714. The operative part of gardening is earned on by labourers, apprentices, journeymen, and masters. The labourers are, women for weeding, gathering some descriptions of crops, and other light works; and men for assisting in the heavier operations in extraordinary seasons. The permanent sub-operatives are the apprentices and journeymen; the former are indentured generally for three years, at the expiration of which they become journeymen, and after a few years' practice in that capacity, in different gardens, they are considered qualified for being masters, or taking the charge of villa, private, or first-rate gardens, according to the capacity, education, and assiduity, and the class of gardens in which they have studied and practised. Foreign gardeners seem at one time to have been highly prized in England. The name of the gardener to Queen Henrietta, at Hammersmith, in 1691, was M. Herman Van Guisnc; and the principal nurseryman about the same period was M. Antoinc Vesprit.
