Chapter 14

The botanical works of Mr. Curtis have long been held in high esteem. The first number of his Flora Londinensis appeared in 1777. He commenced his Botanical Magazine in 1787. His Observations on British Grasses, appeared in a second edition, with coloured plates, in 1790. His Lectures were published after his death, to which is prefixed his portrait. His portrait is also given in Dr. Thornton's Botany. He died in 1799, was buried in Battersea church-yard, and on his grave-stone these lines are inscribed:--

_While living herbs shall spring profusely wild, Or gardens cherish all that's sweet and gay, So long thy works shall please, dear nature's child, So long thy memory suffer no decay._

THOMAS MARTYN, Professor of Botany at Cambridge, whose striking portrait, from a picture by Russel, appears in Dr. Thornton's superb work on botany. He died in June, 1825, in the ninetieth year of his age. His edition of Miller's Gardener's Dictionary, appeared in 4 vols. folio. Mr. Johnson observes, that this work "requires no comment. It is a standard, practical work, never to be surpassed." Mr. Martyn also published _Flora Rustica_, a description of plants, useful or injurious in husbandry, _with coloured plates_, 4 vols. 8vo.

SIR W. CHAMBERS. There are portraits of him by Sir J. Reynolds, engraved by Collyer and by Green; one by Cotes, engraved by Houston, in 1772; and a profile by Pariset, after a drawing by Falconot. He died in 1796, aged sixty-nine. He published,

1. Designs for Chinese Buildings.

2. Plans and Views of the Buildings and Gardens at Kew.

3. A Dissertation on Oriental Gardening, second edition, with additions. To which is annexed an Explanatory Discourse, 4to. 1773. This work gave rise to those smart satires, _An Heroic Epistle_, and _An Heroic Postscript_.

HUMPHREY REPTON, Esq. His portrait is prefixed to his Observations on the Theory and Practice of Landscape Gardening, folio. 1803. He also published on this subject:

1. Letter to U. Price, Esq. on Landscape Gardening, 8vo. 1794.

2. Sketches and Hints on Landscape Gardening, folio, 1795.

3. Enquiry into the Changes in Landscape Gardening, 8vo. 1806.

4. On the Introduction of Indian Architecture and Gardening, folio, 1808.

5. On the supposed Effect of Ivy upon Trees. A charming little essay inserted in the _Linn. Trans._ vol. xi.

6. Fragments on the Theory and Practice of Landscape Gardening, 4to. 1816. In p. 80 of the Encyclop. of Gardening, is some general information respecting Mr. Repton.

WILLIAM FORSYTH, Esq. His portrait is prefixed to the seventh edition of his Treatise on the Culture and Management of Fruit Trees, 8vo. 1824; also to the 4to. edition of the same work in 1802. He also published Observations on the diseases, defects, and injuries in all kinds of Fruit and Forest Trees, with an account of a particular method of cure, 8vo. 1791. Mr. Forsyth died in 1804.

MR. JAMES DICKSON, who established the well-known seed and herb shop in Covent-garden, and died at the age of eighty-six, a few years ago, appears to have been very much esteemed. His family at Croydon possess his portrait, and there is another preserved by the Horticultural Society. He married for his second wife a sister of the intrepid traveller Mungo Park. Mr. Dickson, when searching for plants in the Hebrides, in 1789, was accompanied by him. Handsome mention is made of Mr. Dickson in the Life of Mungo Park, prefixed to the "Journal of a Mission to the Interior of Africa." In the above life, the friendly and generous assistance which Sir Joseph Banks shewed both to Mr. Dickson, and to Mungo Park, is very pleasingly recorded. A memoir of Mr. Dickson is given in the 5th vol. of the Hort. Transactions. He published, Fasciculus Plantarum Cryptog. Brit. 4 parts 4to. 1785-1801.

