people in the south, instead of that miserable sort which used in old
days to be made of barley or beans, may contribute not a little to the
sweetening their blood and correcting their juices, for the inhabitants
of mountainous districts to this day are still liable to the itch and
other cutaneous disorders, from a wretchedness and poverty of diet.

As to the produce of a garden, every middle-aged person of observation
may perceive, within his own memory, both in town and country, how vastly
the consumption of vegetables is increased. Green-stalls in cities now
support multitudes in a comfortable state, while gardeners get fortunes.
Every decent labourer also has his garden, which is half his support, as
well as his delight; and common farmers provide plenty of beans, peas,
and greens, for their hinds to eat with their bacon; and those few that
do not are despised for their sordid parsimony, and looked upon as
regardless of the welfare of their dependents. Potatoes have prevailed
in this little district by means of premiums within these twenty years
only, and are much esteemed here now by the poor, who would scarce have
ventured to taste them in the last reign.

Our Saxon ancestors certainly had some sort of cabbage, because they call
the month of February "sprout-cale;" but long after their days the
cultivation of gardens was little attended to. The religious, being men
of leisure, and keeping up a constant correspondence with Italy, were the
first people among us that had gardens and fruit-trees in any perfection
within the wall of their abbeys and priories. The barons neglected every
pursuit that did not lead to war or tend to the pleasure of the chase.

It was not till gentlemen took up the study of horticulture themselves
that the knowledge of gardening made such hasty advances. Lord Cobham,
Lord Ila, and Mr. Waller, of Beaconsfield, were some of the first people
of rank that promoted the elegant science of ornamenting without
despising the superintendence of the kitchen quarters and fruit walls.

A remark made by the excellent Mr. Ray, in his "Tour of Europe," at once
surprises us, and corroborates what has been advanced above; for we find
him observing so late as his days, that, "The Italians use several herbs
for sallets, which are not yet, or have not been but lately, used in
England, viz., _selleri_ (celery), which is nothing else but the sweet
smallage; the young shoots whereof, with a little of the hea