The castle garden is outside the barbican, shut off by a dense hedge from the exercise ground. In it are not merely many beds of flowers, but fruit trees and a group of venerable elms much older than the First Crusade. Also, there is a broad, fine stretch of closely cropped grass, shaded by the trees for most of the day. Here all kinds of things can occur. At long tables the whole castle will dine and sup in fine weather. Here Conon will assemble his vassals for ceremonious council. Here will be played innumerable games of chess. And here especially, if a few jongleurs can be found to saw their viols on fête days, all the castle folk, noble and villein, will rapturously join in dances, not in stuffy hall under midnight lamps, but in bright daylight with the merry feet twinkling on God's soft green grass.
The Castle Garden
Adela has taken great pains with her garden, which fell into a bad condition during Baron Garnier's day. She often councils with Brother Sebastian at the abbey, a real botanist with a true love of plants and flowers. One side of the beds is adorned with roses, lilies, and marigolds. On the other grow useful herbs such as lettuce, cresses, mint, parsley, hyssop, sage, coriander, and fennel. With these, too, are also poppies, daffodils, and acanthus plants, while a vegetable garden supplies the castle with cucumbers, beets, mustard, and wormwood. The fruit trees yield a sizable crop of apples, quinces, peaches, and pears. There is a kind of hot-house in which the baroness has tried to raise figs, but with no great success; but, of course, there is no difficulty in maturing grapes and cherries; indeed, cherry festivals are among the most familiar and delightful holidays in all this part of France. "Life," say monkish writers, warning the thoughtless, "though perhaps pleasant, is transitory, 'even as is a cherry fair.'"
"Crooked" Heman (the hunchbacked gardener) has considerable skill even without the teachings of Brother Sebastian. He practices grafting successfully, although his theories on the subject are absurd. He is trying to develop a new kind of plum and is tenderly raising some of the new "Agony" pears—a bitter variety for pickling. True, he believes that cherries can grow without stones if you have the right recipe, and that peach trees will bear pomegranates if only you can sprinkle them with enough goats' milk. This does not prevent large practical results. His tools are simple—an ax, a spade, a grafting knife, and a pruning hook; but, thanks to the unlimited number of peasant clowns which the baroness can put at his disposal, he keeps the garden and orchard in admirable order.
Heman's office is the more important because the garden does not exist solely as a pleasure spot or for its fruits and vegetables. Flowers are in constant demand, whenever obtainable, for garlands and chaplets. Even as with the Greeks, no feast is complete without them. Wild flowers are in favor, and many a time Adela's maids are sent out to gather and wreathe woodbine or hawthorn; but, of course, such a supply is irregular. On every social occasion from early spring to the edge of winter the castle garden must, therefore, supply its garlands. It is, accordingly, one of the essential working units of St. Aliquis, along with the stables, the mews, and the armory.
FOOTNOTES:
[14] Such a law was actually enacted for the entire kingdom of France in 1256.
[15] A mediæval manuscript contains a vivid picture of two gamesters, one of whom had only a shirt left; the other had been reduced to sheer nakedness. Their companions had evidently stripped them almost completely, leaving them to compete for one garment!
[16] We hear scandalous stories of bishops and abbots who did not think it unfit to take their hawks to church. It is alleged that they would strap their precious charges to the altar rail while they were performing the holy offices.
[17] By the thirteenth century a material fraction of the better falcons seem, however, to have been hatched and bred in captivity, thus avoiding this perilous exercise.