Nor let the gard’ner dare to plant a flow’r
While on his work the heav’ns ill-boding low’r;
When Moons forbid, forbidding Moons obey,
And hasten when the Stars inviting beams display.”
John Evelyn, in his ‘Sylva, or a Discourse on Forest Trees,’ first published in 1662, remarks on the attention paid by woodmen to the Moon’s influence on trees. He says: “Then for the age of the Moon, it has religiously been observed; and that Diana’s presidency in sylvis was not so much celebrated to credit the fictions of the poets, as for the dominion of that moist planet and her influence over timber. For my part, I am not so much inclined to these criticisms, that I should altogether govern a felling at the pleasure of this mutable lady; however, there is doubtless some regard to be had—
‘Nor is’t in vain signs’ fall and rise to note.’
The old rules are these: Fell in the decrease, or four days after the conjunction of the two great luminaries; sowe the last quarter of it; or (as Pliny) in the very article of the change, if possible; which hapning (saith he) in the last day of the Winter solstice, that timber will prove immortal. At least should it be from the twentieth to the thirtieth day, according to Columella; Cato, four days after the full, as far better for the growth; nay, Oak in the Summer: but all vimineous trees, silente lunâ, such as Sallows, Birch, Poplar, &c. Vegetius, for ship timber, from the fifteenth to the twenty-fifth, the Moon as before.” In his ‘French Gardener,’ a translation from the French, Evelyn makes a few allusions to the Moon’s influence on gardening and grafting operations, and in his Kalendarium Hortense we find him acknowledging its supremacy more than once; but he had doubtless begun to lose faith in the scrupulous directions bequeathed by the Romans. In his introduction to the ‘Kalendar’ he says:—“We are yet far from imposing (by any thing we have here alledged concerning these menstrual periods) those nice and hypercritical punctillos which some astrologers, and such as pursue these rules, seem to oblige our gard’ners to; as if forsooth all were lost, and our pains to no purpose, unless the sowing and the planting, the cutting and the pruning, were performed in such and such an exact minute of the Moon: In hac autem ruris disciplina non desideratur ejusmodi scrupulositas. [Columella]. There are indeed some certain seasons and suspecta tempora, which the prudent gard’ner ought carefully (as much as in him lies) to prevent: but as to the rest, let it suffice that he diligently follow the observations which (by great industry) we have collected together, and here present him.”
The opinion of John Evelyn, thus expressed, doubtless shook the faith of gardeners in the efficacy of lunar influence on plants, and, as a rule, we find no mention of the Moon in the instructions contained in the gardening books published after his death. It is true that Charles Evelyn, in ‘The Pleasure and Profit of Gardening Improved’ (1717) directs that Stock Gilliflower seeds should be sown at the full of the Moon in April, and makes several other references to the influence of the Moon on these plants; but this is an exception to the general rule, and in ‘The Retired Gardener,’ a translation from the French of Louis Liger, printed in 1717, the ancient belief in the Moon’s supremacy in the plant kingdom received its death-blow. The work referred to was published under the direction of London and Wise, Court Nurserymen to Queen Anne, and in the first portion of it, which is arranged in the form of a conversation between a gentleman and his gardener, occurs the following passage:—
Gent.—“I have heard several old gardeners say that vigorous trees ought to be prun’d in the Wane, and those that are more sparing of their shoots in the Increase. Their reason is, that the pruning by no means promotes the fruit if it be not done in the Wane. They add that the reason why some trees are so long before they bear fruit is, because they were planted or grafted either in the Increase or Full of the Moon.”
Gard.—“Most of the old gardeners were of that opinion, and there are some who continue still to be misled by the same error. But ’tis certain that they bear no ground for such an imagination, as I have observ’d, having succeeded in my gardening without such a superstitious observation of the Moon. However, I don’t urge this upon my own authority, but refer my self to M. de la Quintinie, who deserves more to be believed than my self. These are his words:—
‘I solemnly declare [saith he] that after a diligent observation of the Moon’s changes for thirty years together, and an enquiry whether they had any influence on gardening, the affirmation of which has been so long established among us, I perceiv’d that it was no weightier than old wives’ tales, and that it has been advanc’d by unexperienc’d gardeners.’
“And a little after: ‘I have therefore follow’d what appear’d most reasonable, and rejected what was otherwise. In short, graft in what time of the Moon you please, if your graft be good, and grafted in a proper stock, provided you do it like an artist, you will be sure to succeed.... In the same manner [continues he] sow what sorts of grain you please, and plant as you please, in any Quarter of the Moon, I’ll answer for your success; the first and last day of the Moon being equally favourable.’ This is the opinion of a man who must be allow’d to have been the most experienc’d in this age.”