The Doctor’s Garden: Medicine, Science, and Horticulture in Britain

Abstract

not know about the atrocities; a dubious proposition given the ubiquity of newspapers and the circulation of news through commercial channels. On slavery, they were certainly brought up to speed. On this issue, Corfield takes the liberal line. There were people for and against, and eventually freedom triumphed over vested interests. This generalisation skirts the question of why the most impressive mass petitioning movement in British history was unable to secure abolition in 1792, why there was a significant hiatus in granting emancipation, why indentured labourers of colour had to be brought in to do the grunt work of harvesting tropical staples and why the British empire and its manufacturing base continued to be sustained by the enslaved labour of other countries. It is difficult to see 1807 and 1833 as great milestones in human freedom. Corfield is good at what she knows best: social taxonomies; professional life; the urban milieu of the middle class. The apt anecdote and colourful detail make The Georgians a readable book, but it falls short of its aim. This is because, in the end, it is impossible to encompass ‘deeds’ and ‘misdeeds’ within one book. In the current climate, in particular, ‘misdeeds’ require more explication, more exploration at the micro-level and a discussion of what the historical record might reasonably bear.