Note 101 — English Authors on Gardening. (continued 3)

Foxley, this far-famed seat of dignified and benevolent retirement, has on many occasions become interesting. I will merely mention one. It gave a peaceful asylum to Benjamin Stillingfleet, when his mind was depressed by disappointment. The then owner, Robert Price, Esq. and his mild and amiable lady, both kindly pressed him to become an inmate of their domestic retreat, that his health might be restored, and his mind calmed; and though he modestly refused being a constant intruder, yet he took up his residence in a cottage near them, and delighted to pass his leisure hours in their happy domestic circle, "blending his studious pursuits, with rural occupations," and particularly with gardening. No doubt, to this protecting kindness, may, on this spot, have been imbibed his great veneration for Theophrastus; and here he must have laid the foundation of those attainments, which, during the future periods of his life, obtained for him the high approbation of the justly celebrated Mrs. Montagu, who, in her letters, speaks of "this invaluable friend," in the highest possible terms of praise. In this peaceful and consoling retreat, was written his original and masterly tribute to the talents of Xenophon; and here was first kindled his deep enthusiastic zeal for the classic authors of antiquity; and the materials for his then intended edition of Milton (who he says equalled all the ancients whom he imitated; the sublimity of Homer, the majesty of Sophocles, the softness of Theocritus, and the gaiety of Anacreon,) enriched with parallel passages from holy writ, the classics, and the early Italian poets; and here he composed his matchless treatise on the power and principles of Tartini's music (for it seems Mr. Price himself "was a master of the art.") Here too, most probably, he sketched, or first gathered, his early memoranda towards his future general history of husbandry, from the earliest ages of the world to his own time; and fostered a devoted zeal for Linnæus, which produced that spirited eulogium on him, which pervades the preface to his translation of "Miscellaneous Tracts on Natural History."