished  nation,  by 
others  more  barbarous  than  themselves,  is  not  productive  of  that 
lamentable  decay  of  civilisation  that  at  first  sight  might  be  appre¬ 
hended,  is  further  instanced  by  the  result  of  the  conquest  of  the 
Roman  state  by  the  Goths.  The  estimable  arts  of  civilisation  were 
prized  and  studied  bv  the  brave  and  manly  nations  of  the  north, 
whilst  the  meretricious  ornaments  spread  over  them  by  the  effeminate 
Romans  were  despised  and  swept  away.  It  is  only  a  savage,  or  a 
bigot,  that  conquers  to  destroy ;  the  Saxons,  the  Danes,  and  the  Goths 
conquered  to  improve  their  own  comfort  and  condition,  which  alone 
could  be  effected  by  sustaining  the  superior  arts  pursued  by  the  nations 
they  overcame. 
In  the  previous  chapter  we  have  noticed  the  vineyards  of  the 
Anglo-Saxons,  and  the  Normans  did  not  decline  from  this  attention 
paid  to  the  Vine  by  their  predecessors.  At  Edmondsbury,  in  Suffolk, 
the  monks  of  its  monastery  planted  a  vineyard  in  1140,  and  William 
of  Malmesbury,  their  contemporary,  says  that  vineyards  were  possessed 
by  barons  aB  well  as  monks,  and  that  the  Grapes  of  the  Isle  of  Ely 
furnished  wine  next  best  in  quality  to  that  from  the  Grapes  of  the 
vale  of  Gloucester.  Among  other  places,  it  is  evident  that  Winchester 
was  at  a  very  early  period  celebrated  for  its  vineyards,  for  among  our 
most  ancient  literature  are  verses  allusive  to  them,  and  this  line — 
Testis  est  London  ratibus,  Wintonia  Baccho, 
is^  quoted  by  Twynne  (“De  Rebus  Albionicis,”  116)  in  proof  that 
Winton,  afterwards  named  by  the  Saxons  Winchester — that  is,  the 
City  of  Wine — was  so  called  because  there  was  the  best  vintage  in 
Britain. 
Another  old  monkish  verse  is — 
Quatuor  sunt  Eli®  ;  Lanterna,  Capella,  Marias  ; 
Et  Molendinuru,  nec  non  dans  Yinea  vinum. 
It  is  translated  thus  by  Rilph  Austen  :  — 
Four  things  of  Ely  town  much  spoken  are, 
The  leaden  Lanthorn,  Mary’s  Chapel  rare, 
The  mighty  Millhill  in  the  minster  field, 
And  fruitful  vineyards  which  sweet  wine  do  yield. 
Of  Canterbury  and  that  neighbourhood,  the  same  author  makes 
the  abbot  of  St.  Augustine’s  say  that  their  house  was  formerly  not 
destitute  of  Vines  ;  and  Somner  informs  us  that,  in  the  year  1285, 
both  that  abbey  and  the  priory  of  Canterbury  were  plentifully  furnished 
with  vineyards. 
At  Rochester  a  large  piece  of  ground  adjoining  to  the  city  is 
now  called  the  Yine  ;  another  is  so  called  at  Sevenoaks,  in  Kent  ; 
this  also  is  the  name  of  the  seat  formerly  of  the  Barons  Sandes, 
in  Hampshire.  At  Hali  ng,  near  Rochester,  the  Bishop  of  that 
see  had  tormerly  a  vineyard  ;  for  when  Edward  II.,  in  the  nine¬ 
teenth  year  of  his  reign,  was  at  Bockingfield,  Bishop  Hamson  sent  him 
thither,  as  Lambarde  tells  us,  ‘a  present  of  his  drinkes,”  “and  withal 
both  wine  and  Grapes  of  his  own  growth  in  the  vineyarde  at  Hailing.” 
Captain  Nicholas  Teke  of  Godington,  in  Great  Chart,  in  Kent,  “hath 
so  industriously  and  elegantly,”  says  Philipot,  “cultivated  and 
improved  English  Vines  tnat  the  wine,  pressed  and  exacted  out  of 
their  Grapes,  seems  not  only  to  parallel,  but  almost  to  outrival  that  of 
France.” 