RICHARD PAYNE KNIGHT, Esq. author of The Landscape, a didactic poem, 4to. 1794. A second edition, _with a preface_, appeared in 4to. in 1795. This poem is the only production of Mr. Knight, on the subject of landscape scenery, except his occasional allusions thereto, in his Analytical Enquiry into the Principles of Taste, the second edition of which appeared in 8vo. in 1805. This latter work embraces a variety of subjects, and contains many energetic pages, particularly those on Homer, and on the English drama. His philosophical survey of human life "in its last stages," (at p. 461), and where he alludes to "the hooks and links which hold the affections of age," is worthy of all praise; it is deep, solemn, and affecting. The other publications of this gentleman are enumerated in Dr. Watts's Bibl. Brit. Mr. Knight, in his Landscape, after invoking the genius of Virgil, in reference to his

_----O qui me gelidis in vallibus Hoemi Sistat, et ingenti ramorum protegat unbrâ,_

thus proceeds, after severely censuring Mr. _Browne_, who

----bade the stream 'twixt banks close shaved to glide; Banish'd the thickets of high-bowering wood, Which hung, reflected o'er the glassy flood: Where screen'd and shelter'd from the heats of day, Oft on the moss-grown stone reposed I lay, And tranquil view'd the limpid stream below, Brown with o'er hanging shade, in circling eddies flow. Dear peaceful scenes, that now prevail no more, Your loss shall every weeping muse deplore! Your poet, too, in one dear favour'd spot, Shall shew your beauties are not quite forgot: Protect from all the sacrilegious waste Of false improvement, and pretended taste, _One tranquil vale!_[100] where oft, from care retir'd He courts the muse, and thinks himself inspired; Lulls busy thought, and rising hope to rest, And checks each wish that dares his peace molest.

After scorning "wisdom's solemn empty toys," he proceeds:

Let me, retir'd from business, toil, and strife, Close amidst books and solitude my life; Beneath yon high-brow'd rocks in thickets rove, Or, meditating, wander through the grove; Or, from the cavern, view the noontide beam Dance on the rippling of the lucid stream, While the wild woodbine dangles o'er my head, And various flowers around their fragrance spread.

* * * * *

Then homeward as I sauntering move along, The nightingale begins his evening song; Chanting a requiem to departed light, That smooths the raven down of sable night.

After an animated tribute to _Homer_, he reviews the rising and the slumbering, or drooping of the arts, midst storms of war, and gloomy bigotry.

Hail, arts divine!--still may your solace sweet Cheer the recesses of my calm retreat; And banish every mean pursuit, that dares Cloud life's serene with low ambitious cares. Vain is the pomp of wealth: its splendid halls, And vaulted roofs, sustain'd by marble walls.-- In beds of state pale sorrow often sighs, Nor gets relief from gilded canopies: But arts can still new recreation find, To soothe the troubles of th' afflicted mind; Recall the ideal work of ancient days, And man in his own estimation raise; Visions of glory to his eyes impart, And cheer with conscious pride his drooping heart.

After a review of our several timber trees, and a tribute to our native streams, and woods; and after describing in happy lines _Kamtschatka's_ dreary coast, he concludes his poem with reflections on the ill-fated _Queen of France_, whose

Waning beauty, in the dungeon's gloom, Feels, yet alive, the horrors of the tomb!

Mr. Knight's portrait, painted by Sir Thomas Lawrence, is preserved at Downton Castle, near Ludlow; and is engraved among Cadell's Contemporary Portraits. It is also engraved by Bromley, from the same painter. Another portrait was in the library of the late Mr. Johnes, at Havod.

