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Title: The plant-lore and garden-craft of Shakespeare

Author: Henry Nicholson Ellacombe

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Language: English

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[i]

THE PLANT-LORE AND GARDEN-CRAFT OF
SHAKESPEARE.

[ii]

PRESS NOTICES OF FIRST EDITION.

"It would be hard to name a better commonplace book for summer lawns. . . . The lover of poetry, the lover of gardening, and the lover of quaint, out-of-the-way knowledge will each find something to please him. . . . It is a delightful example of gardening literature."—Pall Mall Gazette.

"Mr. Ellacombe, with a double enthusiasm for Shakespeare and for his garden, has produced a very readable and graceful volume on the Plant-Lore of Shakespeare."—Saturday Review.

"Mr. Ellacombe brings to his task an enthusiastic love of horticulture, wedded to no inconsiderable practical and theoretical knowledge of it; a mind cultivated by considerable acquaintance with the Greek and Latin classics, and trained for this special subject by a course of extensive reading among the contemporaries of his author: and a capacity for patient and unwearied research, which he has shown by the stores of learning he has drawn from a class of books rarely dipped into by the student—Saxon and Early English herbals and books of leechcraft; the result is a work which is entitled from its worth to a place in every Shakesperian library."—Spectator.

"The work has fallen into the hands of one who knows not only the plants themselves, but also their literary history; and it may be said that Shakespeare's flowers now for the first time find an historian."—Field.

"A delightful book has been compiled, and it is as accurate as it is delightful."—Gardener's Chronicle.

"Mr. Ellacombe's book well deserves a place on the shelves of both the student of Shakespeare and the lover of plant lore."—Journal of Botany.

"By patient industry, systematically bestowed, Mr. Ellacombe has produced a book of considerable interest; . . . full of facts, grouped on principles of common sense about quotations from our great poet."—Guardian.

"Mr. Ellacombe is an old and faithful labourer in this field of criticism. His 'Plant-lore and Garden-craft of Shakespeare' . . . is the fullest and best book on the subject."—The Literary World (American).

[iii]

THE

PLANT-LORE & GARDEN-CRAFT

OF

SHAKESPEARE.

BY

REV. HENRY N. ELLACOMBE, M.A.,

OF ORIEL COLLEGE, OXFORD,
VICAR OF BITTON, GLOUCESTERSHIRE, AND HON. CANON OF BRISTOL.

SECOND EDITION.

PRINTED FOR
W. SATCHELL AND CO.,
AND SOLD BY,
SIMPKIN, MARSHALL, AND CO.,
LONDON.

1884.

[iv]

Cutwode, Caltha Poetarum, st. 1.

[v]

TO THE READER.

"Faultes escaped in the Printing, correcte with your pennes; omitted by my neglygence, overslippe with patience; committed by ignorance, remit with favour."

Lily, Euphues and his England, Address to the gentlemen Readers.

[vi]

[vii]

CONTENTS.

[viii]

[ix]

PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION.

Since the publication of the First Edition I have received many kind criticisms both from the public critics and from private friends. For these criticisms I am very thankful, and they have enabled me to correct some errors and to make some additions, which I hope will make the book more acceptable and useful.

For convenience of reference I have added the line numbers to the passages quoted, taking both the quotations and the line numbers from the Globe Shakespeare. In a few instances I have not kept exactly to the text of the Globe Edition, but these are noted; and I have added the "Two Noble Kinsmen," which is not in that Edition.

In other respects this Second Edition is substantially the same as the First.

H. N. E.

Bitton Vicarage, Gloucestershire,
February, 1884.

[x]

[xi]

PREFACE TO FIRST EDITION.

The following Notes on the "Plant-lore and Garden-craft of Shakespeare" were published in "The Garden" from March to September, 1877.

They are now republished with additions and with such corrections as the altered form of publication required or allowed.

As the Papers appeared from week to week, I had to thank many correspondents (mostly complete strangers to myself) for useful suggestions and inquiries; and I would again invite any further suggestions or remarks, especially in the way of correction of any mistakes or omissions that I may have made, and I should feel thankful to any one that would kindly do me this favour.

In republishing the Papers, I have been very doubtful whether I ought not to have rejected the cultural remarks on several of the plants, which I had added with a special reference to the horticultural character of "The Garden" newspaper. But I decided to retain them, on finding that they interested some readers, by whom the literary and Shakespearean notices were less valued.

The weekly preparation of the Papers was a very pleasant study to myself, and introduced me to much literary and horticultural information of which I was previously ignorant. In republishing them I hope that some of my readers may meet with equal pleasure, and with some little information that may be new to them.

H. N. E.

Bitton Vicarage, Gloucestershire,
May, 1878.

[xii]

[1]

INTRODUCTION.

ALL the commentators on Shakespeare are agreed upon one point, that he was the most wonderfully many-sided writer that the world has yet seen. Every art and science are more or less noticed by him, so far as they were known in his day; every business and profession are more or less accurately described; and so it has come to pass that, though the main circumstances of his life are pretty well known, yet the students of every art and science, and the members of every business and profession, have delighted to claim him as their fellow-labourer. Books have been written at various times by various writers, which have proved (to the complete satisfaction of the writers) that he was a soldier,[1:1] a sailor, a lawyer,[1:2] an astronomer, a physician,[1:3] a divine,[1:4] a printer,[1:5] an [2]actor, a courtier, a sportsman, an angler,[2:1] and I know not what else besides.

I also propose to claim him as a fellow-labourer. A lover of flowers and gardening myself, I claim Shakespeare as equally a lover of flowers and gardening; and this I propose to prove by showing how, in all his writings, he exhibits his strong love for flowers, and a very fair, though not perhaps a very deep, knowledge of plants; but I do not intend to go further. That he was a lover of plants I shall have no difficulty in showing; but I do not, therefore, believe that he was a professed gardener, and I am quite sure he can in no sense be claimed as a botanist, in the scientific sense of the term. His knowledge of plants was simply the knowledge that every man may have who goes through the world with his eyes open to the many beauties of Nature that surround him, and who does not content himself with simply looking, and then passing on, but tries to find out something of the inner meaning of the beauties he sees, and to carry away with him some of the lessons which they were doubtless meant to teach. But Shakespeare was able to go further than this. He had the great gift of being able to describe what he saw in a way that few others have arrived at; he could communicate to others the pleasure that he felt himself, not by long descriptions, but by a few simple words, a few natural touches, and a few well-chosen epithets, which bring the plants and flowers before us in the freshest, and often in a most touching way.

For this reason the study of the Plant-lore of Shakespeare is a very pleasant study, and there are other things which add to this pleasure. One especial pleasure arises from the thoroughly English character of his descriptions. It has often been observed that wherever the scenes of his plays are laid, and whatever foreign characters he introduces, yet they really are all Englishmen of the time of Elizabeth, and the scenes are all drawn from the England of his day. This is certainly true of the plants and flowers we meet with in the plays; they are thoroughly English plants that (with very few exceptions) he saw in the hedgerows and woods of Warwickshire,[2:2] or in [3]his own or his friends' gardens. The descriptions are thus thoroughly fresh and real; they tell of the country and of the outdoor life he loved, and they never smell of the study lamp. In this respect he differs largely from Milton, whose descriptions (with very few exceptions) recall the classic and Italian writers. He differs, too, from his contemporary Spenser, who has certainly some very sweet descriptions of flowers, which show that he knew and loved them, but are chiefly allusions to classical flowers, which he names in such a way as to show that he often did not fully know what they were, but named them because it was the right thing for a classical poet so to do. Shakespeare never names a flower or plant unnecessarily; they all come before us, when they do come, in the most natural way, as if the particular flower named was the only one that could be named on that occasion. We have nothing in his writings, for instance, like the long list of trees described (and in the most interesting way) in the first canto of the First Book of the "Faerie Queene," and indeed he is curiously distinct from all his contemporaries. Chaucer, before him, spoke much of flowers and plants, and drew them as from the life. In the century after him Herrick may be named as another who sung of flowers as he saw them; but the real contemporaries of Shakespeare are, with few exceptions,[3:1] very silent on the subject. One instance will suffice. Sir Thomas Wyatt's poems are all professedly about the country—they abound in woods and vales, shepherds and swains—yet in all his poems there is scarcely a single allusion to a flower in a really natural way. And because Shakespeare only introduces flowers in their right place, and in the most purely natural way, there is one necessary result. I shall show that the number of flowers he introduces is large, but the number he omits, and which he must have known, is also very large, [4]and well worth noting.[4:1] He has no notice, under any name, of such common flowers as the Snowdrop, the Forget-me-Not, the Foxglove, the Lily of the Valley,[4:2] and many others which he must have known, but which he has not named; because when he names a plant or flower, he does so not to show his own knowledge, but because the particular flower or plant is wanted in the particular place in which he uses it.

Another point of interest in the Plant-lore of Shakespeare is the wide range of his observation. He gathers flowers for us from all sorts of places—from the "turfy mountains" and the "flat meads;" from the "bosky acres" and the "unshrubbed down;" from "rose-banks" and "hedges even-pleached." But he is equally at home in the gardens of the country gentlemen with their "pleached bowers" and "leafy orchards." Nor is he a stranger to gardens of a much higher pretension, for he will pick us famous Strawberries from the garden of my Lord of Ely in Holborn; he will pick us White and Red Roses from the garden of the Temple; and he will pick us "Apricocks" from the royal garden of Richard the Second's sad queen. I propose to follow Shakespeare into these many pleasant spots, and to pick each flower and note each plant which he has thought worthy of notice. I do not propose to make a selection of his plants, for that would not give a proper idea of the extent of his knowledge, but to note every tree, and plant, and flower that he has noted. And as I pick each flower, I shall let Shakespeare first tell us all he has to say about it; in other words, I shall quote every passage in which he names the plant or flower; for here, [5]again, it would not do to make a selection from the passages, my object not being to give "floral extracts," but to let him say all he can in his own choice words. There is not much difficulty in this, but there is difficulty in determining how much or how little to quote. On the one hand, it often seems cruel to cut short a noble passage in the midst of which some favourite flower is placed; but, on the other hand, to quote at too great a length would extend the book beyond reasonable limits. The rule, therefore, must be to confine the quotations within as small a space as possible, only taking care that the space is not so small as entirely to spoil the beauty of the description. Then, having listened to all that Shakespeare has to say on each flower, I shall follow with illustrations (few and short) from contemporary writers; then with any observations that may present themselves in the identification of Shakespeare's plant with their modern representatives, finishing each with anything in the history or modern uses or cultivation of the plant that I think will interest readers.

For the identification of the plants, we have an excellent and trustworthy guide in John Gerard, who was almost an exact contemporary of Shakespeare. Gerard's life ranged from 1545 to 1612, and Shakespeare's from 1564 to 1616. Whether they were acquainted or not we do not know, but it is certainly not improbable that they were; I should think it almost certain that they must have known each other's published works.[5:1]

[6] My subject naturally divides itself into two parts—

I now go at once to the first division, naming each plant in its alphabetical order.

FOOTNOTES:

[7]

PART I.

THE PLANT-LORE OF SHAKESPEARE.

[8]

[9]

ACONITUM.

There is another place in which it is probable that Shakespeare alludes to the Aconite; he does not name it, but he compares the effects of the poison to gunpowder, as in the passage above.

The plant here named as being as powerful in its action as gunpowder is the Aconitum Napellus (the Wolf's bane or Monk's-hood). It is a member of a large family, all of which are more or less poisonous, and the common Monk's-hood as much so as any. Two species are found in America, but, for the most part, the family is confined to the northern portion of the Eastern Hemisphere, ranging from the Himalaya through Europe to Great Britain. It is now found wild in a few parts of England, but it is certainly not indigenous; it was, however, very early introduced into England, being found in all the English vocabularies of plants from the tenth century downwards, and frequently mentioned in the early English medical recipes.

[10] Its names are all interesting. In the Anglo-Saxon Vocabularies it is called thung, which, however, seems to have been a general name for any very poisonous plant;[10:1] it was then called Aconite, as the English form of its Greek and Latin name, but this name is now seldom used, being, by a curious perversion, solely given to the pretty little early-flowering Winter Aconite (Eranthis hyemalis), which is not a true Aconite, though closely allied; it then got the name of Wolf's-bane, as the direct translation of the Greek lycoctonum, a name which it had from the idea that arrows tipped with the juice, or baits anointed with it, would kill wolves and other vermin; and, lastly, it got the expressive names of Monk's-hood[10:2] and the Helmet-flower, from the curious shape of the upper sepal overtopping the rest of the flower.

As to its poisonous qualities, all authors agree that every species of the family is very poisonous, the A. ferox of the Himalaya being probably the most so. Every part of the plant, from the root to the pollen dust, seems to be equally powerful, and it has the special bad quality of being, to inexperienced eyes, so like some harmless plant, that the poison has been often taken by mistake with deadly results. This charge against the plant is of long standing, dating certainly from the time of Virgil—miseros fallunt aconita legentes—and, no doubt, from much before his time. As it [11]was a common belief that poisons were antidotes against other poisons, the Aconite was supposed to be an antidote against the most deadly one—

Ben Jonson, Sejanus, act iii, sc. 3.

Yet, in spite of its poisonous qualities, the plant has always held, and deservedly, a place among the ornamental plants of our gardens; its stately habit and its handsome leaves and flowers make it a favourite. Nearly all the species are worth growing, the best, perhaps, being A. Napellus, both white and blue, A. paniculatum, A. japonicum, and A. autumnale. All the species grow well in shade and under trees. In Shakespeare's time Gerard grew in his London garden four species—A. lycoctonum, A. variegatum, A. Napellus, and A. Pyrenaicum.

FOOTNOTES:

ACORN, see Oak.

ALMOND.

"An Almond for a parrot" seems to have been a proverb for the greatest temptation that could be put before a man. The Almond tree is a native of Asia and North Africa, but it was very early introduced into England, probably by the Romans. It occurs in the Anglo-Saxon lists of plants, and in the "Durham Glossary" (11th century) it has the name of the "Easterne nutte-beam." The tree was always a favourite both for the beauty of its flowers, which come very early in the year, and for its Biblical associations, so that in Shakespeare's time the trees were "in our London gardens [12]and orchards in great plenty" (Gerard). Before Shakespeare's time, Spenser had sung its praises thus—

F. Q., i. 7, 32.

The older English name seems to have been Almande—

Romaunt of the Rose;

Alexander Neckam;

and both this old name and its more modern form of Almond came to us through the French amande (Provençal, amondala), from the Greek and Latin amygdalus. What this word meant is not very clear, but the native Hebrew name of the plant (shaked) is most expressive. The word signifies "awakening," and so is a most fitting name for a tree whose beautiful flowers, appearing in Palestine in January, show the wakening up of Creation. The fruit also has always been a special favourite, and though it is strongly imbued with prussic acid, it is considered a wholesome fruit. By the old writers many wonderful virtues were attributed to the fruit, but I am afraid it was chiefly valued for its supposed virtue, that "five or six being taken fasting do keepe a man from being drunke" (Gerard).[12:1] This popular error is not yet extinct.

As an ornamental tree the Almond should be in every shrubbery, and, as in Gerard's time, it may still be planted in town gardens with advantage. There are several varieties of the common Almond, differing slightly in the colour and size of the flowers; and there is one little shrub (Amygdalus nana) of the family that is very pretty in the front row of a shrubbery. All the species are deciduous.

FOOTNOTES:

[13]

ALOES.

Aloes have the peculiarity that they are the emblems of the most intense bitterness and of the richest and most costly fragrance. In the Bible Aloes are mentioned five times, and always with reference to their excellence and costliness.[13:1] Juvenal speaks of it only as a bitter—

Pliny describes it very minutely, and says, "Strong it is to smell unto, and bitter to taste" (xxvii. 4, Holland's translation). Our old English writers spoke of it under both aspects. It occurs in several recipes of the Anglo-Saxon Leechdoms, as a strong and bitter purgative. Chaucer notices its bitterness only—

Troilus and Cryseide, st. 159.

But the author of the "Remedie of Love," formerly attributed to Chaucer, says—

Shakespeare only mentions the bitter quality.

The two qualities are derived from two very different plants. The fragrant ointment is the product of an Indian shrub, Aquilaria agallochum; and the bitter purgative is from the true Aloes, A. Socotrina, A. vulgaris, and others. These plants were well known in Shakespeare's time, and were grown in England. Turner and Gerard describe them [14]as the Sea Houseleek; and Gerard tells us that they were grown as vegetable curiosities, for "the herbe is alwaies greene, and likewise sendeth forth branches, though it remaine out of the earth, especially if the root be covered with lome, and now and then watered; for so being hanged on the seelings and upper posts of dining-roomes, it will not onely continue a long time greene, but it also groweth and bringeth forth new leaves."[14:1]

FOOTNOTES:

ANEMONE.

Shakespeare does not actually name the Anemone, and I place this passage under that name with some doubt, but I do not know any other flower to which he could be referring.

The original legend of the Anemone as given by Bion was that it sprung from the tears of Venus, while the Rose sprung from Adonis' blood—

Bion Idyll, i, 66.

Polwhele's Translation, 1786.

But this legend was not followed by the other classical writers, who made the Anemone to be the flower of Adonis. Theocritus compares the Dog-rose (so called also in his day, κυνοσβατος) and the Anemone with the Rose, and the Scholia [15]comment on the passage thus—"Anemone, a scentless flower, which they report to have sprung from the blood of Adonis; and again Nicander says that the Anemone sprung from the blood of Adonis."

The storehouse of our ancestors' pagan mythology was in Ovid, and his well-known lines are—

Thus translated by Golding in 1567, from whom it is very probable that Shakespeare obtained his information—

I feel sure that Shakespeare had some particular flower in view. Spenser only speaks of it as a flower, and gives no description—

F. Q., iii, 1, 34.

F. Q., iii, 1, 38.

Ben Jonson similarly speaks of it as "Adonis' flower" (Pan's Anniversary), but with Shakespeare it is different; he describes the flower minutely, and as if it were a well-known flower, "purple chequered with white," and considering that [16]in his day Anemone was supposed to be Adonis' flower (as it was described in 1647 by Alexander Ross in his "Mystagogus Poeticus," who says that Adonis "was by Venus turned into a red flower called Anemone"), and as I wish, if possible, to link the description to some special flower, I conclude that the evidence is in favour of the Anemone. Gerard's Anemone was certainly the same as ours, and the "purple" colour is no objection, for "purple" in Shakespeare's time had a very wide signification, meaning almost any bright colour, just as purpureus had in Latin,[16:1] which had so wide a range that it was used on the one hand as the epithet of the blood and the poppy, and on the other as the epithet of the swan ("purpureis ales oloribus," Horace) and of a woman's white arms ("brachia purpurea candidiora nive," Albinovanus). Nor was "chequered" confined to square divisions, as it usually is now, but included spots of any size or shape.

We have transferred the Greek name of Anemone to the English language, and we have further kept the Greek idea in the English form of "wind-flower." The name is explained by Pliny: "The flower hath the propertie to open but when the wind doth blow, wherefore it took the name Anemone in Greeke" ("Nat. Hist." xxi. 11, Holland's translation). This, however, is not the character of the Anemone as grown in English gardens; and so it is probable that the name has been transferred to a different plant than the classical one, and I think no suggestion more probable than Dr. Prior's that the classical Anemone was the Cistus, a shrub that is very abundant in the South of Europe; that certainly opens its flowers at other times than when the wind blows, and so will not well answer to Pliny's description, but of which the flowers are bright-coloured and most fugacious, and so will answer to Ovid's description. This fugacious character of the Anemone is perpetuated in Sir William Jones' lines ("Poet. Works," i, 254, ed. 1810)—

[17]

but the lines, though classical, are not true of the Anemone, though they would well apply to the Cistus.[17:1]

Our English Anemones belong to a large family inhabiting cold and temperate regions, and numbering seventy species, of which three are British.[17:2] These are A. Nemorosa, the common wood Anemone, the brightest spring ornament of our woods; A. Apennina, abundant in the South of Europe, and a doubtful British plant; and A. pulsatilla, the Passe, or Pasque flower, i.e., the flower of Easter, one of the most beautiful of our British flowers, but only to be found on the chalk formation.

FOOTNOTES:

APPLE.

Here Shakespeare names the Apple, the Crab, the Pippin, the Pomewater, the Apple-john, the Codling, the Caraway, the Leathercoat, and the Bitter-Sweeting. Of the Apple generally I need say nothing, except to notice that the name [20]was not originally confined to the fruit now so called, but was a generic name applied to any fruit, as we still speak of the Love-apple, the Pine-apple,[20:1] &c. The Anglo-Saxon name for the Blackberry was the Bramble-apple; and Sir John Mandeville, in describing the Cedars of Lebanon, says: "And upon the hills growen Trees of Cedre, that ben fulle hye, and they beren longe Apples, and als grete as a man's heved"[20:2] (cap. ix.). In the English Bible it is the same. The Apple is mentioned in a few places, but it is almost certain that it never means the Pyrus malus, but is either the Orange, Citron, or Quince, or is a general name for a tree fruit. So that when Shakespeare (24) and the other old writers speak of Eve's Apple, they do not necessarily assert that the fruit of the temptation was our Apple, but simply that it was some fruit that grew in Eden. The Apple (pomum) has left its mark in the language in the word "pomatum," which, originally an ointment made of Apples, is now an ointment in which Apples have no part.

The Crab was held in far more esteem in the sixteenth century than it is with us. The roasted fruit served with hot ale (9 and 10) was a favourite Christmas dish, and even without ale the roasted Crab was a favourite, and this not for want of better fruit, for Gerard tells us that in his time "the stocke or kindred of Apples was infinite," but because they were considered pleasant food.[20:3] Another curious use of Crabs is told in the description of Crab-wake, or "Crabbing the Parson," at Halesowen, Salop, on St. Kenelm's Day (July 17), in Brand's "Popular Antiquities" (vol. i. p. 342, Bohn's edition). Nor may we now despise the Crab tree, though we do not eat its fruit. Among our native trees there is none more beautiful than the Crab tree, both in flower and in fruit. An old Crab tree in full flower is a sight that will delight any artist, nor is it altogether useless; its wood is very hard and very lasting, and from its fruit [21]verjuice is made, not, however, much in England, as I believe nearly all the verjuice now used is made in France.

The Pippin, from being originally a general name for any Apple raised from pips and not from grafts, is now, and probably was in Shakespeare's time, confined to the bright-coloured, long-keeping Apples (Justice Shallow's was "last year's Pippin"), of which the Golden Pippin ("the Pippin burnished o'er with gold," Phillips) is the type.

The Bitter-Sweeting (22) was an old and apparently a favourite Apple. It is frequently mentioned in the old writers, as by Gower, "Conf. Aman." viii. 174—

By Chaucer—

Prologue of the Chanoune's Yeman.

And by Ben Jonson—

Underwoods.

Parkinson names it in his list of Apples, but soon dismisses it—"Twenty sorts of Sweetings, and none good." The name is now given to an Apple of no great value as a table fruit, but good as a cider apple, and for use in silk dyeing.

It is not easy to identify the Pomewater (21). It was highly esteemed both by Shakespeare ("it hangeth like a jewel in the ear of cœlo") and many other writers. In Gerard's figure it looks like a Codling, and its Latin name is Malus carbonaria, which probably refers to its good qualities as a roasting Apple. The name Pomewater (or Water Apple) makes us expect a juicy but not a rich Apple, and with this agrees Parkinson's description: "The [22]Pomewater is an excellent, good, and great whitish Apple, full of sap or moisture, somewhat pleasant sharp, but a little bitter withall; it will not last long, the winter frosts soon causing it to rot and perish." It must have been very like the modern Lord Suffield Apple, and though Parkinson says it will not last long, yet it is mentioned as lasting till the New Year in a tract entitled "Vox Graculi," 1623. Speaking of New Year's Day, the author says: "This day shall be given many more gifts than shall be asked for; and apples, egges, and oranges shall be lifted to a lofty rate; when a Pomewater bestuck with a few rotten cloves shall be worth more than the honesty of a hypocrite" (quoted by Brand, vol. i. 17, Bohn's edition).

We have no such difficulty with the "dish of Apple-johns" (17 and 18). Hakluyt recommends "the Apple John that dureth two years to make show of our fruit" to be carried by voyagers.[22:1] "The Deusan (deux ans) or Apple-john," says Parkinson, "is a delicate fine fruit, well rellished when it beginneth to be fit to be eaten, and endureth good longer than any other Apple." With this description there is no difficulty in identifying the Apple-john with an Apple that goes under many names, and is figured by Maund as the Easter Pippin. When first picked it is of a deep green colour, and very hard. In this state it remains all the winter, and in April or May it becomes yellow and highly perfumed, and remains good either for cooking or dessert for many months.

The Codling (2) is not the Apple now so called, but is the general name of a young unripe Apple.

The "Leathercoats" (19) are the Brown Russets; and though the "dish of Caraways" in the same passage may refer to the Caraway or Caraway-russet Apple, an excellent little apple, that seems to be a variety of the Nonpareil, and has long been cultivated in England, yet it is almost certain that it means a dish of Caraway Seeds. (See Carraways.)

FOOTNOTES:

[23]

APRICOTS.

Shakespeare's spelling of the word "Apricocks" takes us at once to its derivation. It is derived undoubtedly from the Latin præcox or præcoquus, under which name it is referred to by Pliny and Martial; but, before it became the English Apricot it was much changed by Italians, Spaniards, French, and Arabians. The history of the name is very curious and interesting, but too long to give fully here; a very good account of it may be found in Miller and in "Notes and Queries," vol. ii. p. 420 (1850). It will be sufficient to say here that it acquired its name of "the precocious tree," because it flowered and fruited earlier than the Peach, as explained in Lyte's "Herbal," 1578: "There be two kinds of Peaches, whereof the one kinde is late ripe, . . . the other kinds are soner ripe, wherefore they be called Abrecox or Aprecox." Of its introduction into England we have no very certain account. It was certainly grown in England before Turner's time (1548), though he says, "We have very few of these trees as yet;"[23:1] but the only account of its introduction is by Hakluyt, who states that it was brought from Italy by one Wolf, gardener to King Henry the Eighth. If that be its true history, Shakespeare was in [24]error in putting it into the garden of the queen of Richard the Second, nearly a hundred years before its introduction.[24:1]

In Shakespeare's time the Apricot seems to have been grown as a standard; I gather this from the description in Nos. 2 (see the entire passage s.v. "Pruning" in Part II.) and 3, and from the following in Browne's "Britannia's Pastorals"—

Book ii. Song 4.

FOOTNOTES:

ASH.

Warwickshire is more celebrated for its Oaks and Elms than for its Ash trees. Yet considering how common a tree the Ash is, and in what high estimation it was held by our ancestors, it is strange that it is only mentioned in this one passage. Spenser spoke of it as "the Ash for nothing ill;" it was "the husbandman's tree," from which he got the wood for his agricultural implements; and there was connected with it a great amount of mystic folk-lore, which was carried to its extreme limit in the Yggdrasil, or legendary Ash of Scandinavia, which was almost looked upon as the parent of Creation: a full account of this may be found in Mallet's "Northern Antiquities" and other works on Scandinavia. It is an English native tree,[24:3] and it adds much to [25]the beauty of any English landscape in which it is allowed to grow. It gives its name to many places, especially in the South, as Ashdown, Ashstead, Ashford, &c.; but to see it in its full beauty it must be seen in our northern counties, though the finest in England is said to be at Woburn.

Old Ballad.

In the dales of Yorkshire it is especially beautiful, and any one who sees the fine old trees in Wharfdale and Wensleydale will confess that, though it may not have the rich luxuriance of the Oaks and Elms of the southern and midland counties, yet it has a grace and beauty that are all its own, so that we scarcely wonder that Gilpin called it "the Venus of the woods."

FOOTNOTES:

ASPEN.

The Aspen or Aspe[25:1] (Populus tremula) is one of our three native Poplars, and has ever been the emblem of enforced restlessness, on account of which it had in Anglo-Saxon times the expressive name of quick-beam. How this perpetual motion in the "light quivering Aspen" is produced has not been quite satisfactorily explained; and the mediæval legend that it supplied the wood of the Cross, and has never since ceased to tremble, is still told as a sufficient reason both in Scotland and England.

Mrs. Hemans.

The Aspen has an interesting botanical history, as being undoubtedly, like the Scotch fir, one of the primæval trees of Europe; while its grey bark and leaves and its pleasant rustling sound make the tree acceptable in our hedgerows, but otherwise it is not a tree of much use. In Spenser's time it was considered "good for staves;" and before his time the tree must have been more valued than it is now, for in the reign of Henry V. an Act of Parliament was passed (4 Henry V. c. 3) to prevent the consumption of Aspe, otherwise than for the making of arrows, with a penalty of an Hundred Shillings if used for making pattens or clogs. This Act remained in force till the reign of James I., when it was repealed. In our own time the wood is valued for internal panelling of rooms, and is used in the manufacture of gunpowder.

By the older writers the Aspen was the favourite simile for female loquacity. The rude libel is given at full length in "The Schoole-house of Women" (511-545), concluding thus—

Hazlitt's Popular English Poetry, vol. iv, p. 126.

And to the same effect Gerard concludes his account of the tree thus: "In English Aspe and Aspen tree, and may also be called Tremble, after the French name, considering it is the matter whereof women's tongues were made (as the poets and some others report), which seldom cease wagging."

FOOTNOTES:

[27]

BACHELOR'S BUTTON.

"Though the Bachelor's Button is not exactly named by Shakespeare, it is believed to be alluded to in this passage; and the supposed allusion is to a rustic divination by means of the flowers, carried in the pocket by men and under the apron by women, as it was supposed to retain or lose its freshness according to the good or bad success of the bearer's amatory prospects."[27:1]

The true Bachelor's Button of the present day is the double Ranunculus acris, but the name is applied very loosely to almost any small double globular flowers. In Shakespeare's time it was probably applied still more loosely to any flowers in bud (according to the derivation from the French bouton). Button is frequently so applied by the old writers—

Romaunt of the Rose.

And by Shakespeare—

Hamlet, act i, sc. 3 (54).

FOOTNOTES:

[28]

BALM, BALSAM, OR BALSAMUM.

In all these passages, except the two last, the reference is to the Balm or Balsam which was imported from the East, from very early times, and was highly valued for its curative properties. The origin of Balsam was for a long time a secret, but it is now known to have been the produce of several gum-bearing trees, especially the Pistacia lentiscus and the Balsamodendron Gileadense; and now, as then, the name is not strictly confined to the produce of any one plant. But in Nos. 15 and 16 the reference is no doubt to the Sweet Balm of the English gardens (Melissa officinalis), a plant highly prized by our ancestors for its medicinal qualities (now known to be of little value), and still valued for its pleasant scent and its high value as a bee plant, which is shown by its old Greek and Latin names, Melissa, Mellissophyllum, and Apiastrum. The Bastard Balm (Melittis melissophyllum) is a handsome native plant, found sparingly in Devonshire, Hampshire, and a few other places, and is well worth growing wherever it can be induced to grow; but it is a very capricious plant, and is apparently not fond of garden cultivation. "Très jolie plante, mais d'une culture difficile" (Vilmorin). It probably would thrive best in the shade, as it is found in copses.

[30]

BARLEY.

These two passages require little note. The Barley (Hordeum vulgare) of Shakespeare's time and our own is the same. We may note, however, that the Barley broth (2) of which the French Constable spoke so contemptuously as the food of English soldiers was probably beer, which long before the time of Henry V. was so celebrated that it gave its name to the plant (Barley being simply the Beer-plant), and in Shakespeare's time, "though strangers never heard of such a word or such a thing, by reason it is not everyewhere made," yet "our London Beere-Brewers would scorne to learne to make beere of either French or Dutch" (Gerard).

FOOTNOTES:

BARNACLES.

It may seem absurd to include Barnacles among plants; but in the time of Shakespeare the Barnacle tree was firmly believed in, and Gerard gives a plate of "the Goose tree, Barnacle tree, or the tree bearing Geese," and says that he declares "what our eies have seene, and our hands have touched."

A full account of the fable will be found in Harting's "Ornithology of Shakespeare," p. 247, and an excellent account in Lee's "Sea Fables Explained" (Fisheries Exhibition handbooks), p. 98. But neither of these writers have quoted [31]the testimony of Sir John Mandeville, which is, however, well worth notice. When he was told in "Caldilhe" of a tree that bore "a lytylle Best in Flessche in Bon and Blode as though it were a lytylle Lomb, withouten Wolle," he did not refuse to believe them, for he says, "I tolde hem of als gret a marveylle to hem that is amonges us; and that was of the Bernakes. For I tolde hem, that in our Contree weren Trees, that beren a Fruyt, that becomen Briddes fleeynge; and tho that fallen in the Water lyven, and thei that fallen on the Erthe dyen anon; and thei ben right gode to mannes mete. And here of had thei als gret marvaylle that sume of hem trowed, it were an impossible thing to be" ("Voiage and Travaille," c. xxvi.).

BAY TREES.

It is not easy to determine what tree is meant in these passages. In the first there is little doubt that Shakespeare copied from some Italian source the superstition that the Bay trees in a country withered and died when any great calamity was approaching. We have no proof that such an idea ever prevailed in England. In the second passage reference is made to the decking of the chief dish at high feasts with garlands of flowers and evergreens. But the Bay tree had been too recently introduced from the South of Europe in Shakespeare's time to be so used to any great extent, though the tree was known long before, for it is mentioned in the Anglo-Saxon Vocabularies by the name of [32]Beay-beam, that is, the Coronet tree;[32:1] but whether the Beay-beam meant our Bay tree is very uncertain. We are not much helped in the inquiry by the notice of the "flourishing green Bay tree" in the Psalms, for it seems very certain that the Bay tree there mentioned is either the Oleander or the Cedar, certainly not the Laurus nobilis.

The true Bay is probably mentioned by Spenser in the following lines—

Amoretti—Sonnet xxix.

And in the following passage (written in the lifetime of Shakespeare) the Laurel and the Bay are both named as the same tree—

Christopher Brooke—Introd. verses to Browne's Pastorals.

In the present day no garden of shrubs can be considered complete without the Bay tree, both the common one and especially the Californian Bay (Oreodaphne Californica), which, with its bright green lanceolate foliage and powerful aromatic scent (to some too pungent), deserves a place everywhere, and it is not so liable to be cut by the spring winds as the European Bay.[32:2] Parkinson's high praise of the Bay tree (forty years after Shakespeare's death) is too long for insertion, but two short sentences may be quoted: "The Bay leaves are of as necessary use as any other in the garden or orchard, for they serve both for pleasure and profit, both for ornament and for use, both for honest civil [33]uses and for physic, yea, both for the sick and for the sound, both for the living and for the dead; . . . so that from the cradle to the grave we have still use of it, we have still need of it."

The Bay tree gives us a curious instance of the capriciousness of English plant names. Though a true Laurel it does not bear the name, which yet is given to two trees, the common (and Portugal) Laurel, and the Laurestinus, neither of which are Laurels—the one being a Cherry or Plum (Prunus or Cerasus), the other a Guelder Rose (Viburnum).[33:1]

FOOTNOTES:

BEANS.

The Bean (Faba vulgaris), though an Eastern plant, was very early introduced into England as an article of food both for men and horses. As an article of human food opinions were divided, as now. By some it was highly esteemed—

is the description of the Bean in the "Modus Cenandi," l. 182 ("Babee's Book," ii, 48). While H. Vaughan describes it as—

and it was very generally used as a proverb of contempt—

[34]

It is not apparently a romantic plant, and yet there is no plant round which so much curious folk lore has gathered. This may be seen at full length in Phillips' "History of Cultivated Vegetables." It will be enough here to say that the Bean was considered as a sacred plant both by the Greeks and Romans, while by the Egyptian priests it was considered too unclean to be even looked upon; that it was used both for its convenient shape and for its sacred associations in all elections by ballot; that this custom lasted in England and in most Europeans countries to a very recent date in the election of the kings and queens at Twelfth Night and other feasts; and that it was of great repute in all popular divinations and love charms. I find in Miller another use of Beans, which we are thankful to note among the obsolete uses: "They are bought up in great quantities at Bristol for Guinea ships, as food for the negroes on their passage from Africa to the West Indies."

As an ornamental garden plant the Bean has never received the attention it seems to deserve. A plant of Broad Beans grown singly is quite a stately plant, and the rich scent is an additional attraction to many, though to many others it is too strong, and it has a bad character—"Sleep in a Bean-field all night if you want to have awful dreams or go crazy," is a Leicestershire proverb:[34:3] and the Scarlet Runner (which is also a Bean) is one of the most beautiful climbers we have. In England we seldom grow it for ornament, but in France I have seen it used with excellent effect to cover a trellis-screen, mixed with the large blue Convolvulus major.

FOOTNOTES:

[35]

BILBERRY.

The Bilberry is a common British shrub found on all mossy heaths, and very pretty both in flower and in fruit. Its older English name was Heathberry, and its botanical name is Vaccinium myrtillus. We have in Britain four species of Vaccinium: the Whortleberry or Bilberry (V. myrtillus), the Large Bilberry (V. uliginosum), the Crowberry (V. vitis idæa), and the Cranberry (V. oxycoccos). These British species, as well as the North American species (of which there are several), are all beautiful little shrubs in cultivation, but they are very difficult to grow; they require a heathy soil, moisture, and partial shade.

BIRCH.

Shakespeare only mentions this one unpleasant use of the Birch tree, the manufacture of Birch rods; and for such it seems to have been chiefly valued in his day. "I have not red of any vertue it hath in physick," says Turner; "howbeit, it serveth for many good uses, and for none better than for betynge of stubborn boys, that either lye or will not learn." Yet the Birch is not without interest. The word "Birch" is the same as "bark," meaning first the rind of a tree and then a barque or boat (from which we also get our word "barge"), and so the very name carries us to those early times when the Birch was considered one [36]of the most useful of trees, as it still is in most northern countries, where it grows at a higher degree of latitude than any other tree. Its bark was especially useful, being useful for cordage, and matting, and roofing, while the tree itself formed the early British canoes, as it still forms the canoes of the North American Indians, for which it is well suited, from its lightness and ease in working.

In Northern Europe it is the most universal and the most useful of trees. It is "the superlative tree in respect of the ground it covers, and in the variety of purposes to which it is converted in Lapland, where the natives sit in birchen huts on birchen chairs, wearing birchen boots and breeches, with caps and capes of the same material, warming themselves by fires of birchwood charcoal, reading books bound in birch, and eating herrings from a birchen platter, pickled in a birchen cask. Their baskets, boats, harness, and utensils are all of Birch; in short, from cradle to coffin, the Birch forms the peculiar environment of the Laplander."[36:1] In England we still admire its graceful beauty, whether it grows in our woods or our gardens, and we welcome its pleasant odour on our Russia leather bound books; but we have ceased to make beer from its young shoots,[36:2] and we hold it in almost as low repute (from the utilitarian point of view) as Turner and Shakespeare seem to have held it.

FOOTNOTES:

BITTER-SWEET, see Apple (22).

[37]

BLACKBERRIES.

I here join together the tree and the fruit, the Bramble (Rubus fruticosus) and the Blackberry. There is not much to be said for a plant that is the proverbial type of a barren country or untidy cultivation, yet the Bramble and the Blackberry have their charms, and we could ill afford to lose them from our hedgerows. The name Bramble originally meant anything thorny, and Chaucer applied it to the Dog Rose—

But in Shakespeare's time it was evidently confined to the Blackberry-bearing Bramble.

There is a quaint legend of the origin of the plant which is worth repeating. It is thus pleasantly told by Waterton: "The cormorant was once a wool merchant. He entered into partnership with the Bramble and the bat, and they freighted a large ship with wool; she was wrecked, and the firm became bankrupt. Since that disaster the bat skulks about till midnight to avoid his creditors, the cormorant is for ever diving into the deep to discover its foundered [38]vessel, while the Bramble seizes hold of every passing sheep to make up his loss by stealing the wool."

As a garden plant, the common Bramble had better be kept out of the garden, but there are double pink and white-blossomed varieties, and others with variegated leaves, that are handsome plants on rough rockwork. The little Rubus saxatilis is a small British Bramble that is pretty on rockwork, and among the foreign Brambles there are some that should on no account be omitted where ornamental shrubs are grown. Such are the R. leucodermis from Nepaul, with its bright silvery bark and amber-coloured fruit; R. Nootkanus, with very handsome foliage, and pure white rose-like flowers; R. Arcticus, an excellent rockwork plant from Northern Europe, with very pleasant fruit, but difficult to establish; R. Australis (from New Zealand), a most quaint plant, with leaves so depauperated that it is apparently leafless, and hardy in the South of England; and R. deliciosus, a very handsome plant from the Rocky Mountains. There are several others well worth growing, but I mention these few to show that the Bramble is not altogether such a villainous and useless weed as it is proverbially supposed to be.

FOOTNOTES:

BOX.

The Box is a native British tree, and in the sixteenth century was probably much more abundant as a wild tree than it is now. Chaucer notes it as a dismal tree. He describes Palamon in his misery as—

The Knightes Tale.

Spenser noted it as "The Box yet mindful of his olde offence," and in Shakespeare's time there were probably more woods of Box in England than the two which still remain [39]at Box Hill, in Surrey, and Boxwell, in Gloucestershire. The name remains, though the trees are gone, in Box in Wilts, Boxgrove, Boxley, Boxmoor, Boxted, and Boxworth.[39:1] From its wild quarters the Box tree was very early brought into gardens, and was especially valued, not only for its rich evergreen colour, but because, with the Yew, it could be cut and tortured into all the ungainly shapes which so delighted our ancestors in Shakespeare's time, though one of the most illustrious of them, Lord Bacon, entered his protest against such barbarisms: "I, for my part, do not like images cut out in Juniper or other garden stuff; they be for children" ("Essay of Gardens").

The chief use of the Box now is for blocks for wood-carving, for which its close grain makes it the most suitable of all woods.[39:2]

FOOTNOTES:

BRAMBLE, see Blackberries.

BRIER.

In Shakespeare's time the "Brier" was not restricted to the Sweet Briar, as it usually is now; but it meant any sort of wild Rose, and even it would seem from No. 9 that it was applied to the cultivated Rose, for there the scene is laid in the Temple Gardens. In some of the passages it probably does not allude to any Rose, but simply to any [41]wild thorny plant. That this was its common use then, we know from many examples. In "Le Morte Arthur," the Earl of Ascolot's daughter is described—

And in "A Pleasant New Court Song," in the Roxburghe Ballads—

It bears the same meaning in our Bibles, where "Thorns," "Brambles," and "Briers," stand for any thorny and useless plant, the soil of Palestine being especially productive of thorny plants of many kinds. Wickliffe's translation of Matthew vii. 16, is—"Whether men gaderen grapis of thornes; or figis of Breris?" and Tyndale's translation is much the same—"Do men gaddre grapes of thornes, or figges of Bryeres?"[41:1]

FOOTNOTES:

BROOM.

The Broom was one of the most popular plants of the Middle Ages. Its modern Latin name is Cytisus scoparius, but under its then Latin name of Planta genista it gave its name to the Plantagenet family, either in the time of Henry II., as generally reported, or probably still earlier. As the [42]favourite badge of the family it appears on their monuments and portraits, and was embroidered on their clothes and imitated in their jewels. Nor was it only in England that the plant was held in such high favour; it was the special flower of the Scotch, and it was highly esteemed in many countries on the Continent, especially in Brittany. Yet, in spite of all this, there are only these three notices of the plant in Shakespeare, and of those three, two (2 and 3) refer to its uses when dead; and the third (1), though it speaks of it as living, yet has nothing to say of the remarkable beauties of this favourite British flower. Yet it has great beauties which cannot easily be overlooked. Its large, yellow flowers, its graceful habit of growth, and its fragrance—

Spenser, Sonnet xxvi.

at once arrest the attention of the most careless observer of Nature. We are almost driven to the conclusion that Shakespeare could not have had much real acquaintance with the Broom, or he would not have sent his "dismissed bachelor" to "Broom-groves."[42:1] I should very much doubt that the Broom could ever attain to the dimensions of a grove, though Steevens has a note on the passage that "near Gamlingay, in Cambridgeshire, it grows high enough to conceal the tallest cattle as they pass through it; and in places where it is cultivated still higher." Chaucer speaks of the Broom, but does not make it so much of a tree—

And other poets have spoken of the Broom in the same way—thus Collins—

Castle of Indolence, canto i.

And a Russian poet speaks of the Broom as a tree—

[43]

Flora Domestica, p. 68.

As a garden plant it is perhaps seen to best advantage when mixed with other shrubs, as when grown quite by itself it often has an untidy look. There is a pure white variety which is very beautiful, but it is very liable to flower so abundantly as to flower itself to death. There are a few other sorts, but none more beautiful than the British.

FOOTNOTES:

BULRUSH.

See Rush, p. 262.

BURDOCK AND BURS.

The Burs are the unopened flowers of the Burdock (Arctium lappa), and their clinging quality very early obtained for them expressive names, such as amor folia, love leaves, and philantropium. This clinging quality arises from the bracts of the involucrum being long and stiff, and with hooked tips which attach themselves to every passing object. The Burdock is a very handsome plant when seen in its native habitat by the side of a brook, its broad leaves being most picturesque, but it is not a plant to introduce into a garden.[44:1] There is another tribe of plants, however, which are sufficiently ornamental to merit a place in the garden, and whose Burs are even more clinging than those of the Burdock. These are the Acænas; they are mostly natives of America and New Zealand, and some of them (especially A. sarmentosa and A. microphylla) form excellent carpet plants, but their points being furnished with double hooks, like a double-barbed arrow, they have double powers of clinging.

FOOTNOTES:

BURNET.

The Burnet (Poterium sanguisorba) is a native plant of no great beauty or horticultural interest, but it was valued as a good salad plant, the leaves tasting of Cucumber, and Lord Bacon (contemporary with Shakespeare) seems to have been especially fond of it. He says ("Essay of Gardens"):

[45] "Those flowers which perfume the air most delightfully, not passed by as the rest, but being trodden upon and crushed, are three—that is, Burnet, Wild Thyme, and Water Mints; therefore you are to set whole alleys of them, to have the pleasure when you walk or tread." Drayton had the same affection for it—

Nymphal V.

It also was, and still is, valued as a forage plant that will grow and keep fresh all the winter in dry barren pastures, thus often giving food for sheep when other food was scarce. It has occasionally been cultivated, but the result has not been very satisfactory, except on very poor land, though, according to the Woburn experiments, as reported by Sinclair, it contains a larger amount of nutritive matter in the spring than most of the Grasses. It has brown flowers, from which it is supposed to derive its name (Brunetto).[45:1]

FOOTNOTES:

CABBAGE.

The history of the name is rather curious. It comes to us from the French Chou cabus, which is the French corruption of Caulis capitatus, the name by which Pliny described it.

The Cabbage of Shakespeare's time was essentially the same as ours, and from the contemporary accounts it seems that the sorts cultivated were as good and as numerous as they are now. The cultivated Cabbage is the same specifically as the wild Cabbage of our sea-shores (Brassica oleracea) improved by cultivation. Within the last few years the Cabbage has been brought from the kitchen garden [46]into the flower garden on account of the beautiful variegation of its leaves. This, however, is no novelty, for Parkinson said of the many sorts of Cabbage in his day: "There is greater diversity in the form and colour of the leaves of this plant than there is in any other that I know groweth on the ground. . . . Many of them being of no use with us for the table, but for delight to behold the wonderful variety of the works of God herein."

CAMOMILE.

The low-growing Camomile, the emblem of the sweetness of humility, has the lofty names of Camomile (Chamæmelum, i.e., Apple of the Earth) and Anthemis nobilis. Its fine aromatic scent and bitter flavour suggested that it must be possessed of much medicinal virtue, while its low growth made it suitable for planting on the edges of flower-beds and paths, its scent being brought out as it was walked upon. For this purpose it was much used in Elizabethan gardens; "large walks, broad and long, close and open, like the Tempe groves in Thessaly, raised with gravel and sand, having seats and banks of Camomile; all this delights the mind, and brings health to the body."[46:1] As a garden flower it is now little used, though its bright starry flower and fine scent might recommend it; but it is still to be found in herb gardens, and is still, though not so much as formerly, used as a medicine.

Like many other low plants, the Camomile is improved by being pressed into the earth by rolling or otherwise, and there are many allusions to this in the old writers: thus Lily in his "Euphues" says: "The Camomile the more it [47]is trodden and pressed down, the more it spreadeth;" and in the play, "The More the Merrier" (1608), we have—

FOOTNOTES:

CARDUUS, see Holy Thistle.

CARNATIONS.

There are two other places in which Carnation is mentioned, but they refer to carnation colour—i.e., to pure flesh colour.

Dr. Johnson and others have supposed that the flower is so named from the colour, but that this is a mistake is made very clear by Dr. Prior. He quotes Spenser's "Shepherd's Calendar"—

and so it is spelled in Lyte's "Herbal," 1578, coronations or cornations. This takes us at once to the origin of the name. The plant was one of those used in garlands (coronæ), [48]and was probably one of the most favourite plants used for that purpose, for which it was well suited by its shape and beauty. Pliny gives a long list of garland flowers (Coronamentorum genera) used by the Romans and Athenians, and Nicander gives similar lists of Greek garland plants (στεφανωματικὰ ἄνθη), in which the Carnation holds so high a place that it was called by the name it still has—Dianthus, or Flower of Jove.

Its second specific name, Caryophyllus—i.e., Nut-leaved—seems at first very inappropriate for a grassy leaved plant, but the name was first given to the Indian Clove-tree, and from it transferred to the Carnation, on account of its fine clove-like scent. Its popularity as an English plant is shown by its many names—Pink, Carnation, Gilliflower[48:1] (an easily-traced and well-ascertained corruption from Caryophyllus), Clove, Picotee,[48:2] and Sops-in-Wine, from the flowers being used to flavour wine and beer.[48:3] There is an historical interest also in the flowers. All our Carnations, Picotees, and Cloves come originally from the single Dianthus caryophyllus; this is not a true British plant, but it holds a place in the English flora, being naturalized on Rochester and other castles. It is abundant in Normandy, and I found it (in 1874) covering the old castle of Falaise in which William the Conqueror was born. Since that I have found that it grows on the old castles of Dover, Deal, and Cardiff, all of them of Norman construction, as was [49]Rochester, which was built by Gundulf, the special friend of William. Its occurrence on these several Norman castles make it very possible that it was introduced by the Norman builders, perhaps as a pleasant memory of their Norman homes, though it may have been accidentally introduced with the Normandy (Caen) stone, of which parts of the castles are built. How soon it became a florist's flower we do not know, but it must have been early, as in Shakespeare's time the sorts of Cloves, Carnations, and Pinks were so many that Gerard says: "A great and large volume would not suffice to write of every one at large in particular, considering how infinite they are, and how every yeare, every clymate and countrey, bringeth forth new sorts, and such as have not heretofore bin written of;" and so we may certainly say now—the description of the many kinds of Carnations and Picotees, with directions for their culture, would fill a volume.

FOOTNOTES:

CARRAWAYS.

Carraways are the fruit of Carum carui, an umbelliferous plant of a large geographical range, cultivated in the eastern counties, and apparently wild in other parts of England, but not considered a true native. In Shakespeare's time the seed was very popular, and was much more freely used than in our day. "The seed," says Parkinson, "is much used to be put among baked fruit, or into bread, cakes, &c., to give them a rellish. It is also made into comfits and put into Trageas or (as we call them in English) Dredges, that are taken for cold or wind in the body, as also are served to the table with fruit."

Carraways are frequently mentioned in the old writers as an accompaniment to Apples. In a very interesting bill of fare of 1626, extracted from the account book of Sir Edward Dering, is the following—

[50]

So in Russell's "Book of Nurture:" "After mete . . . pepyns Careaway in comfyte," line 78, and the same in line 714; and in Wynkyn de Worde's "Boke of Kervynge" ("Babee's Book," p. 266 and 271), and in F. Seager's "Schoole of Vertue" ("Babee's Book," p. 343)—

The custom of serving roast Apples with a little saucerful of Carraway is still kept up at Trinity College, Cambridge, and, I believe, at some of the London Livery dinners.

CARROT.

Dame Quickly's pun gives us our Carrot, a plant which, originally derived from our wild Carrot (Daucus Carota), was introduced as a useful vegetable by the Flemings in the time of Elizabeth, and has probably been very little altered or improved since the time of its introduction. In Shakespeare's time the name was applied to the "Yellow Carrot" or Parsnep, as well as to the Red one. The name of Carrot comes directly from its Latin or rather Greek name, Daucus [51]Carota, but it once had a prettier name. The Anglo-Saxons called it "bird's-nest," and Gerard gives us the reason, and it is a reason that shows they were more observant of the habits of plants than we generally give them credit for: "The whole tuft (of flowers) is drawn together when the seed is ripe, resembling a bird's nest; whereupon it hath been named of some Bird's-nest."

CEDAR.

The Cedar is the classical type of majesty and grandeur, and superiority to everything that is petty and mean. So Shakespeare uses it, and only in this way; for it is very certain he never saw a living specimen of the Cedar of Lebanon. But many travellers in the East had seen it and minutely described it, and from their descriptions he derived his knowledge of the tree; but not only, and probably not chiefly from travellers, for he was well acquainted with his Bible, and there he would meet with many a passage that dwelt on the glories of the Cedar, and told how it was the king of trees, so that "the Fir trees were not like his boughs, and the Chestnut trees were not like his branches, nor any tree in the garden of God was like unto him in his beauty, fair by the multitude of his branches, so that all the trees of Eden that were in the garden of God envied him" (Ezekiel xxxi. 8, 9). It was such descriptions as these that supplied Shakespeare with his imagery, and which made our ancestors try to introduce the tree into England. But there seems to have been much difficulty in establishing it. Evelyn tried to introduce it, but did not succeed at first, and the tree is not mentioned in his "Sylva" of 1664. It was, [53]however, certainly introduced in 1676, when it appears, from the gardeners' accounts, to have been planted at Bretby Park, Derbyshire ("Gardener's Chronicle," January, 1877). I believe this is the oldest certain record of the planting of the Cedar in England, the next oldest being the trees in Chelsea Botanic Gardens, which were certainly planted in 1683. Since that time the tree has proved so suitable to the English soil that it is grown everywhere, and everywhere asserts itself as the king of evergreen trees, whether grown as a single tree on a lawn, or mixed in large numbers with other trees, as at Highclere Park, in Hampshire (Lord Carnarvon's). Among English Cedar trees there are probably none that surpass the fine specimens at Warwick Castle, which owe, however, much of their beauty to their position on the narrow strip of land between the Castle and the river. I mention these to call attention to the pleasant coincidence (for it is nothing more) that the most striking descriptions of the Cedar are given by Shakespeare to the then owner of the princely Castle of Warwick (Nos. 3 and 4).

The mediæval belief about the Cedar was that its wood was imperishable. "Hæc Cedrus, A^e sydyretre, et est talis nature quod nunquam putrescet in aqua nec in terra" (English Vocabulary—15th cent.); but as a timber tree the English-grown Cedar has not answered to its old reputation, so that Dr. Lindley called it "the worthless though magnificent Cedar of Lebanon."

CHERRY.

Besides these, there is mention of "cherry lips"[54:1] and "cherry-nose,"[54:2] and the game of "cherry-pit."[54:3] We have the authority of Pliny that the Cherry (Prunus Cerasus) was introduced into Italy from Pontus, and by the Romans was introduced into Britain. It is not, then, a true native, but it has now become completely naturalized in our woods and hedgerows, while the cultivated trees are everywhere favourites for the beauty of their flowers, and their rich and handsome fruit. In Shakespeare's time there were almost as many, and probably as good varieties, as there are now.

FOOTNOTES:

[55]

CHESTNUTS.

This is the Spanish or Sweet Chestnut, a fruit which seems to have been held in high esteem in Shakespeare's time, for Lyte, in 1578, says of it, "Amongst all kindes of wilde fruites the Chestnut is best and meetest for to be eaten." The tree cannot be regarded as a true native, but it has been so long introduced, probably by the Romans, that grand specimens are to be found in all parts of England; the oldest known specimen being at Tortworth, in Gloucestershire, which was spoken of as an old tree in the time of King Stephen; while the tree that is said to be the oldest and the largest in Europe is the Spanish Chestnut tree on Mount Etna, the famous Castagni du Centu Cavalli, which measures near the root 160 feet in circumference. It is one of our handsomest trees, and very useful for timber, and at one time it was supposed that many of our oldest buildings were roofed with Chestnut. This was the current report of the grand roof at Westminster Hall, but it is now discovered to be of Oak, and it is very doubtful whether the Chestnut timber is as lasting as it has long been supposed to be.

The Horse Chestnut was probably unknown to Shakespeare. It is an Eastern tree, and in no way related to the true Chestnut, and though the name has probably no connection with horses or their food, yet it is curious that the petiole has (especially when dry) a marked resemblance to a horse's leg and foot, and that both on the parent stem and the petiole may be found a very correct representation of a horseshoe with its nails.[55:1]

FOOTNOTES:

[56]

CLOVER.

"Honey-stalks" are supposed to be the flower of the Clover. This seems very probable, but I believe the name is no longer applied. Of the Clover there are two points of interest that are worth notice. The Clover is one of the plants that claim to be the Shamrock of St. Patrick. This is not a settled point, and at the present day the Woodsorrel is supposed to have the better claim to the honour. But it is certain that the Clover is the "clubs" of the pack of cards. "Clover" is a corruption of "Clava," a club. In England we paint the Clover on our cards and call it "clubs," while in France they have the same figure, but call it "trefle."

CLOVES.

As a mention of a vegetable product, I could not omit this passage, but the reference is only to the imported spice and not to the tree from which then, as now, the Clove was gathered. The Clove of commerce is the unexpanded flower of the Caryophyllus aromaticus, and the history of its [57]discovery and cultivation by the Dutch in Amboyna, with the vain attempts they made to keep the monopoly of the profitable spice, is perhaps the saddest chapter in all the history of commerce. See a full account with description and plate of the plant in "Bot. Mag.," vol. 54, No. 2749.

FOOTNOTES:

COCKLE.

In Shakespeare's time the word "Cockle" was becoming restricted to the Corn-cockle (Lychnis githago), but both in his time, and certainly in that of the writers before him, it was used generally for any noxious weed that grew in corn-fields, and was usually connected with the Darnel and Tares.[57:1] So Gower—

Confessio Amantis, lib. quintus (2-190, Paulli).

Latimer has exactly the same idea: "Oh, that our prelates would bee as diligent to sowe the corne of goode doctrine as Sathan is to sow Cockel and Darnel." . . . "There was never such a preacher in England as he (the devil) is. Who is able to tel his dylygent preaching? which every daye and every houre laboreth to sowe Cockel and [58]Darnel" (Latimer's Fourth Sermon). And to the same effect Spenser—

The Cockle or Campion is said to do mischief among the Wheat, not only, as the Poppy and other weeds, by occupying room meant for the better plant, but because the seed gets mixed with the corn, and then "what hurt it doth among corne, the spoyle unto bread, as well in colour, taste, and unwholsomness is better known than desired." So says Gerard, but I do not know how far modern experience confirms him. It is a pity the plant has so bad a character, for it is a very handsome weed, with a fine blue flower, and the seeds are very curious objects under the microscope, being described as exactly like a hedgehog rolled up.[58:1]

FOOTNOTES:

COLOQUINTIDA.

The Coloquintida, or Colocynth, is the dried fleshy part of the fruit of the Cucumis or Citrullus colocynthis. As a drug it was imported in Shakespeare's time and long before, but he may also have known the plant. Gerard seems to have grown it, though from his describing it as a native of the sandy shores of the Mediterranean, he perhaps confused it with the Squirting Cucumber (Momordica elaterium). It is a native of Turkey, but has been found also in Japan. It is also found in the East, and we read of it in the history of Elisha: "One went out into the field to gather herbs, and found a wild Vine, and gathered thereof wild [59]Gourds, his lap full."[59:1] It is not quite certain what species of Gourd is here meant, but all the old commentators considered it to be the Colocynth,[59:2] the word "vine" meaning any climbing plant, a meaning that is still in common use in America.

All the tribe of Cucumbers are handsome foliaged plants, but they require room. On the Continent they are much more frequently grown in gardens than in England, but the hardy perennial Cucumber (Cucumis perennis) makes a very handsome carpet where the space can be spared, and the Squirting Cucumber (also hardy and perennial) is worth growing for its curious fruit. (See also Pumpion.)

FOOTNOTES:

COLUMBINE.

This brings us to one of the most favourite of our old-fashioned English flowers. It is very doubtful whether it is a true native, but from early times it has been "carefully nursed up in our gardens for the delight both of its forme and colours" (Parkinson); yet it had a bad character, as we see from two passages quoted by Steevens—

All Fools, by Chapman, 1605.

and again in the 15th Song of Drayton's "Polyolbion"—

"The Columbine amongst they sparingly do set."

[60] Spenser gave it a better character. Among his "gardyn of sweet floures, that dainty odours from them threw around," he places—

And, still earlier, Skelton (1463-1529) spoke of it with high praise—

Both the English and the Latin names are descriptive of the plant. Columbine, or the Dove-plant, calls our attention to the "resemblance of its nectaries to the heads of pigeons in a ring round a dish, a favourite device of ancient artists" (Dr. Prior); or to "the figure of a hovering dove with expanded wings, which we obtain by pulling off a single petal with its attached sepals" (Lady Wilkinson); though it may also have had some reference to the colour, as the word is used by Chaucer—

The Marchaundes Tale (190).

The Latin name, Aquilegia, is generally supposed to come from aquilegus, a water-collector, alluding to the water-holding powers of the flower; it may, however, be derived from aquila, an eagle, but this seems more doubtful.

As a favourite garden flower, the Columbine found its way into heraldic blazonry. "It occurs in the crest of the old Barons Grey of Vitten, as may be seen in the garter coat of William Grey of Vitten" (Camden Society 1847), and is thus described in the Painter's bill for the ceremonial of the funeral of William Lord Grey of Vitten (MS. Coll. of Arms, i, 13, fol. 35a): "Item, his creste with the favron, or, sette on a leftehande glove, argent, out thereof issuyinge, caste over threade, a braunch of Collobyns, blue, the stalk vert." Old Gwillim also enumerates the Columbine among his "Coronary Herbs," as follows: "He beareth argent, a chevron sable between three Columbines slipped proper, by the name of Hall of Coventry. The Columbine is pleasing [61]to the eye, as well in respect of the seemly (and not vulgar) shape as in regard of the azury colour thereof, and is holden to be very medicinable for the dissolving of imposthumations or swellings in the throat."

As a garden plant the Columbine still holds a favourite place. Hardy, handsome, and easy of cultivation, it commends itself to the most ornamental as well as to the cottage garden, and there are so many different sorts (both species and varieties) that all tastes may be suited. Of the common species (A. vulgaris) there are double and single, blue, white, and red; there is the beautiful dwarf A. Pyrenaica, never exceeding six inches in height, but of a very rich deep blue; there are the red and yellow ones (A. Skinneri and A. formosa) from North America; and, to mention no more, there are the lovely A. cœrulea and the grand A. chrysantha from the Rocky Mountains, certainly two of the most desirable acquisitions to our hardy flowers that we have had in late years.

CORK.

It is most probable that Shakespeare had no further acquaintance with the Cork tree than his use of Corks. The living tree was not introduced into England till the latter part of the seventeenth century, yet is very fairly described both by Gerard and Parkinson. The Cork, however, was largely imported, and was especially used for shoes. Not only did "shoemakers put it in shoes and pantofles for warmness sake," but for its lightness it was used for the high-heeled shoes of the fashionable ladies. I suppose from the following lines that these shoes were a distinguishing part of a bride's trousseau—

[62]

The Bride's Burial—Roxburghe Ballads.

The Cork tree is a necessary element in all botanic gardens, but as an ornamental tree it is not sufficiently distinct from the Ilex. Though a native of the South of Europe it is hardy in England.

CORN.

I have made these quotations as short as possible. They could not be omitted, but they require no comment.

COWSLIP.

"Cowslips! how the children love them, and go out into the fields on the sunny April mornings to collect them in their little baskets, and then come home and pick the pips to make sweet unintoxicating wine, preserving at the same time untouched a bunch of the goodliest flowers as a harvest-sheaf of beauty! and then the white soft husks are gathered into balls and tossed from hand to hand till they drop to pieces, to be trodden upon and forgotten. And so at last, when each sense has had its fill of the flower, and they are thoroughly tired of their play, the children rest from their celebration of the Cowslip. Blessed are such flowers that appeal to every sense." So wrote Dr. Forbes Watson in his very pretty and Ruskinesque little work "Flowers and Gardens," and the passage well expresses one of the chief charms of the Cowslip. It is the most favourite wild flower with children. It must have been also a favourite with Shakespeare, for his descriptions show that he had studied it with affection. The minute description in (6) should be noticed. The upright golden Cowslip is compared to one of Queen Elizabeth's Pensioners, who were splendidly dressed, and are frequently noticed in the literature of the day. With Mrs. Quickly they were the ne plus ultra of grandeur—"And yet there has been earls, nay, which is more, pensioners" ("Merry Wives," act ii, sc. 2). Milton, too, sings in its praise—

Song on May Morning.

[66]

Sabrina's Song in Comus.

But in "Lycidas" he associates it with more melancholy ideas—

This association of sadness with the Cowslip is copied by Mrs. Hemans, who speaks of "Pale Cowslips, meet for maiden's early bier;" but these are exceptions. All the other poets who have written of the Cowslip (and they are very numerous) tell of its joyousness, and brightness, and tender beauty, and its "bland, yet luscious, meadow-breathing scent."

