English gardening does not seem to have been regularly cultivated until the reign of Henry VIII.; although previously to his time, parks and gardens had been laid out. Bluff King Hal formed the gardens of Nonsuch Palace in Surrey on a most magnificent scale, decking them out with many wonderful and curious contrivances, including a pyramid of marble with concealed holes, which spirted water upon all who came within reach,--a practical joke which our forefathers seem to have relished highly, for the ingenious engine was imitated in other gardens after that period. In this reign also were first laid out by Cardinal Wolsey the Hampton Court Gardens, containing the labyrinth, at that period an indispensable device of a large garden. The artificial style in James I.’s time called forth the indignation of the great Lord Bacon, who, although content to retain well-trimmed hedges and trees, pleaded strongly in the interest of nature. He insisted that beyond the highly dressed and embellished parts of the garden, should ever lie a portion sacred from the hand of man--a fragment of wild nature! He calls it “the heath, or desert.” During Charles II.’s reign, landscape-gardening received an impulse. It was in his time that Chatsworth was laid out, and that buildings were introduced into gardens. During his reign, too, lived Evelyn--a spirit devoted to the service of the rural genius. In his Diary, Evelyn makes mention of several noblemen’s and gentlemen’s gardens which he visited, and some of which indeed he himself devised. His remarks convey an idea of the state of gardening during the reign of the merry monarch. “Hampton Park, Middlesex,” he says, “was formerly a flat, naked piece of ground, now planted with sweet rows of lime trees, and the canal for water now near perfected; also the hare park. In the garden is a rich and noble fountain, with syrens, statues, &c., cast in copper by Fanelli, but no plenty of water. There is a parterre which they call Paradise, in which is a pretty banqueting-house set over a cave or cellar.” It was under Charles too that St. James’s Park was formed, a labour upon which the king employed Le Nôtre, the celebrated gardener of Versailles,--an artist of singular good taste, and with an admirable eye for the picturesque. During the reign of William and Mary, Hampton Court was considerably improved. Some Dutch features were introduced into gardening, and vegetable sculpture, and parterres in lace, came into vogue.