Following this came the rage for Anemones and Ranunculi, in which people endeavoured to excel over their friends. And after that came in small Chrysanthemums, Lilac or Blue Pipe tree, Lobelia, and the Acacia tree.
It will be seen that within quite a short space of time the old garden containing few flowers, and only those as a rule that had some medicinal properties, vanished before a perfect orgy of colour and wealth of varieties; and that gardening for pleasure gave the people a new and fascinating occupation. The rage for Anemones and for the different kinds of Ranunculus developed until in the late Seventeenth Century the madness, for it was nothing else, for Tulip collecting came in, to give place still later to the Rose, and in our day only to be equalled by the collection of Chrysanthemums and Orchids.
The best books previous to Evelyn’s “Sylva” are Gervase Markham’s “Country House-Wife’s Garden,” (1617), and John Parkinson’s “Paradisus in Sole” (1629).
One word more on the subject of flower mania. The rage for the Tulip that attacked both English and Dutch in the late Seventeenth Century is one of the most peculiar things in the history of gardening. The Tulip is really a Persian flower, the shape of it suggesting the name, thoulyban, a Persian turban. It was introduced into England about 1577, by way of Germany, having been brought there by the German Ambassador from Constantinople. By the Seventeenth Century there had developed such a passion for this flower that it led to wreck and ruin of rich men who paid fabulous sums for the bulbs, a single bulb being sold for a fortune. One bulb of the Semper Augustus was sold for four thousand six hundred florins, a new carriage, a pair of grey horses, and complete harness. So great did the business in Tulips become that every Dutch town had special Tulip exchanges, and there speculators assembled and bid away vast sums to acquire rare kinds. The mania lasted about three years, and was only finally stopped by the Government.
TULIPS IN “THE GARDEN OF PEACE.”
PART III
KALENDARIUM HORTENSE
KALENDARIUM HORTENSE: