The Hop-Garden

[1] From the age of four until eleven, he spent much time around the farms, but varying reports of his level of participation during the day-to-day activities lead some to speculations that he sat out during most of the work and possibly suffered from asthma attacks.

"[3] Instead, there is substantial evidence to suggest that Smart spent his time enjoying the country side and immersing himself in the nature around East Barming.

[4] The first edition of The Hop-Garden, in Poems on Several Occasions, 1752, included plates from Smart's friends Francis Hayman and Thomas Worlidge.

[6] It may have been expected that Smart would rely on Augustan rhyming couplets for his poem, even though Pope stated that Miltonic language might be inappropriate for a pastoral theme.

[15] Furthermore, as Pellicer claims, there would be no need for a dispute to be made over farming methods, and Smart is instead writing a poem that complements Philip's instead of satirizes it.

[19] It was this review, even after Smart's reply in The Hilliad, that guided the future negative reception of the poem that Chris Mounsey describes as a "litany of abuse".

[10] Among Smart's biographers, the quality of the work is very debatable: Arthur Sherbo claims that the work "is remarkable for the poorness of the blank verse and the stilted Latinate quality of its language"[6] while Chris Mounsey responds, "Possibly because of its complexity, allied to the fact that it does not meet with the expectations of most readers of Smart, the poem has hitherto been ill interpreted.