The names of the plant are a puzzle; botanically it is a Primrose, but it is never so called. It has many names, but its most common are Paigle and Cowslip. Paigle has never been satisfactorily explained, nor has Cowslip. Our great etymologists, Cockayne and Dr. Prior and Wedgwood, are all at variance on the name; and Dr. Prior assures us that it has nothing to do with either "cows" or "lips," though the derivation, if untrue, is at least as old as Ben Jonson, who speaks of "Bright Dayes-eyes and the lips of Cowes." But we all believe it has, and, without inquiring too closely into the etymology, we connect the flower with the rich pastures and meadows of which it forms so pretty a spring ornament, while its fine scent recalls the sweet breath of the cow—"just such a sweet, healthy odour is what we find in cows; an odour which breathes around them as they sit at rest on the pasture, and is believed by many, perhaps with truth, to be actually curative of disease" (Forbes Watson).

Botanically, the Cowslip is a very interesting plant. In all essential points the Primrose, Cowslip, and Oxlip are identical; the Primrose, however, choosing woods and copses and the shelter of the hedgerows, the Cowslip choosing the open meadows, while the Oxlip is found in either. The garden "Polyanthus of unnumbered dyes" (Thomson's "Seasons:" Spring) is only another form produced by [67]cultivation, and is one of the most favourite plants in cottage gardens. It may, however, well be grown in gardens of more pretension; it is neat in growth, handsome in flower, of endless variety, and easy cultivation. There are also many varieties of the Cowslip, of different colours, double and single, which are very useful in the spring garden.

FOOTNOTES:

CRABS, see Apple.

CROCUS, see Saffron.

CROW-FLOWERS.

The Crow-flower is now the Buttercup,[67:1] but in Shakespeare's time it was applied to the Ragged Robin (Lychnis flos-cuculi), and I should think that this was the flower that poor Ophelia wove into her garland. Gerard says, "They are not used either in medicine or in nourishment; but they serve for garlands and crowns, and to deck up gardens." We do not now use the Ragged Robin for the decking of our gardens, not that we despise it, for it is a flower that all admire in the hedgerows, but because we have other members of the same family as easy to grow and more [68]handsome, such as the double variety of the wild plant, L. Chalcedonica, L. Lagascæ, L. fulgens, L. Haagena, &c. In Shakespeare's time the name was also given to the Wild Hyacinth, which is so named by Turner and Lyte; but this could scarcely have been the flower of Ophelia's garland, which was composed of the flowers of early summer, and not of spring. (See Appendix, p. 388.)

FOOTNOTES:

CROWN IMPERIAL.

The Crown Imperial is a Fritillary (F. imperialis). It is a native of Persia, Afghanistan, and Cashmere, but it was very early introduced into England from Constantinople, and at once became a favourite. Chapman, in 1595, spoke of it as—

Ovid's Banquet of Sense.

Gerard had it plentifully in his garden, and Parkinson gave it the foremost place in his "Paradisus Terrestris." "The Crown Imperial," he says, "for its stately beautifulnesse deserveth the first place in this our garden of delight, to be here entreated of before all other Lillies." George Herbert evidently admired it much—

Peace (13).

And if not in Shakespeare's time, yet certainly very soon after, there were as many varieties as there are now. The plant, as a florist's flower, has stood still in a very remarkable way. Though it is apparently a plant that invites the attention of the hybridizing gardener, yet we still have but the two colours, the red and the yellow (a pure white would [69]be a great acquisition), with single and double flowers, flowers in tiers, and with variegated leaves. And all these varieties have existed for more than two hundred years.

As a stately garden plant it should be in every garden. It flowers early, and then dies down. But it should be planted rather in the background, as the whole plant has an evil smell, especially in sunshine. Yet it should have a close attention, if only to study and admire the beautiful interior of the flower. I know of no other flower that is similarly formed, and it cannot be better described than in Gerard's words: "In the bottome of each of the bells there is placed six drops of most cleere shining sweet water, in taste like sugar, resembling in shew faire Orient pearles, the which drops if you take away, there do immediately appeare the like; notwithstanding, if they may be suffered to stand still in the floure according to his owne nature, they wil never fall away, no, not if you strike the plant untill it be broken." How these drops are formed, and what service they perform in the economy of the flower, has not been explained, as far as I am aware; but there is a pretty German legend which tells how the flower was originally white and erect, and grew in its full beauty in the garden of Gethsemane, where it was often noticed and admired by our Lord; but in the night of the agony, as our Lord passed through the garden, all the other flowers bowed their head in sorrowful adoration, the Crown Imperial alone remaining with its head unbowed, but not for long—sorrow and shame took the place of pride, she bent her proud[69:1] head, and blushes of shame, and tears of sorrow soon followed, and so she has ever continued, with bent head, blushing colour, and ever-flowing tears. It is a pretty legend, and may be found at full length in "Good Words for the Young," August, 1870.

FOOTNOTES:

[70]

CUCKOO-BUDS AND FLOWERS.

There is a difficulty in deciding what flower Shakespeare meant by Cuckoo-buds. We now always give the name to the Meadow Cress (Cardamine pratensis), but it cannot be that in either of these passages, because that flower is mentioned under its other name of Lady-smocks in the previous line (No. 1), nor is it "of yellow hue;" nor does it grow among Corn, as described in No. 2. Many plants have been suggested, and the choice seems to me to lie between two. Mr. Swinfen Jervis[70:1] decides without hesitation in favour of Cowslips, and the yellow hue painting the meadows in spring time gives much force to the decision; Schmidt gives the same interpretation; but I think the Buttercup, as suggested by Dr. Prior, will still better meet the requirements.

FOOTNOTES:

CUPID'S FLOWER, see Pansies.

CURRANTS.

The Currants of (1) are the Currants of commerce, the fruit of the Vitis Corinthiaca, whence the fruit has derived its name of Corans, or Currants.

The English Currants are of an entirely different family; and are closely allied to the Gooseberry. The Currants—black, white, and red—are natives of the northern parts of Europe, and are probably wild in Britain. They do not seem to have been much grown as garden fruit till the early part of the sixteenth century, and are not mentioned by the earlier writers; but that they were known in Shakespeare's time we have the authority of Gerard, who, speaking of Gooseberries, says: "We have also in our London gardens another sort altogether without prickes, whose fruit is very small, lesser by muche than the common kinde, but of a perfect red colour." This "perfect red colour" explains the "currant lip" of No. 2.

CYME, see Senna.

CYPRESS.[71:1]

The Cypress (Cupressus sempervirens), originally a native of Mount Taurus, is found abundantly through all the South of Europe, and is said to derive its name from the Island of Cyprus. It was introduced into England many years before Shakespeare's time, but is always associated in the old authors with funerals and churchyards; so that Spenser calls it the "Cypress funereal," which epithet he may have taken from Pliny's description of the Cypress: "Natu morosa, fructu supervacua, baccis torva, foliis amara, odore violenta, ac ne umbrâ quidem gratiosa—Diti sacra, et ideo funebri signo ad domos posita" ("Nat. Hist.," xvi. 32).

Sir John Mandeville mentions the Cypress in a very curious way: "The Cristene men, that dwellen beyond the See, in Grece, seyn that the tree of the Cros, that we callen Cypresse, was of that tree that Adam ete the Appule of; and that fynde thei writen" ("Voiage," &c., cap. 2). And the old poem of the "Squyr of lowe degre," gives the tree a sacred pre-eminence—

Ritson's Ear. Eng. Met. Romances, viii. (31).

"In the Arundel MS. 42 may be found an alphabet of plants. . . . The author mentions his garden 'by Stebenhythe by syde London,' and relates that he brought a bough of Cypress with its Apples from Bristol 'into Estbritzlond,' fresh in September, to show that it might be propagated by slips."—Promptorium Parvulorum, app. 67.

The Cypress is an ornamental evergreen, but stiff in its growth till it becomes of a good age; and for garden purposes the European plant is becoming replaced by the richer forms from Asia and North America, such as C. Lawsoniana, macrocarpa, Lambertiana, and others.

FOOTNOTES:

[73]

DAFFODILS.[73:1]

See also Narcissus, p. 175.

Of all English plants there have been none in such constant favour as the Daffodil, whether known by its classical name of Narcissus, or by its more popular names of Daffodil, or Daffadowndilly, and Jonquil. The name of Narcissus it gets from being supposed to be the same as the plant so named by the Greeks first and the Romans afterwards. It is a question whether the plants are the same, and I believe most authors think they are not; but I have never been able to see very good reasons for their doubts. The name Jonquil comes corrupted through the French, from juncifolius or "rush-leaf," and is properly restricted to those species of the family which have rushy leaves. "Daffodil" is commonly said to be a corruption of Asphodel ("Daffodil is Ασφοδελον, and has capped itself with a letter which eight hundred years ago did not belong to it."—Cockayne, Spoon and Sparrow, 19), with which plant it was confused (as it is in Lyte's "Herbal"), but Lady Wilkinson says very positively that "it is simply the old English word 'affodyle,'[73:2] [74]which signifies 'that which cometh early.'" "Daffadowndilly," again is supposed to be but a playful corruption of "Daffodil," but Dr. Prior argues (and he is a very safe authority) that it is rather a corruption of "Saffron Lily." Daffadowndilly is not used by Shakespeare, but it is used by his contemporaries, as by Spenser frequently, and by H. Constable, who died in 1604—

But however it derived its pretty names, it was the favourite flower of our ancestors as a garden flower, and especially as the flower for making garlands, a custom very much more common then than it is now. It was the favourite of all English poets. Gower describes the Narcissus—

Confes. Aman. lib. prim. (1. 121 Paulli).

Shakespeare must have had a special affection for it, for in all his descriptions there is none prettier or more suggestive than Perdita's short but charming description of the Daffodil (No. 2). A small volume might be filled with the many poetical descriptions of this "delectable and sweet-smelling flower," but there are some which are almost classical, and which can never be omitted, and which will bear repetition, however well we know them. Milton says, "The Daffodillies fill their cups with tears."[74:1] There are Herrick's well-known lines—

And there are Keats' and Shelley's well-known and beautiful lines which bring down the praises of the Daffodil to our own day. Keats says—

Shelley is still warmer in his praise—

The Sensitive Plant, p. 1.

Nor must Wordsworth be left out when speaking of the poetry of Daffodils. His stanzas are well known, while his sister's prose description of them is the most poetical of all: "They grew among the mossy stones; . . . some rested their heads on these stones as on a pillow, the rest tossed [76]and reeled and danced, and seemed as if they verily laughed with the wind, they looked so gay and glancing."[76:1]

But it is time to come to prose. The Daffodil of Shakespeare is the Wild Daffodil (Narcissus pseudo-Narcissus) that is found in abundance in many parts of England. This is the true English Daffodil, and there is only one other species that is truly native—the N. biflorus, chiefly found in Devonshire. But long before Shakespeare's time a vast number had been introduced from different parts of Europe, so that Gerard was able to describe twenty-four different species, and had "them all and every of them in our London gardens in great abundance." The family, as at present arranged by Mr. J. G. Baker, of the Kew Herbarium, consists of twenty-one species, with several sub-species and varieties; all of which should be grown. They are all, with the exception of the Algerian species, which almost defy cultivation in England, most easy of cultivation—"Magnâ curâ non indigent Narcissi." They only require after the first planting to be let alone, and then they will give us their graceful flowers in varied beauty from February to May. The first will usually be the grand N. maximus, which may be called the King of Daffodils, though some authors have given to it a still more illustrious name. The "Rose of Sharon" was the large yellow Narcissus, common in Palestine and the East generally, of which Mahomet said: "He that has two cakes of bread, let him sell one of them for some flower of the Narcissus, for bread is the food of the body, but Narcissus is the food of the soul." From these grand leaders of the tribe we shall be led through the Hoop-petticoats, the many-flowered Tazettas, and the sweet [77]Jonquils, till we end the Narcissus season with the Poets' Narcissus (Ben Jonson's "chequ'd and purple-ringed Daffodilly"), certainly one of the most graceful flowers that grows, and of a peculiar fragrance that no other flower has; so beautiful is it, that even Dr. Forbes Watson's description of it is scarcely too glowing: "In its general expression the Poets' Narcissus seems a type of maiden purity and beauty, yet warmed by a love-breathing fragrance; and yet what innocence in the large soft eye, which few can rival amongst the whole tribe of flowers. The narrow, yet vivid fringe of red, so clearly seen amidst the whiteness, suggests again the idea of purity, gushing passion—purity with a heart which can kindle into fire."

FOOTNOTES:

DAISIES.

See Appendix. I., p. 359.

DAMSONS, see Plums.

[78]

DARNEL.

Virgil, in his Fifth Eclogue, says—

Thus translated by Thomas Newton, 1587—

And the same is repeated in the first Georgic, and in both places lolium is always translated Darnel, and so by common consent Darnel is identified with the Lolium temulentum or wild Rye Grass. But in Shakespeare's time Darnel, like Cockle (which see), was the general name for any hurtful weed. In the old translation of the Bible, the Zizania, which is now translated Tares, was sometime translated Cockle,[78:1] and Newton, writing in Shakespeare's time, says—"Under the name of Cockle and Darnel is comprehended all vicious, noisom and unprofitable graine, encombring and hindring good corne."—Herball to the Bible. The Darnel is not only injurious from choking the corn, but its seeds become mixed with the true Wheat, and so in Dorsetshire—and [79]perhaps in other parts—it has the name of "Cheat" (Barnes' Glossary), from its false likeness to Wheat. It was this false likeness that got for it its bad character. "Darnell or Juray," says Lyte ("Herball," 1578), "is a vitious graine that combereth or anoyeth corne, especially Wheat, and in his knotten straw, blades, or leaves is like unto Wheate." Yet Lindley says that "the noxious qualities of Darnel or Lolium temulentum seem to rest upon no certain proof" ("Vegetable Kingdom," p. 116).

FOOTNOTES:

DATES.

The Date is the well-known fruit of the Date Palm (Phœnix dactylifera), the most northern of the Palms. The Date Palm grows over the whole of Southern Europe, North Africa, and South-eastern Asia; but it is not probable that Shakespeare ever saw the tree, though Neckam speaks of it in the twelfth century, and Lyte describes it, and Gerard made many efforts to grow it; he tried to grow plants from the seed, "the which I have planted many times in my garden, and have grown to the height of three foot, but the first frost hath nipped them in such sort that they perished, [80]notwithstanding mine industrie by covering them, or what else I could do for their succour." The fruit, however, was imported into England in very early times, and was called by the Anglo-Saxons Finger-Apples, a curious name, but easily explained as the translation of the Greek name for the fruit, δακτυλοι which was also the origin of the word date, of which the olden form was dactylle.[80:1]

FOOTNOTES:

DEAD MEN'S FINGERS.

See Long Purples, p. 148.

DEWBERRIES.

The Dewberry (Rubus cæsius) is a handsome fruit, very like the Blackberry, but coming earlier. It has a peculiar sub-acid flavour, which is much admired by some, as it must have been by Titania, who joins it with such fruits as Apricots, Grapes, Figs, and Mulberries. It may be readily distinguished from the Blackberry by the fruit being composed of a few larger drupes, and being covered with a glaucous bloom.

DIAN'S BUD.

The same herb is mentioned in act iii, sc. 2 (366)—

But except in these two passages I believe the herb is not mentioned by any author. It can be nothing but Shakespeare's translation of Artemisia, the herb of Artemis or Diana, a herb of wonderful virtue according to the writers before Shakespeare's day. (See Wormwood.)

DOCKS.

The Dock may be dismissed with little note or comment, merely remarking that the name is an old one, and is variously spelled as dokke, dokar, doken, &c. An old name for the plant was "Patience;" the "bitter patience" of Spenser, which is supposed by Dr. Prior to be a corruption of Passions.

DOGBERRY.

(Dramatis personæ in Much Ado About Nothing.)

The Dogberry is the fruit either of the Cornus sanguinea or of the Euonymus Europæus. Parkinson limits the name [82]to the Cornus, and says: "We for the most part call it the Dogge berry tree, because the berries are not fit to be eaten, or to be given to a dogge." The plant is only named by Shakespeare as a man's name, but it could scarcely be omitted, as I agree with Mr. Milner that it was "probable that our dramatist had the tree in his mind when he gave a name to that fine fellow for a 'sixth and lastly,' Constable, Dogberry of the Watch" ("Country Pleasures," p. 229).

EBONY.

The Ebony as a tree was unknown in England in the time of Shakespeare. The wood was introduced, and was the typical emblem of darkness. The timber is the produce of more than one species, but comes chiefly from Diospyros Ebenum, Ebenaster, Melanoxylon, Mabola, &c. (Lindley), all natives of the East.