DR. ANDREW DUNCAN. He died at Edinburgh in June 1828, at the great age of eighty-four. His portrait was drawn by Raiburn, and engraved by Mitchell. He was a contemporary of several eminent persons, whose society and friendship formed one of the chief pleasures of his life. There was scarcely an institution proposed for the benefit of his native city, Edinburgh, to which his name will not be found a contributor. He was, in fact, the patron and benefactor of all public charities. In 1809 he projected, and by his exertions, succeeded in establishing, the Horticultural Society of Edinburgh. His animated and scientific discourses, delivered at the meetings of the Caledonian Horticultural Society, will always be perused with eager pleasure by every horticulturist. In that delivered in December, 1814, and inserted in the fifth number of their Memoirs, this zealous well-wisher of his native city, thus exults:--"I am now, gentlemen, past the seventieth year of my age, and I have been a steady admirer both of Flora and Pomona from the very earliest period of my youth. During a pretty long life, it has been my lot to have had opportunities of visiting gardens in three different quarters of the globe, in Europe, in Asia, and in Africa; and from what I have seen, I am decidedly of opinion, that at the present day, there is not a large city in the world, which enjoys a supply of vegetable food in more abundance, in greater variety, or in higher excellence, than the city of Edinburgh. From the potatoe to the pine-apple,--from the most useful to the most delicious productions of the vegetable kingdom, we are not at present outdone, as far as my observation goes, by any large city on the face of the earth." His medical talents may well be believed not to have been small, when it is told, that he was the rival in practice, and by no means an unsuccessful one, of the illustrious Cullen, of the Monros, and of Gregory. In private life, Dr. Duncan was eminently distinguished for his sociality, and the desire to benefit all mankind. He was a member of several social clubs. His favourite amusement was _gardening_. He possessed a garden in the neighbourhood of Edinburgh, which he cultivated entirely with his own hands, and on the door of which was placed, in conspicuous letters, '_hinc salus_.' He was particularly kind to the students attending his lectures, and gave a tea-drinking every Sunday evening to about a dozen of them, by rotation, who assembled at six o'clock and went away at eight. When old, he used sometimes to forget the lapse of time, and in his lectures, frequently spoke about the _late_ Mr. Haller, who lived a century before. To the last year of his life he never omitted going up, on the morning of the 1st of May, to wash his face in the dew of the summit of a mountain near Edinburgh, called Arthur's Seat. He had the merit of being the father of the present Dr. Duncan, the celebrated author of the Edinburgh Dispensatory, and professor of materia medica. Dr. Duncan's funeral was properly made a public one, at which the professors, magistrates, and medical bodies of Edinburgh attended, to testify their sorrow and respect.

SIR UVEDALE PRICE. His portrait was taken by Sir Thomas Lawrence, and is now at Foxley.[101] The Hereford Journal of Wednesday, September 16, 1829, thus relates his decease:--"On Monday last died, at Foxley, in this county, Sir Uvedale Price, Bart. in the eighty-third year of his age. The obituary of 1829 will not record a name more gifted or more dear! In a county where he was one of the oldest, as well as one of the most constant of its inhabitants, it were superfluous to enumerate his many claims to distinction and regret. His learning, his sagacity, his exquisite taste, his indefatigable ardour, would have raised to eminence a man much less conspicuous by his station in life, by his correspondence with the principal literati of Europe, and by the attraction and polish of his conversation and manners. Possessing his admirable faculties to so venerable an age, we must deplore that a gentleman who conferred such honour on our county is removed from that learned retirement in which he delighted, and from that enchanting scene which, in every sense, he so greatly adorned. He is succeeded in his title by his only son, now Sir Robert Price, one of our representatives."

Sir Uvedale published the following:

1. An Essay on the Picturesque, as compared with the Sublime and Beautiful, and on the use of studying pictures for the purpose of improving real landscape, 8vo. 1794. This volume was afterwards published in 1796, in 8vo. with _considerable additions_, and in 1798 was published at _Hereford_ a second volume, being an Essay on Artificial Water, an Essay on Decorations near the House, and an Essay on Architecture and Buildings as connected with Scenery.

2. A Letter to H. Repton, Esq. on the application of the practice and principles of Landscape Painting to Landscape Gardening. Intended as a supplement to the Essays. To which is prefixed Mr. Repton's Letter to Mr. Price. Lond. 1795, 8vo. Second edition, _Hereford_, 1798, 8vo. This is a sportive display of pleasant wit, polished learning, and deep admiration of the great landscape painters. Keen as some of his pages are, and lamenting that there should have been any controversy ("or tilting at each other's breasts,") on the subject of Launcelot Browne's works, "I trust, (says he,) however, that my friends will vouch for me, that whatever sharpness there may be in my style, there is no rancour in my heart." Mr. Repton in his Enquiry into the Changes of Landscape Gardening, acknowledges "the elegant and gentleman-like manner in which Mr. Price has examined my opinions." Indeed, many pages in this present letter shew this.

