Photo. Macbeth.
Harl. MS. 4425, Brit. Mus.
To face page 177.
It is generally of springtime in a garden—a garden of green glades and alleys, fruit-trees and flowers, such as was very dear to the mediæval soul—of which we read. The Roman de la Rose opens with a description of a garden, hemmed round with castle wall—a pleasaunce within a fortress—and planted with trees “from out the land of Saracens,” and many others, to wit, the pine, the beech (loved of squirrels), the graceful birch, the shimmering aspen, the hazel, the oak, and many flowers withal—roses and violets and periwinkle, golden king-cups, and pink-rimmed daisies. The poet describes with careful detail the design of the garden:
The garden was nigh broad as wide,
And every angle duly squared;
how the trees were planted:
Such skilful art
Had planned the trees that each apart
Six fathoms stood, yet like a net
The interlacing branches met;
and how “channelled brooks” flowed from clear fountains through “thymy herbage and gay flowers.”
The debt which the mediæval world owed to the East is shown both in the fruits and the spices which are described as growing in the garden, and in the pastimes said to have been enjoyed in its cool shade. We read of pomegranates, nutmegs, almonds, dates, figs, liquorice, aniseed, cinnamon, and zedoary, an Eastern plant used as a stimulant. When the poet would tell of dance and song, he goes by