EGLANTINE.

If Shakespeare had only written these two passages they would sufficiently have told of his love for simple flowers. None but a dear lover of such flowers could have written these lines. There can be no doubt that the Eglantine in his time was the Sweet Brier—his notice of the sweet leaf makes this certain. Gerard so calls it, but makes some confusion—which it is not easy to explain—by saying that the flowers are white, whereas the flowers of the true Sweet Brier are pink. In the earlier poets the name seems to have been given to any wild Rose, and Milton certainly did not consider the Eglantine and the Sweet Brier to be identical. He says ("L'Allegro")—

But Milton's knowledge of flowers was very limited. Herrick has some pretty lines on the flower, in which it seems most probable that he was referring to the Sweet Brier—

It was thus the emblem of pleasure mixed with pain—

Spenser, Sonnet xxvi.

And so its names pronounced it to be; it was either the Sweet Brier, or it was Eglantine, the thorny plant (Fr., aiglentier). There was also an older name for the plant, of which I can give no explanation. It was called Bedagar. [84]"Bedagar dicitur gallice aiglentier" (John de Gerlande). "Bedagrage, spina alba, wit-thorn" (Harl. MS., No. 978 in "Reliquiæ Antiquæ," i, 36).[84:1] The name still exists, though not in common use; but only as the name of a drug made from "the excrescences on the branches of the Rose, and particularly on those of the wild varieties" (Parsons on the Rose).

It is a native of Britain, but not very common, being chiefly confined to the South of England. I have found it on Maidenhead Thicket. As a garden plant it is desirable for the extremely delicate scent of its leaves, but the flower is not equal to others of the family. There is, however, a double-flowered variety, which is handsome. The fruit of the single flowered tree is large, and of a deep red colour, and is said to be sometimes made into a preserve. In modern times this is seldom done, but it may have been common in Shakespeare's time, for Gerard says quaintly: "The fruit when it is ripe maketh most pleasant meats and banqueting dishes, as tarts and such like, the making whereof I commit to the cunning cooke, and teeth to eat them in the rich man's mouth." And Drayton says—

Nymphal II.

Eglantine has a further interest in being one of the many thorny trees from which the sacred crown of thorns was supposed to be made—"And afterwards he was led into a garden of Cayphas, and there he was crowned with Eglantine" (Sir John Mandeville).

FOOTNOTES:

ELDER.

There is, perhaps, no tree round which so much of contradictory folk-lore has gathered as the Elder tree.[85:1] With many it was simply "the stinking Elder," of which nothing but evil could be spoken. Biron (No. 5) only spoke the common mediæval notion that "Judas was hanged on an Elder;" and so firm was this belief that Sir John Mandeville was shown the identical tree at Jerusalem, "and faste by is zit, the Tree of Eldre that Judas henge himself upon, for despeyr that he hadde, when he solde and betrayed oure Lord." This was enough to give the tree a bad fame, which other things helped to confirm—the evil smell of its leaves, the heavy narcotic smell of its flowers, its hard and heartless wood,[85:2] and the ugly drooping black fungus that is almost exclusively found on it (though it occurs also on the Elm), which was vulgarly called the Ear of Judas (Hirneola auricula Judæ). This was the bad character; but, on the other hand, there were many who could tell of its many virtues, so that in 1644 appeared a book entirely devoted to its praises. This was "The Anatomie of the Elder, translated from the Latin of Dr. Martin Blockwich by C. de Iryngio" [86](i.e., Christ. Irvine), a book that, in its Latin and English form, went through several editions. And this favourable estimate of the tree is still very common in several parts of the Continent. In the South of Germany it is believed to drive away evil spirits, and the name "'Holderstock' (Elder Stock) is a term of endearment given by a lover to his beloved, and is connected with Hulda, the old goddess of love, to whom the Elder tree was considered sacred." In Denmark and Norway it is held in like esteem, and in the Tyrol an "Elder bush, trained into the form of a cross, is planted on the new-made grave, and if it blossoms the soul of the person lying beneath it is happy." And this use of the Elder for funeral purposes was, perhaps, also an old English custom; for Spenser, speaking of Death, says—

Shepherd's Calendar—November.

Nor must we pass by the high value that was placed on the wood both by the Jews and Greeks. It was the wood chiefly used for musical instruments, so that the name Sambuke was applied to several very different instruments, from the fact that they were all made of Elder wood. The "sackbut," "dulcimer," and "pipe" of Daniel iii. are all connected together in this manner.

As a garden plant the common Elder is not admissible, though it forms a striking ornament in the wild hedgerows and copses, while its flowers yield the highly perfumed Elder-flower water, and its fruits give the Elder wine; but the tree runs into many varieties, several of which are very ornamental, the leaves being often very finely divided and jagged, and variegated both with golden and silver blotches. There is a handsome species from Canada (Sambucus Canadensis), which is worth growing in shrubberies, as it produces its pure white flowers in autumn.

FOOTNOTES:

[87]

ELM.

Though Vineyards were more common in England in the sixteenth century than now, yet I can nowhere find that the Vines were ever trained, in the Italian fashion, to Elms or Poplars. Yet Shakespeare does not stand alone in thus speaking of the Elm in its connection with the Vine. Spenser speaks of "the Vine-prop Elme," and Milton—

And Browne—

Britannia's Pastorals, book i, song 1.

Ibid., ii, 4.

But I should think that neither Shakespeare, nor Browne, nor Milton ever saw an English Vine trained to an Elm; they were simply copying from the classical writers.

[88]The Wych Elm is probably a true native, but the more common Elm of our hedgerows is a tree of Southern Europe and North Africa, and is of such modern introduction into England that in Evelyn's time it was rarely seen north of Stamford. It was probably introduced into Southern England by the Romans.

FOOTNOTES:

ERINGOES.

Gerard tells us that Eringoes are the candied roots of the Sea Holly (Eryngium maritimum), and he gives the recipe for candying them. I am not aware that the Sea Holly is ever now so used, but it is a very handsome plant as it is seen growing on the sea shore, and its fine foliage makes it an ornamental plant for a garden. But as used by Falstaff I am inclined to think that the vegetable he wished for was the Globe Artichoke, which is a near ally of the Eryngium, was a favourite diet in Shakespeare's time, and was reputed to have certain special virtues which are not attributed to the Sea Holly, but which would more accord with Falstaff's character.[88:1] I cannot, however, anywhere find that the Artichoke was called Eringoes.

FOOTNOTES:

FENNEL.

[89] The Fennel was always a plant of high reputation. The Plain of Marathon was so named from the abundance of Fennel (μαραθρον) growing on it.[89:1] And like all strongly scented plants, it was supposed by the medical writers to abound in "virtues." Gower, describing the star Pleiades, says—

Conf. Aman., lib. sept. (3, 129. Paulli.)

These virtues cannot be told more pleasantly than by Longfellow—

"Yet the virtues of Fennel, as thus enumerated by Longfellow, do not comprise either of those attributes of the plant which illustrate the two passages from Shakespeare. The first alludes to it as an emblem of flattery, for which ample authority has been found by the commentators.[89:2] Florio is quoted for the phrase 'Dare finocchio,' to give fennel, as meaning to flatter. In the second quotation the allusion is to the reputation of Fennel as an inflammatory herb with much the same virtues as are attributed to Eringoes."—Mr. J. F. Marsh in The Garden.

The English name was directly derived from its Latin name Fœniculum, which may have been given it from its hay-like smell (fœnum), but this is not certain. We have another English word derived from the Giant Fennel of the South of Europe (ferula); this is the ferule, an instrument of punishment for small boys, also adopted from the Latin, the [90]Roman schoolmaster using the stalks of the Fennel for the same purpose as the modern schoolmaster uses the cane.

The early poets looked on the Fennel as an emblem of the early summer—

Libæus Diaconus.(1225).

As a useful plant, the chief use is as a garnishing and sauce for fish. Large quantities of the seed are said to be imported to flavour gin, but this can scarcely be called useful. As ornamental plants, the large Fennels (F. Tingitana, F. campestris, F. glauca, &c.) are very desirable where they can have the necessary room.

FOOTNOTES:

FERN.

There is a fashion in plants as in most other things, and in none is this more curiously shown than in the estimation in which Ferns are and have been held. Now-a-days it is the fashion to admire Ferns, and few would be found bold enough to profess an indifference to them. But it was not always so. Theocritus seems to have admired the Fern—

Idyll xx. (Calverley.)

Idyll v. (Calverley.)

But Virgil gives it a bad character, speaking of it as "filicem invisam." Horace is still more severe, "neglectis urenda filix innascitur agris." The Anglo-Saxon translation of Boethius spoke contemptuously of the "Thorns, and the Furzes, and the Fern, and all the weeds" (Cockayne). And so it was in Shakespeare's time. Butler spoke of it as the—

[91]

Cowley spoke the opinion of his day as if the plant had neither use nor beauty—

Plantarum, lib. i.

And later still Gilpin, who wrote so much on the beauties of country scenery at the close of the last century, has nothing better to say for Ferns than that they are noxious weeds, to be classed with "Thorns and Briers, and other ditch trumpery." The fact, no doubt, is that Ferns were considered something "uncanny and eerie;" our ancestors could not understand a plant which seemed to them to have neither flower nor seed, and so they boldly asserted it had neither. "This kinde of Ferne," says Lyte in 1587, "beareth neither flowers nor sede, except we shall take for sede the black spots growing on the backsides of the leaves, the whiche some do gather thinking to worke wonders, but to say the trueth it is nothing els but trumperie and superstition." A plant so strange must needs have strange qualities, but the peculiar power attributed to it of making persons invisible arose thus:—It was the age in which the doctrine of signatures was fully believed in; according to which doctrine Nature, in giving particular shapes to leaves and flowers, had thereby plainly taught for what diseases they were specially useful.[91:1] Thus a heart-shaped leaf was for heart disease, a liver-shaped for the liver, a bright-eyed flower was for the eyes, a foot-shaped flower or leaf would certainly cure the gout, and so on; and then when they found a plant which certainly grew and increased, but of which the organs of fructification were invisible, it was a clear conclusion that properly used the plant would confer the gift of invisibility. Whether the [92]people really believed this or not we cannot say,[92:1] but they were quite ready to believe any wonder connected with the plant, and so it was a constant advertisement with the quacks. Even in Addison's time "it was impossible to walk the streets without having an advertisement thrust into your hand of a doctor who had arrived at the knowledge of the Green and Red Dragon, and had discovered the female Fern-seed. Nobody ever knew what this meant" ("Tatler," No. 240). But to name all the superstitions connected with the Fern would take too much space.

The name is expressive; it is a contraction of the Anglo-Saxon fepern, and so shows that some of our ancestors marked its feathery form; and its history as a garden plant is worth a few lines. So little has it been esteemed as a garden plant that Mr. J. Smith, the ex-Curator of the Kew Gardens, tells us that in the year 1822 the collection of Ferns at Kew was so extremely poor that "he could not estimate the entire Kew collection of exotic Ferns at that period at more than forty species" (Smith's "Ferns, British and Exotic," introduction). Since that time the steadily increasing admiration of Ferns has caused collectors to send them from all parts of the world, so that in 1866 Mr. Smith was enabled to describe about a thousand species, and now the number must be much larger; and the closer search for Ferns has further brought into notice a very large number of most curious varieties and monstrosities, which it is still more curious to observe are, with very few exceptions, confined to the British species.

FOOTNOTES:

[93]

FIGS.

In some of these passages (as 5, 6, 7, and perhaps in more) the reference is to a grossly insulting and indecent gesture called "making the fig." It was a most unpleasant custom, which largely prevailed throughout Europe in Shakespeare's time, and on which I need not dwell. It is fully described in Douce's "Illustrations of Shakespeare," i, 492.

In some of the other quotations the reference is simply to the proverbial likeness of a Fig to a matter of the least [94]importance.[94:1] But in the others the dainty fruit, the green Fig, is noticed.

The Fig tree, celebrated from the earliest times for the beauty of its foliage and for its "sweetness and good fruit" (Judges ix. 11), is said to have been introduced into England by the Romans; but the more reliable accounts attribute its introduction to Cardinal Pole, who is said to have planted the Fig tree still living at Lambeth Palace. Botanically, the Fig is of especial interest. The Fig, as we eat it, is neither fruit nor flower, though partaking of both, being really the hollow, fleshy receptacle enclosing a multitude of flowers, which never see the light, yet come to full perfection and ripen their seed. The Fig stands alone in this peculiar arrangement of its flowers, but there are other plants of which we eat the unopened or undeveloped flowers, as the Artichoke, the Cauliflower, the Caper, the Clove, and the Pine Apple.

FOOTNOTES:

FILBERTS.

FLAGS.

We now commonly call the Iris a Flag, and in Shakespeare's time the Iris pseudoacorus was called the Water Flag, and so this passage might, perhaps, have been placed [95]under Flower-de-luce. But I do not think that the Flower-de-luce proper was ever called a Flag at that time, whereas we know that many plants, especially the Reeds and Bulrushes, were called in a general way Flags. This is the case in the Bible, the language of which is always a safe guide in the interpretation of contemporary literature. The mother of Moses having placed the infant in the ark of Bulrushes, "laid it in the Flags by the river's brink," and the daughter of Pharaoh "saw the ark among the Flags." Job asks, "Can the Flag grow without water?" and Isaiah draws the picture of desolation when "the brooks of defence shall be emptied and dried up, and the Reeds and the Flags shall wither." But in these passages, not only is the original word very loosely translated, but the original word itself was so loosely used that long ago Jerome had said it might mean any marsh plant, quidquid in palude virens nascitur. And in the same way I conclude that when Shakespeare named the Flag he meant any long-leaved waterside plant that is swayed to and fro by the stream, and that therefore this passage might very properly have been placed under Rushes.

FLAX.

The Flax of commerce (Linum usitatissimum) is not a true native, though Turner said: "I have seen flax or lynt growyng wilde in Sommerset shyre" ("Herbal," part ii. p. 39); but it takes kindly to the soil, and soon becomes naturalized in the neighbourhood of any Flax field or mill. We have, however, three native Flaxes in England, of which the smallest, the Fairy Flax (L. catharticum), is one of the most graceful ornaments of our higher downs and hills.[96:1] The Flax of commerce, which is the plant referred to by Shakespeare, is supposed to be a native of Egypt, and we have early notice of it in the Book of Exodus; and the microscope has shown that the cere-cloths of the most ancient Egyptian mummies are made of linen. It was very early introduced into England, and the spinning of Flax was the regular occupation of the women of every household, from the mistress downwards, so that even queens are represented in the old illuminations in the act of spinning, and "the spinning-wheel was a necessary implement in every household, from the palace to the cottage."—Wright, Domestic Manners. The occupation is now almost gone, driven out by machinery, but it has left its mark on our language, at least on our legal language, which acknowledges as the only designation of an unmarried woman that she is "a spinster."

A crop of Flax is one of the most beautiful, from the rich colour of the flowers resting on their dainty stalks. But it is also most useful; from it we get linen, linseed oil, oilcake, and linseed-meal; nor do its virtues end there, for "Sir [97]John Herschel tells us the surprising fact that old linen rags will, when treated with sulphuric acid, yield more than their own weight of sugar. It is something even to have lived in days when our worn-out napkins may possibly reappear on our tables in the form of sugar."—Lady Wilkinson.

As garden plants the Flaxes are all ornamental. There are about eighty species, some herbaceous and some shrubby, and of almost all colours, and in most of the species the colours are remarkably bright and clear. There is no finer blue than in L. usitatissimum, no finer yellow than in L. trigynum, or finer scarlet than in L. grandiflorum.

FOOTNOTES:

FLOWER-DE-LUCE.

Out of these five passages four relate to the Fleur-de-luce as the cognizance of France, and much learned ink has been spilled in the endeavour to find out what flower, if any, was intended to be represented, so that Mr. Planché says that "next to the origin of heraldry itself, perhaps nothing connected with it has given rise to so much controversy as the origin of this celebrated charge." It has been at various times asserted to be an Iris, a Lily, a sword-hilt, a spearhead, and a toad, or to be simply the Fleur de St. Louis. [98]Adhuc sub judice lis est—and it is never likely to be satisfactorily settled. I need not therefore dwell on it, especially as my present business is to settle not what the Fleur-de-luce meant in the arms of France, but what it meant in Shakespeare's writings. But here the same difficulty at once meets us, some writers affirming stoutly that it is a Lily, others as stoutly that it is an Iris. For the Lily theory there are the facts that Shakespeare calls it one of the Lilies, and that the other way of spelling it is Fleur-de-lys. I find also a strong confirmation of this in the writings of St. Francis de Sales (contemporary with Shakespeare). "Charity," he says, "comprehends the seven gifts of the Holy Ghost, and resembles a beautiful Flower-de-luce, which has six leaves whiter than snow, and in the middle the pretty little golden hammers" ("Philo," book xi., Mulholland's translation). This description will in no way fit the Iris, but it may very well be applied to the White Lily. Chaucer, too, seems to connect the Fleur-de-luce with the Lily—

These are certainly strong authorities for saying that the Flower-de-luce is the Lily. But there are as strong or stronger on the other side. Spenser separates the Lilies from the Flower-de-luces in his pretty lines—

Shepherd's Calendar.