3. A Dialogue on the distinct Characters of the Picturesque and the Beautiful, in answer to the objections of Mr. Knight, 1801, 8vo.[102]

A general review of Sir Uvedale's ideas on this subject, is candidly given by Mr. Loudon at p. 78 of his Encyclop. after a mature study of _all_ the modern writers who have endeavoured to form "a taste for the harmony and connection of natural scenery." Mr. Loudon farther calls him "the great reformer of landscape gardening."

We have to regret, that though so many springs must have cheered the long life of Sir Uvedale Price, (and which he calls the _dolce prima vera, gioventu dell'anno_, and whose blossoms, flowers, and "profusion of fresh, gay, and beautiful colours and sweets," he so warmly dwelt on in many of his pages,) and though the number of these springs must have nearly equalled those which gilded the days of Lord Kames, of the honourable Horace Walpole, of Mr. Gilpin, and of Joseph Cradock, Esq. yet we have to regret that his classic pen has presented to the public no other efforts of his genius and cultivated taste, than the few respectable ones above stated. Had he chose to have indulged his own powers in describing what has been done towards "embellishing the face of this noble kingdom," (to quote his own words,) we might have perused descriptive pages equal to his own critical and refined review of Blenheim, or of Powis Castle, and of a character as high and pure, as those of Thomas Whateley. In proof of this, we need only refer to many pages in his Essays,--not only when he so well paints the charms of sequestered nature, whether in its deep recesses, _o'er canopied with luscious eglantine_,--in the "modest and retired character of a brook,"--the rural simplicity of a cottage, with its lilacs and fruit trees, its rustic porch, covered with vine or ivy, but when he dwells on the ruins and on "the religious calm" of our abbeys,[103] or on our old mansion-houses, with their terraces, their summer-houses covered with ivy, and mixed with wild vegetation. And we need farther only to refer to those feeling pages in his second volume, where he laments that his own youth and inexperience should (in order to follow the silly folly of _being in the fashion_,) have doomed to sudden and total destruction an old paternal garden, with all its embellishments, and whose destruction revives in these pages all the emotions of his youth; and he concludes these pages of regret, by candidly confessing, that he gained little but "much difficulty, expence and dirt," and that he thus detains his readers in relating what so personally concerns himself, "because there is nothing so useful to others, however humiliating to ourselves, as the frank confession of our errors and of their causes. No man can equally with the person who committed them, impress upon others the extent of the mischief done, and the regret that follows it." It is painful to quit pages so interesting as those that immediately follow this quotation.[104]

There are few objects that the enlightened mind of Sir Uvedale has not remarked. Take the following as an instance:

"Nothing is so captivating, or seems so much to accord with our ideas of beauty, as the smiles of a beautiful countenance; yet they have sometimes a striking mixture of the other character. Of this kind are those smiles which break out suddenly from a serious, sometimes from almost a severe countenance, and which, when that gleam is over, leave no trace of it behind--

_Brief as the lightning in the collied night, That in a spleen unfolds both heaven and earth, And e'er a man has time to say, behold! The jaws of darkness do devour it up._

There is another smile, which seems in the same degree to accord with the ideas of beauty only: it is that smile which proceeds from a mind full of sweetness and sensibility, and which, when it is over, still leaves on the countenance its mild and amiable impression; as after the sun is set, the mild glow of his rays is still diffused over every object. This smile, with the glow that accompanies it, is beautifully painted by Milton, as most becoming an inhabitant of heaven:

To whom the angel, with a smile that glow'd Celestial rosy red, love's proper hue, Thus answered."

The great object in the above Essays, is to improve the laying out of grounds by studying the productions "of those great artists _who have most diligently studied the beauties of nature_. On this subject he has in these volumes poured forth the effusions of his richly gifted mind, in his contemplation of the works of those really great painters, whose landscape scenery, from the most rural to the grandest, "have been consecrated by long uninterrupted admiration." Instead of the narrow, mechanical practice of a few English gardeners, or layers-out of grounds, he wishes "the noble and varied works of the eminent painters of every age, and of every country, and those of _their_ supreme mistress NATURE, should be the great models of imitation."[105] He has supported many of his opinions or observations, or embellished or enlivened them, by acute allusions, not only to Milton but to Shakspeare, whom he calls "that most original creator, and most accurate observer."[106]