Of  Sussex,  Lambarde  writes,  “  History  doth  mention  that  there 
was  about  that  time  (the  Norman  invasion)  great  store  of  Vines  at 
Santlac  (near  to  Battel).”  He  adds,  as  to  Berkshire,  “  the  like 
whereof  I  have  read  to  have  been  at  Windsor,  in  so  much  as  tithe  of 
them  hath  been  there  yielded  in  great  plenty,  which  giveth  me  to 
think  that  wine  hath  been  made  long  since  within  the  realm, 
although  in  our  memory  it  be  accounted  a  great  dainty  to  hear  ol.” 
He  further  observes  that  some  part  of  the  wine  was  spent  in  the 
king’s  household,  and  some  sold  for  the  king’s  profit. 
Domesday  Book  mentions  at  Rageneia,  in  Essex,  one  park  and  six 
arpennies  of  vineyard,  which,  if  it  takes  well,  yields  twenty  modii  of 
wine.  And  at  Ware,  a  park  and  six  arpennies  of  vineyard  very  lately 
planted.  We  hear  of  vineyards  also  in  Middlesex,  Cambridgeshire, 
at  Denny  Abbey,  the  Isle  of  Ely,  at  Dunstable,  and  at  St.  Edmunds- 
bury,  in  the  engraved  plan  of  which  town  the  vineyard  of  the  abbey  is 
particularly  uoted.  Within  the  walls  of  the  City  of  London  there  is  a 
street  called  the  Vineyard  ;  and  others  in  the  liberties  and  suburbs, 
and  in  Westminster ;  there  are  also  the  Vineyards  of  Houndsditch  and 
Cold  bath  Fields. 
In  the  Journal  of  Works  at  Windsor,  in  the  reign  of  Edward  III., 
which  is  preserved  among  the  Exchequer  Records,  we  find  every 
operation  of  Vine  culture  detailed  by  the  keeper  of  the  vineyard  at 
Windsor  Castle,  from  planting,  grafting,  and  manuring,  till  the 
pressing  of  the  fruit,  the  making  and  repairing  of  the  casks,  and  the 
barrelling  of  the  wine.  The  superintendence  of  this  Windsor  vineyard 
was,  for  some  tim*,  entrusted  to  one  Etienne  de  Bordeaux,  who,  no 
doubt,  was  brought  over  from  Guienne. 
In  the  archives  of  the  church  of  Ely  is  the  following  register: — 
Exitus  Yineti .  2  15  3| 
Ditto  Vine®  . 10  12 
10  bushels  of  Grapes  from  the  vineyard . ■.  ...  0  7  6 
7  Dolia  Musti  from  the  vineyard,  12  Edward  II.  ...  15  1  0 
Wine  sold  for .  1  12  0 
Verjuice .  1  7  0 
For  Wine  out  of  this  vineyard  .  12  2 
For  Verjuice  from  thence  .  0  16  0 
No  wine,  but  v, rjuice  made,  9  Edward  IV.  Hence  it  appeals  plainly 
that,  at  Ely,  Grapies  would  sometimes  ripen,  and  the  convent  made 
wine  of  them  ;  and  when  they  did  not  they  converted  their  produce 
into  verjuice. 
In  Northamptonshire,  Martin,  Abbot  of  Peterborough,  in  the  time 
of  King  Stephen,  is  said  expressly,  in  the  Saxon  Chronicle,  to  have 
planted  a  vineyard;  and  it  was  a  large  one.  Madox,  in  his  History  of 
the  Exchequer,  writes  that  the  sheriffs  of  Northamptonshire  and 
Leicestershire  were  allowed  in  their  account  for  the  livery  of  the 
King’s  vine-dresser,  at  Rockingham,  and  for  necessaries  for  the 
vineyard.  There  are  evidences  of  vineyards  still  farther  north,  as  at 
Darley  Abbey,  in  the  county  of  Derby.  In  the  reign  of  Henry  III., 
the  neglect  of  vineyards  in  England  is  attributed  by  Twynne  in  part 
to  that  fondness  for  French  wine  which  then  came  upon  us.  In  this 
King’s  time,  about  the  year  1260,  a  dolium  (thirty-six  gallons)  of  the 
best  wine  could  be  bought  for  forty  shillings,  sometimes  for  two  marks, 
and  sometimes  for  twenty  shillings.  This  neglect  and  decrease  of 
vineyards  may  be  traced  to  the  time  of  Henry  II.,  who  had  acquired 
possession  of  Guienne,  in  right  of  his  consort,  Eleanor  of  Aquitaine, 
and  the  encouragement  and  protection  given  to  the  wines  of  Guienne 
and  its  neighbouring  parts,  which  were  all  known  as  Gascony  wine,. 