Ben Jonson separates them in the same way—

Lord Bacon also separates them: "In April follow the double White Violet, the Wall-flower, the Stock-Gilliflower, the Cowslip, the Flower-de-luces, and Lilies of all Natures;" and so does Drayton—

Nymphal V.

[99] In heraldry also the Fleur-de-lis and the Lily are two distinct bearings. Then, from the time of Turner in 1568, through Gerard and Parkinson to Miller, all the botanical writers identify the Iris as the plant named, and with this judgment most of our modern writers agree.[99:1] We may, therefore, assume that Shakespeare meant the Iris as the flower given by Perdita, and we need not be surprised at his classing it among the Lilies. Botanical classification was not very accurate in his day, and long after his time two such celebrated men as Redouté and De Candolle did not hesitate to include in the "Liliacæ," not only Irises, but Daffodils, Tulips, Fritillaries, and even Orchids.

What Iris Shakespeare especially alluded to it is useless to inquire. We have two in England that are indigenous—one the rich golden-yellow (I. pseudacorus), which in some favourable positions, with its roots in the water of a brook, is one of the very handsomest of the tribe; the other the Gladwyn (I. fœtidissima), with dull flowers and strong-smelling leaves, but with most handsome scarlet fruit, which remain on the plant and show themselves boldly all through the winter and early spring. Of other sorts there is a large number, so that the whole family, according to the latest account by Mr. Baker, of Kew, contains ninety-six distinct species besides varieties. They come from all parts of the world, from the Arctic Circle to the South of China; they are of all colours, from the pure white Iris Florentina to the almost black I. Susiana; and of all sizes, from a few inches to four feet or more. They are mostly easy of cultivation and increase readily, so that there are few plants better suited for the hardy garden or more ornamental.

FOOTNOTES:

[100]

FUMITER, FUMITORY.

Of Fumitories we have five species in England, all of them weeds in cultivated grounds and in hedgerows. None of them can be considered garden plants, but they are closely allied to the Corydalis, of which there are several pretty species, and to the very handsome Dielytras, of which one species—D. spectabilis—ranks among the very handsomest of our hardy herbaceous plants. How the plant acquired its name of Fumitory—fume-terre, earth-smoke—is not very satisfactorily explained, though many explanations have been given; but that the name was an ancient one we know from the interesting Stockholm manuscript of the eleventh century published by Mr. J. Pettigrew, and of which a few lines are worth quoting. (The poem is published in the "Archæologia," vol. xxx.)—

FURZE.

[101]We now call the Ulex Europæus either Gorse, or Furze, or Whin; but in the sixteenth century I think that the Furze and Gorse were distinguished (see Gorse), and that the brown Furze was the Ulex. It is a most beautiful plant, and with its golden blossoms and richly scented flowers is the glory of our wilder hill-sides. It is especially a British plant, for though it is found in other parts of Europe, and even in the Azores and Canaries, yet I believe it is nowhere found in such abundance or in such beauty as in England. Gerard says, "The greatest and highest that I did ever see do grow about Excester, in the West Parts of England;" and those that have seen it in Devonshire will agree with him. It seems to luxuriate in the damp, mild climate of Devonshire, and to see it in full flower as it covers the low hills that abut upon the Channel between Ilfracombe and Clovelly is a sight to be long remembered. It is, indeed, a plant that we may well be proud of. Linnæus could only grow it in a greenhouse, and there is a well-known story of Dillenius that when he first saw the Furze in blossom in England he fell on his knees and thanked God for sparing his life to see so beautiful a part of His creation. The story may be apocryphal, but we have a later testimony from another celebrated traveller who had seen the glories of tropical scenery, and yet was faithful to the beauties of the wild scenery of England. Mr. Wallace bears this testimony: "I have never seen in the tropics such brilliant masses of colour as even England can show in her Furze-clad commons, her glades of Wild Hyacinths, her fields of Poppies, her meadows of Buttercups and Orchises, carpets of yellow, purple, azure blue, and fiery crimson, which the tropics can rarely exhibit. We have smaller masses of colour in our Hawthorns and Crab trees, our Holly and Mountain Ash, our Broom, Foxgloves, Primroses, and purple Vetches, which clothe with gay colours the length and breadth of our land" ("Malayan Archipelago," ii. 296).

As a garden shrub the Furze may be grown either as a single lawn shrub or in the hedge or shrubbery. Everywhere it will be handsome both in its single and double varieties, and as it bears the knife well, it can be kept within limits. The upright Irish form also makes an elegant shrub, but does not flower so freely as the typical plant.

[102]

GARLICK.

There is something almost mysterious in the Garlick that it should be so thoroughly acceptable, almost indispensable, to many thousands, while to others it is so horribly offensive as to be unbearable. The Garlick of Egypt was one of the delicacies that the Israelites looked back to with fond regret, and we know from Herodotus that it was the daily food of the Egyptian labourer; yet, in later times, the Mohammedan legend recorded that "when Satan stepped out from the Garden of Eden after the fall of man, Garlick sprung up from the spot where he placed his left foot, and Onions from that which his right foot touched, on which account, perhaps, Mohammed habitually fainted at the sight of either." It was the common food also of the Roman labourer, but Horace could only wonder at the "dura messorum illia" that could digest the plant "cicutis allium nocentius." It was, and is the same with its medical virtues. According to some it was possessed of every virtue,[102:1] so that it had the name of Poor Man's Treacle [103](the word treacle not having its present meaning, but being the Anglicised form of theriake, or heal-all[103:1]); while, on the other hand, Gerard affirmed "it yieldeth to the body no nourishment at all; it ingendreth naughty and sharpe bloud."

Bullein describes it quaintly: "It is a grosse kinde of medicine, verye unpleasant for fayre Ladies and tender Lilly Rose colloured damsels which often time profereth sweet breathes before gentle wordes, but both would do very well" ("Book of Simples"). Yet if we could only divest it of its evil smell, the wild Wood Garlick would rank among the most beautiful of our British plants. Its wide leaves are very similar to those of the Lily of the Valley, and its starry flowers are of the very purest white. But it defies picking, and where it grows it generally takes full possession, so that I have known several woods—especially on the Cotswold Hills—that are to be avoided when the plant is in flower. The woods are closely carpeted with them, and every step you take brings out their fœtid odour. There are many species grown in the gardens, some of which are even very sweet smelling (as A. odorum and A. fragrans); but these are the exceptions, and even these have the Garlick scent in their leaves and roots. Of the rest many are very pretty and worth growing, but they are all more or less tainted with the evil habits of the family.

FOOTNOTES:

GILLIFLOWERS, see Carnations.

GINGER.

Ginger was well known both to the Greeks and Romans. It was imported from Arabia, together with its name, Zingiberri, which it has retained, with little variation, in all languages.

When it was first imported into England is not known, but probably by the Romans, for it occurs as a common ingredient in many of the Anglo-Saxon medical recipes. Russell, in the "Boke of Nurture," mentions several kinds of Ginger; as green and white, "colombyne, valadyne, and Maydelyn." In Shakespeare's time it was evidently very common and cheap.

[105] It is produced from the roots of Zingiber officinale, a member of the large and handsome family of the Ginger-worts. The family contains some of the most beautiful of our greenhouse plants, as the Hedychiums, Alpinias, and Mantisias; and, though entirely tropical, most of the species are of easy cultivation in England. Ginger is very easily reared in hotbeds, and I should think it very probable that it may have been so grown in Shakespeare's time. Gerard attempted to grow it, but he naturally failed, by trying to grow it in the open ground as a hardy plant; yet "it sprouted and budded forth greene leaves in my garden in the heate of somer;" and he tells us that plants were sent him by "an honest and expert apothecarie, William Dries, of Antwerp," and "that the same had budded and grown in the said Dries' garden."

GOOSEBERRIES.

The Gooseberry is probably a native of the North of England, but Turner said (s.v. uva crispa) "it groweth onely that I have sene in England, in gardines, but I have sene it in Germany abrode in the fieldes amonge other busshes."

The name has nothing to do with the goose. Dr. Prior has satisfactorily shown that the word is a corruption of "Crossberry." By the writers of Shakespeare's time, and even later, it was called Feaberry (Gerard, Lawson, and others), and in one of the many books on the Plague published in the sixteenth century, the patient is recommended to eat "thepes, or goseberries" ("A Counsell against the Sweate," fol. 23).

[106]

GORSE or GOSS.

In speaking of the Furze (which see), I said that in Shakespeare's time the Furze and Gorse were probably distinguished, though now the two names are applied to the same plant. "In the 15th Henry VI. (1436), license was given to Humfrey, Duke of Gloucester, to inclose 200 acres of land—pasture, wode, hethe, vrises,[106:1] and gorste (bruere, et jampnorum), and to form thereof a Park at Greenwich."—Rot. Parl. iv. 498.[106:2] This proves that the "Gorst" was different from the "Vrise," and it may very likely have been the Petty Whin. "Pricking Goss," however, may be only a generic term, like Bramble and Brier, for any wild prickly plant.

FOOTNOTES:

GOURD.

I merely mention this to point out that "Gourd," though probably originally derived from the fruit, is not the fruit here, but is an instrument of gambling. The fruit, however, was well known in Shakespeare's time, and was used as the type of intense greenness—

Spenser, Virgil's Gnat.

GRACE, see Rue.

[107]

GRAPES, see Vines.

GRASSES.

In and before Shakespeare's time Grass was used as a general term for all plants. Thus Chaucer—

The Squyeres Tale.

[109]It is used in the same general way in the Bible, "the Grass of the field."

In the whole range of botanical studies the accurate study of the Grasses is, perhaps, the most difficult as the genus is the most extensive, for Grasses are said to "constitute, perhaps, a twelfth part of the described species of flowering plants, and at least nine-tenths of the number of individuals comprising the vegetation of the world" (Lindley), so that a full study of the Grasses may almost be said to be the work of a lifetime. But Shakespeare was certainly no such student of Grasses: in all these passages Grass is only mentioned in a generic manner, without any reference to any particular Grass. The passages in which hay is mentioned, I have not thought necessary to quote.

HAREBELL.

The Harebell of Shakespeare is undoubtedly the Wild Hyacinth (Scilla nutans), the "sanguine flower inscribed with woe" of Milton's "Lycidas," though we must bear in mind that the name is applied differently in various parts of the island; thus "the Harebell of Scotch writers is the Campanula, and the Bluebell, so celebrated in Scottish song, is the Wild Hyacinth or Scilla; while in England the same names are used conversely, the Campanula being the Bluebell and the Wild Hyacinth the Harebell" ("Poets' Pleasaunce")—but this will only apply in poetry; in ordinary language, at least in the South of England, the Wild Hyacinth is the Bluebell, and is the plant referred to by Shakespeare as the Harebell.

It is one of the chief ornaments of our woods,[109:1] growing [110]in profusion wherever it establishes itself, and being found of various colours—pink, white, and blue. As a garden flower it may well be introduced into shrubberies, but as a border plant it cannot compete with its rival relation, the Hyacinthus orientalis, which is the parent of all the fine double and many coloured Hyacinths in which the florists have delighted for the last two centuries.

FOOTNOTES:

HARLOCKS.

I cannot do better than follow Dr. Prior on this word: "Harlock, as usually printed in 'King Lear' and in Drayton, ecl. 4—

is a word that does not occur in the Herbals, and which the commentators have supposed to be a misprint for Charlock. There can be little doubt that Hardock is the correct reading, and that the plant meant is the one now called Burdock." Schmidt also adopts Burdock as the right interpretation.

HAWTHORNS.

Under its many names of Albespeine, Whitethorn, Haythorn or Hawthorn, May, and Quickset, this tree has ever been a favourite with all lovers of the country.

such is Browne's advice in his "Britannia's Pastorals" (ii. 2). He, like the other early poets, clearly loved the tree for its beauty; and in picturesque beauty the Hawthorn yields to none, when it can be seen in some sheltered valley growing with others of its kind, and allowed to grow unpruned, for then in the early summer it is literally a sheet of white, yet beautifully relieved by the tender green of the young leaves, and by the bright crimson of the anthers, and loaded with a scent that is most delicate and refreshing. But not only for its beauty is the Hawthorn a favourite tree, but also for its many pleasant associations—it is essentially the May tree, the tree that tells that winter is really past, and that summer has fairly begun. Hear Spenser—

[112]

Shepherd's Calendar—May.

Yet in spite of its pretty name, and in spite of the poets, the Hawthorn now seldom flowers till June, and I should suppose it is never in flower on May Day, except perhaps in Devonshire and Cornwall; and it is very doubtful if it ever were so found, except in these southern counties, though some fancy that the times of flowering of several of our flowers are changed, and in some instances largely changed. But "it was an old custom in Suffolk, in most of the farmhouses, that any servant who could bring in a branch of Hawthorn in full blossom on the 1st of May was entitled to a dish of cream for breakfast. This custom is now disused, not so much from the reluctance of the masters to give the reward, as from the inability of the servants to find the Whitethorn in flower."—Brand's Antiquities.[112:1] Even those who might not see the beauty of an old Thorn tree, have found its uses as one of the very few trees that will grow thick in the most exposed places, and so give pleasant shade and shelter in places where otherwise but little shade and shelter could be found.

And "at Hesket, in Cumberland, yearly on St. Barnabas' Day, by the highway side under a Thorn tree is kept the court for the whole forest of Englewood."—History of Westmoreland.

The Thorn may well be admitted as a garden shrub either [113]in its ordinary state, or in its beautiful double white, red, and pink varieties, and those who like to grow curious trees should not omit the Glastonbury Thorn, which flowers at the ordinary time, and bears fruit, but also buds and flowers again in winter, showing at the same time the new flowers and the older fruit.

Nor must we omit to mention that the Whitethorn is one of the trees that claims to have been used for the sacred Crown of Thorns. It is most improbable that it was so, in fact almost certain that it was not; but it was a mediæval belief, as Sir John Mandeville witnesses: "Then was our Lord yled into a gardyn, and there the Jewes scorned hym, and maden hym a crowne of the branches of the Albiespyne, that is Whitethorn, that grew in the same gardyn, and setten yt upon hys heved. And therefore hath the Whitethorn many virtues. For he that beareth a branch on hym thereof, no thundre, ne no maner of tempest may dere hym, ne in the howse that it is ynne may non evil ghost enter."

And we may finish the Hawthorn with a short account of its name, which is interesting:—"Haw," or "hay," is the same word as "hedge" ("sepes, id est, haies," John de Garlande), and so shows the great antiquity of this plant as used for English hedges. In the north, "haws" are still called "haigs;" but whether Hawthorn was first applied to the fruit or the hedge, whether the hedge was so called because it was made of the Thorn tree that bears the haws, or whether the fruit was so named because it was borne on the hedge tree, is a point on which etymologists differ.

FOOTNOTES:

HAZEL.

Dr. Prior has decided that "'Filbert' is a barbarous compound of phillon or feuille, a leaf, and beard, to denote its distinguishing peculiarity, the leafy involucre projecting beyond the nut." But in the times before Shakespeare the name was more poetically said to be derived from the nymph Phyllis. Nux Phyllidos is its name in the old vocabularies, and Gower ("Confessio Amantis") tells us why—

[115]

(Lib. quart.),

and so Spenser spoke of it as "'Phillis' philbert" (Elegy 17).[115:1]

The Nut, the Filbert, and the Cobnut, are all botanically the same, and the two last were cultivated in England long before Shakespeare's time, not only for the fruit, but also, and more especially, for the oil.

There is a peculiarity in the growth of the Nut that is worth the notice of the botanical student. The male blossoms, or catkins (anciently called "agglettes or blowinges"), are mostly produced at the ends of the year's shoots, while the pretty little crimson female blossoms are produced close to the branch; they are completely sessile or unstalked. Now in most fruit trees, when a flower is fertilized, the fruit is produced exactly in the same place, with respect to the main tree, that the flower occupied; a Peach or Apricot, for instance, rests upon the branch which bore the flower. But in the Nut a different arrangement prevails. As soon as the flower is fertilized it starts away from the parent branch; a fresh branch is produced, bearing leaves and the Nut or Nuts at the end, so that the Nut is produced several inches away from the spot on which the flower originally was. I know of no other tree that produces its fruit in this way, nor do I know what special benefit to the plant arises from this arrangement.