He has depicted his own mind in p. 378 of the first volume of his Essays; for after lamenting that despotic system of improvement which demands all to be laid open,--all that obstructs to be levelled to the ground,--houses, orchards, gardens, all swept away,--nothing tending to humanize the mind--and that a despot thinks every person an intruder who enters his domain, wishing to destroy cottages and pathways, and to reign alone, he thus proceeds:--"Here I cannot resist paying a tribute to the memory of a beloved uncle, and recording a benevolence towards all the inhabitants around him, that struck me from my earliest remembrance; and it is an impression I wish always to cherish. It seemed as if he had made his extensive walks as much for them as for himself; they used them as freely, and their enjoyment was his. The village bore as strong marks of his and of his brother's attentions (for in that respect they appeared to have but one mind), to the comforts and pleasures of its inhabitants. Such attentive kindnesses, are amply repaid by affectionate regard and reverence; and were they general throughout the kingdom, they would do much more towards guarding us against democratical opinions

_Than twenty thousand soldiers, arm'd in proof._

The cheerfulness of the scene I have mentioned, and all the interesting circumstances attending it, (so different from those of solitary grandeur,) have convinced me, that he who destroys dwellings, gardens and inclosures, for the sake of mere extent, and parade of property, only extends the bounds of monotony, and of dreary, selfish pride; but contrasts those of vanity, amusement and humanity."

One may trace, too, his feeling mind towards the conclusion of his second volume, where, after many pleasing pages on the rural scenery of cottages, and in hamlets and villages, ("where a lover of humanity may find so many sources of amusement and interest,") and on the means of embellishing them, "I could wish (says he) to turn the minds of improvers from too much attachment to solitary parade, towards objects more connected with general habitation and embellishment; ... and it may be truly said, that there is no way in which wealth can produce such natural unaffected variety, and such interest, as by adorning a real village, and promoting the comforts and enjoyments of its inhabitants. _Goldsmith_ has most feelingly described (more, I trust, from the warmth of a poetical imagination and quick sensibility than from real fact), the ravages of wealthy pride. My aim is to shew, that they are no less hostile to real taste, than to humanity; and should I succeed, it is possible that those, whom all the affecting images and pathetic touches of Goldsmith would not have restrained from destroying a village, may even be induced to build one, in order to shew their taste in the decoration and disposition of village-houses and cottages." After many traces of village scenery, he thus proceeds: "The church, together with the church-yard, is, on various accounts, an interesting object to the villagers of every age and disposition; to the old and serious, as a spot consecrated to the purposes of religion, where the living christian performs his devotions, and where, after his death, his body is deposited near those of his ancestors and departed friends, and relations: to the young and thoughtless, as a place where, on the day of rest from labour, they meet each other in their holiday clothes; and also (what forms a singular contrast with tombs and grave-stones), as the place which at their wakes, is the chief scene of their gaiety and rural sports." After speaking of the yew, which from the solemnity of its foliage, is most suited to church-yards, being as much consecrated to the dead as the cypress among the ancients, he says that "there seems to be no reason, why in the more southern parts of England, cypresses should not be mixed with yews, or why cedars of Libanus, which are perfectly hardy, and of a much quicker growth than yews, should not be introduced. In high romantic situations, particularly, where the church-yard is elevated above the general level, a cedar, spreading his branches downwards from that height, would have the most picturesque, and at the same time, the most solemn effect."

ADDENDA.

Page 5.--I am enabled from Mr. Johnson's lately published History of English Gardening, to add a very early tract on that subject, and I take the liberty of transcribing his exact words: "A Boke of Husbandry, London, 4to. This little work is very rare, being one of the productions from the press of Wynkin de Worde. It consists of but twelve leaves, and is without date, but certainly was not of a later year than 1500. The following extracts explain its nature. 'Here begyneth a treatyse of Husbandry which Mayster Groshede somtyme Bysshop of Lyncoln made, and translated it out of Frensshe into Englyshe, whiche techeth all maner of men to governe theyr londes, tenementes, and demesnes ordinately.'