F. Q., ii, xii, 58.
Yet it is pleasant to look back upon these old gardens, and to see how they were cherished and beloved by some of the greatest and noblest of Englishmen. Spenser has left on record his judgment on the gardens of his day—
"To the gay gardens his unstaid desire
Him wholly carried, to refresh his sprights;
There lavish Nature, in her best attire,
Poures forth sweete odors and alluring sights:
And Arte, with her contending, doth aspire
To excell the naturall with made delights;
And all, that faire or pleasant may be found,
In riotous excesse doth there abound.
* * * * *
There he arriving around about doth flie,
From bed to bed, from one to other border;
And takes survey, with curious busie eye,
Of every flowre and herbe there set in order."
Muiopotmos.
Clearly in Spenser's eyes the formalities of an Elizabethan garden (for we must suppose he had such in his thoughts) did not exclude nature or beauty.
It was also with such formal gardens in his mind and before his eyes that Lord Bacon wrote his "Essay on Gardens," and commenced it with the well-known sentence (for I must quote him once again for the last time), "God Almighty first planted a garden, and indeed it is the purest of all human pleasures; it is the greatest refreshment to the spirits of man, without which buildings and palaces are but gross handiworks; and a man shall ever see, that when ages grow to civility and elegance, men come to build stately sooner than to garden finely, as if gardening were the greater perfection." And, indeed, in spite of their stiffness and unnaturalness, there must have been a great charm in those gardens, and though it would be antiquarian affectation to attempt or wish to restore them, yet there must have been a stateliness about them which our gardens have not, and they must have had many points of real comfort which it seems a pity to have lost. Those long shady "covert alleys," with their "thick-pleached" sides and roof, must have been very pleasant places to walk in, giving shelter in winter, and in summer deep shade, with the pleasant smell of Sweet Brier and Roses. They must have been the very places for a thoughtful student, who desired quiet and retirement for his thoughts—
"And adde to these retired leisure
That in trim gardens takes his pleasure"—
Il Penseroso.