The news and herald. (Winnsboro, S.C.) 1877-1900, 1880-04-01
Old Fashioned Gardening,

A learned writer under this head makes a
plea for the old fashioned flowers and
modes of planting that have gone out in the
prevailing new taste for carpet. beds, of
uniform color, leaf plants and masses of
smooth scarlet, purple and white, of solid
ly planted flowers all of kind. 1t con-
trasts these with the old walled garden,
with its crooked peach and plum trees,
with here and there shady corner for lii cs
of the valley, and the sunny exposure
where the autumn violets were the first to
bloom. There was q wealth and variety of
pot-hcrbs; one wall was crowned with a
patch of yellow sedum another was fringcd
with wall flowers, and the old bricks
were often covered by a network of the
delicate and beautiful crcepcr, ''Lhe mother
or millions" There was the delightful
smell of newly turned mould to mngle
with the fragrance of hedge of sweet peas
or Of bed of clovc-gilly flowers Sweet
William and mignoncttc filed the vacant
spaces, and the bees from row of straw
hives were humming over all. The lark
spur and the lady slippey' the double pop
py, double daisies, French marigolds,
''with their strong hcadyssccnt and glorious
show for color" in short the whole sue
ccssion Of Towering plants in the same bed,
these made all the difference between tho
old flower bed and the modern "landscape"
planting. An old English author, Pariin-
son, who writes himselfI "Apothecary of
London, 1928" sets forth this succession
of plants, THAT doc 50 give their flowers
one after another that all their bravery is
not SPENT In ParlInson's day it was too
carly for the immense variety of roses; the
damasl< and the hriar rose and few single
roses were all that found place in his list
but not the cabbage and most roses which
seem old fashioned to-day There were
almost hundred sorts of daifodils, which
the "Apothccary" insists shall all be called
by their Shakcspcaran name and not some
of them "Narcisses, when as all know that
know any I.atne, that "Narcisscs, is the La
tine, and Daifodil the English of one and the
same thing. would willingly, therefore,
that all would grow judicious and call
everything by his proper English name IN
speaking English, or else by such Latino
name as everything hath that hath not Il
proper English name, that thereby they
may distinguish tho several varieties of
things and not confound them" 1t is often
asserted that vegetables formed small
part OF the diet of Engishncn in preceding
centuries-but it appears that they had all
the vegetables now in ordinary (Englisll)
USE, anu more variety O1 salads. They used
sorrcl for sauce, and made tarts of spinach
rs well as OF rhubarb aud gooseberrics
Red lettuce, red onions were grown in tho
garden, and a Spanish onion, which is
every swcete and eaten by many like an
apple" was described. There is a curious
mixture in the old book OF fragrant scents
from the garden, and the "vertucs" of
plants and herbs and the apothccary of
Charles the First's time believed that tthe
flowers of the white kind Oily OF the val
lcy) are often used with those things that
help to strengthen the memory and to pro-
cure ease to apopectic persons. At
hose great houses "wlcre head gardeners
are kept at a salary which would support
two curatcs," the modern carpet beds OF
flowers are rs much all appendagc of style
as the liveried footnlen or the stables of
sleek horses. But the home care of flowers,
III the windows or in the yards of cities, as
well as in the country plots can gain much
by a study Of these old varieties in their
blooming tangle among the grass grown
alleys, and whose very names bring back
their fragrance to people who knew them
in their youth.