Much folk-lore has gathered round the Hazel tree and the Nuts. The cracking of Nuts, with much fortune-telling connected therewith, was the favourite amusement on All Hallow's Eve (Oct. 31), so that the Eve was called Nutcrack Night. I believe the custom still exists; it certainly has not been very long abolished, for the Vicar of Wakefield and his neighbours "religiously cracked Nuts on All [116]Hallow's Eve." And in many places "an ancient custom prevailed of going a Nutting on Holy Rood Day (Sept. 14), which it was esteemed quite unlucky to omit."—Forster.[116:1]

A greater mystery connected with the Hazel is the divining rod, for the discovery of water and metals. This has always by preference been a forked Hazel-rod, though sometimes other rods are substituted. The belief in its power dates from a very early period, and is by no means extinct. The divining-rod is said to be still used in Cornwall, and firmly believed in; nor has this belief been confined to the uneducated. Even Linnæus confessed himself to be half a convert to it, and learned treatises have been written accepting the facts, and accounting for them by electricity or some other subtle natural agency. Most of us, however, will rather agree with Evelyn's cautious verdict, that the virtues attributed to the forked stick "made out so solemnly by the attestation of magistrates, and divers other learned and credible persons, who have critically examined matters of fact, is certainly next to a miracle, and requires a strong faith."

FOOTNOTES:

HEATH.

There are other passages in which the word Heath occurs in Shakespeare, but in none else is the flower referred to; the other references are to an open heath or common. And in this place no special Heath can be selected, unless by "long Heath" we suppose him to have meant the Ling (Calluna vulgaris). And this is most probable, for so Lyte calls it. "There is in this countrie two kindes of Heath, one which beareth the flowres alongst the stemmes, and is called Long Heath." But it is supposed by some that the correct reading is "Ling, Heath," &c., and in that case Heath will be a generic word, meaning any of the British [117] species (see Ling)]. Of British species there are five, and wherever they exist they are dearly prized as forming a rich element of beauty in our landscapes. They are found all over the British Islands, and they seem to be quite indifferent as to the place of their growth. They are equally beautiful in the extreme Highlands of Scotland, or on the Quantock and Exmoor Hills of the South—everywhere they clothe the hill-sides with a rich garment of purple that is wonderfully beautiful, whether seen under the full influence of the brightest sunshine, or under the dark shadows of the blackest thundercloud. And the botanical geography of the Heath tribe is very remarkable; it is found over the whole of Europe, in Northern Asia, and in Northern Africa. Then the tribe takes a curious leap, being found in immense abundance, both of species and individuals, in Southern Africa, while it is entirely absent from North and South America. Not a single species has been found in the New World. A few plants of Calluna vulgaris have been found in Newfoundland and Massachusetts, but that is not a true Heath.

As a garden plant the Heath has been strangely neglected. Many of the species are completely hardy, and will make pretty evergreen bushes of from 2ft. to 4ft. high, but they are better if kept close-grown by constant clipping. The species best suited for this treatment are E. Mediterranea, E. arborea, and E. codonoides. Of the more humble-growing species, E. vagans (the Cornish Heath) will grow easily in most gardens, though in its native habitat it is confined to the serpentine formation; nor must we omit E. herbacea, which also will grow anywhere, and, if clipped yearly after flowering, will make a most beautiful border to any flower-bed; or it may be used more extensively, as it is at Doddington Park, in Gloucestershire (Sir Gerald Codrington's), where there is a large space in front of the house, several yards square, entirely filled with E. herbacea. When this is in flower (and it is so for nearly two months, or sometimes more) the effect, as seen from above, is of the richest Turkey carpet, but of such a colour and harmony as no Turkey carpet ever attained.

Several of the South-European Heaths were cultivated in England in Shakespeare's time.

[118]

HEBENON OR HEBONA.[118:1]

Before and in the time of Shakespeare other writers had spoken of the narcotic and poisonous effects of Heben, Hebenon, or Hebona. Gower says—

Conf. Aman., lib. quart. (ii. 103, Paulli).

Spenser says—

F. Q., introd., st. 3.

F. Q., book ii, c. viij, st. 17.

And he speaks of a "speare of Heben wood," and "a Heben launce." Marlowe, a contemporary and friend of Shakespeare, makes Barabas curse his daughter with—

Jew of Malta, act iii, st. 4.

[119] It may be taken for granted that all these authors allude to the same tree, but what tree is meant has sorely puzzled the commentators. Some naturally suggested the Ebony, and this view is supported by the respectable names of Archdeacon Nares, Douce, Schmidt, and Dyce. A larger number pronounced with little hesitation in favour of Henbane (Hyoscyamus niger), the poisonous qualities of which were familiar to the contemporaries of Shakespeare, and were supposed by most of the botanical writers of his day (and on the authority of Pliny) to be communicated by being poured into the ears. But the Henbane is not a tree, as Gower's "Hebenus" and Spenser's "Heben" certainly were; and though it will satisfy some of the requirements of the plant named by Shakespeare, it will not satisfy all.[119:1]

It might have been supposed that the difficulty would at once have been cleared up by reference to the accounts of the death of Hamlet's father, as given by Saxo Grammaticus, and the old "Hystorie of Hamblet," but neither of these writers attribute his death to poison.[119:2]

The question has lately been very much narrowed and satisfactorily settled (for the present, certainly, and probably altogether) by Dr. Nicholson and the Rev. W. A. Harrison. These gentlemen have decided that the true reading is Hebona, and that Hebona is the Yew. Their views are stated at full length in two exhaustive papers contributed to the New Shakespeare Society, and published in their "Transactions."[119:3] The full argument is too long for insertion here, [120]and my readers will thank me for referring them to the papers in the "Transactions." The main arguments are based on three facts: 1. That in nearly all the northern nations (including, of course, Denmark) the name of the Yew is more or less like Heben. 2. That all the effects attributed by Shakespeare to the action of Hebona are described as arising from Yew-poisoning by different medical writers, some of them contemporary with him, and some writing with later experiences. 3. That the post mortem appearances after Yew-poisoning and after snake-poisoning are very similar, and it was "given out, that sleeping in my orchard, a serpent stung me."

But it may well be asked, How could Shakespeare have known of all these effects, which (as far as our present search has discovered) are not named by any one writer of his time, and some of which have only been made public from the results of Yew-poisoning since his day? I think the question can be answered in a very simple way. The effects are described with such marked minuteness that it seems to me not only very probable, but almost certain, that Shakespeare must have been an eye-witness of a case of Yew-poisoning, and that what he saw had been so photographed on his mind that he took the first opportunity that presented itself to reproduce the picture. With his usual grand contempt for perfect accuracy he did not hesitate to sweep aside at once the strict historical records of the old king's death, and in its place to paint for us a cold-blooded murder carried out by means which he knew from his personal experience to be possible, and which he felt himself able to describe with a minuteness which his knowledge of his audiences assured him would not be out of place even in that great tragedy.

The objection to the Yew theory of Hebona, that the Yew is named by Shakespeare under its more usual name, is no real objection. On the same ground Ebony and Henbane must be excluded; together with Gilliflowers, which he elsewhere speaks of as Carnations; and Woodbine, because he also speaks of Honeysuckle.

FOOTNOTES:

[121]

HEMLOCK.

One of the most poisonous of a suspicious family (the Umbelliferæ), "the great Hemlocke doubtlesse is not possessed of any one good facultie, as appeareth by his lothsome smell and other apparent signes," and with this evil character the Hemlock was considered to be only fit for an ingredient of witches' broth—

Ben Jonson, Witches' Song in the Masque of the Queens.

Yet the Hemlock adds largely to the beauty of our hedgerows; its spotted tall stems and its finely cut leaves make it a handsome weed, and the dead stems and dried umbels are marked features in the winter appearance of the hedges. As a poison it has an evil notoriety, being supposed to be the poison by which Socrates was put to death, though this is not quite certain. It is not, however, altogether a useless plant—"It is a valuable medicinal plant, and in autumn the ripened stem is cut into pieces to make reeds for worsted thread."—Johnston.

HEMP.

In all these passages, except the last, the reference is to rope made from Hemp, and not to the Hemp plant, and it is very probable that Shakespeare never saw the plant. It was introduced into England long before his time, and largely cultivated, but only in few parts of England, and chiefly in the eastern counties. I do not find that it was cultivated in gardens in his time, but it is a plant well deserving a place in any garden, and is especially suitable from its height and regular growth, for the central plant of a flower-bed. It is supposed to be a native of India, and seems capable of cultivation in almost any climate.[122:1]

The name has a curious history. "The Greek κάνναβις, and Latin cannabis, are both identical with the Sanscrit kanam, as well as with the German hanf, and the English hemp. More directly from cannabis comes canvas, made up of hemp or flax, and canvass, to discuss: i.e., sift a question; metaphorically from the use of hempen sieves or sifters."—Birdwood's Handbook to the Indian Court, p. 23.

FOOTNOTES:

HERB OF GRACE, see Rue.

HOLLY.

[123] From this single notice of the Holly in Shakespeare, and from the slight account of it in Gerard, we might conclude that the plant was not the favourite in the sixteenth century that it is in the nineteenth; but this would be a mistake. The Holly entered largely into the old Christmas carols.

and it was from the earliest times used for the decoration of houses and churches at Christmas. It does not, however, derive its name from this circumstance, though it was anciently spelt "holy," or called the "holy tree," for the name comes from a very different source, and is identical with "holm," which, indeed, was its name in the time of Gerard and Parkinson, and is still its name in some parts of England, though it has almost lost its other old name of Hulver,[123:1] except in the eastern counties, where the word is still in use. But as an ornamental tree it does not seem to have been much valued, though in the next century Evelyn is loud in the praises of this "incomparable tree," and admired it both for its beauty and its use. It is certainly the handsomest of our native evergreens, and is said to be finer in England than in any other country; and as seen growing in its wild habitats in our forests, as it may be seen in the New Forest and the Forest of Dean, it stands without a rival, equally beautiful in summer and in winter; in summer its bright glossy leaves shining out distinctly in the midst of any surrounding greenery, while as "the Holly that outdares cold winter's ire" (Browne), it is the very emblem of bright cheerfulness, with its foliage uninjured in the most severe weather, and its rich coral berries, sometimes borne in the greatest profusion, delighting us with their brilliancy and beauty. And as a garden shrub, the Holly still holds its own, after all the fine exotic shrubs that have been introduced into our gardens during the present century. It can be grown as a single shrub, or it may be clipped, and will then form the best and the most impregnable hedge that can be grown. No other [124]plant will compare with it as a hedge plant, if it be only properly attended to, and we can understand Evelyn's pride in his "glorious and refreshing object," a Holly hedge 160ft. in length, 7ft. in height, and 5ft. in diameter, which he could show in his "poor gardens at any time of the year, glittering with its armed and vernished leaves," and "blushing with their natural corale." Nor need we be confined to plain green in such a hedge. The Holly runs into a great many varieties, with the leaves of all shapes and sizes, and blotched and variegated in different fashions and colours. All of these seem to be comparatively modern. In the time of Gerard and Parkinson there seems to have been only the one typical species, and perhaps the Hedgehog Holly.

I may finish the notice of the Holly by quoting two most remarkable uses of the tree mentioned by Parkinson: "With the flowers of Holly, saith Pliny from Pythagoras, water is made ice; and againe, a staffe of the tree throwne at any beast, although it fall short by his defect that threw it, will flye to him, as he lyeth still, by the speciall property of the tree." He may well add—"This I here relate that you may understand the fond and vain conceit of those times, which I would to God we were not in these dayes tainted withal."

FOOTNOTES:

HOLY THISTLE.

The Carduus benedictus, or Blessed Thistle, is a handsome annual from the South of Europe, and obtained its name from its high reputation as a heal-all, being supposed [125]even to cure the plague, which was the highest praise that could be given to a medicine in those days. It is mentioned in all the treatises on the Plague, and especially by Thomas Brasbridge, who, in 1578, published his "Poore Mans Jewell, that is to say, a Treatise of the Pestilence: vnto which is annexed a declaration of the vertues of the Hearbes Carduus Benedictus and Angelica." This little book Shakespeare may have seen; it speaks of the virtues of the "distilled" leaves: it says, "it helpeth the hart," "expelleth all poyson taken in at the mouth and other corruption that doth hurt and annoye the hart," and that "the juyce of it is outwardly applied to the bodie" ("lay it to your heart"), and concludes, "therefore I counsell all them that have Gardens to nourish it, that they may have it always to their own use, and the use of their neighbours that lacke it." The plant has long lost this high character.

HONEYSTALKS, see Clover.

HONEYSUCKLE.

[126] I have joined together here the Woodbine and the Honeysuckle, because there can be little doubt that in Shakespeare's time the two names belonged to the same plant,[126:1] and that the Woodbine was (where the two names were at all discriminated, as in No. 3), applied to the plant generally, and Honeysuckle to the flower. This seems very clear by comparing together Nos. 1 and 2. In earlier writings the name was applied very loosely to almost any creeping or climbing plant. In an Anglo-Saxon Vocabulary of the eleventh century it is applied to the Wild Clematis ("Viticella—Weoden-binde"); while in Archbishop Ælfric's "Vocabulary" of the tenth century it is applied to the Hedera nigra, which may be either the Common or the Ground Ivy ("Hedera nigra—Wude-binde"); and in the Herbarium and Leechdom books of the twelfth century it is applied to the Capparis or Caper-plant, by which, however (as Mr. Cockayne considers), the Convolvulus Sepium is meant. After Shakespeare's time again the words began to be used confusedly. Milton does not seem to have been very clear in the matter. In "Paradise Lost" he makes our first parents "wind the Woodbine round this arbour" (perhaps he had Shakespeare's arbour in his mind); and in "Comus" he tells us of—

While in "Lycidas" he tells of—

And we can scarcely suppose that he would apply two such contrary epithets as "flaunting" and "well-attired" to the same plant. And now the name, as of old, is used with great uncertainty, and I have heard it applied to many [127]plants, and especially to the small sweet-scented Clematis (C. flammula).

But with the Honeysuckle there is no such difficulty. The name is an old one, and in its earliest use was no doubt indifferently applied to many sweet-scented flowers (the Primrose amongst them); but it was soon attached exclusively to our own sweet Honeysuckle of the woods and hedges. We have two native species (Lonicera periclymenum and L. xylosteum), and there are about eighty exotic species, but none of them sweeter or prettier than our own, which, besides its fragrant flowers, has pretty, fleshy, red fruit.

The Honeysuckle has ever been the emblem of firm and fast affection—as it climbs round any tree or bush, that is near it, not only clinging to it faster than Ivy, but keeping its hold so tight as to leave its mark in deep furrows on the tree that has supported it. The old writers are fond of alluding to this. Bullein in "The Book of Simples," 1562, says very prettily, "Oh, how swete and pleasant is Wood-binde, in woodes or arbours, after a tender, soft rain: and how friendly doe this herbe, if I maie so name it, imbrace the bodies, armes, and branches of trees, with his long winding stalkes, and tender leaves, openyng or spreading forthe his swete Lillis, like ladie's fingers, emōg the thornes or bushes," and there is no doubt from the context that he is here referring to the Honeysuckle. Chaucer gives the crown of Woodbine to those who were constant in love—

The Flower and the Leaf.

The two last lines well describe the fast union between the Honeysuckle and its mated tree.

FOOTNOTES:

[128]

HYSSOP.

We should scarcely expect such a lesson of wisdom drawn from the simple herb-garden in the mouth of the greatest knave and villain in the whole range of Shakespeare's writings. It was the preaching of a deep hypocrite, and while we hate the preacher we thank him for his lesson.[128:1]

The Hyssop (Hyssopus officinalis) is not a British plant, but it was held in high esteem in Shakespeare's time. Spenser spoke of it as—

and Gerard grew in his garden five or six different species or varieties. He does not tell us where his plants came from, and perhaps he did not know. It comes chiefly from Austria and Siberia; yet Greene in his "Philomela," 1615, speaks of "the Hyssop growing in America, that is liked of strangers for the smell, and hated of the inhabitants for the operation, being as prejudicial to the one as delightsome to the other." It is now very little cultivated, for it is not a plant of much beauty, and its medicinal properties are not much esteemed; yet it is a plant that must always have an interest to readers of the Bible; for there it comes before us as the plant of purification, as the plant of which the study was not beneath the wisdom of Solomon, and especially [129]as the plant that added to the cruelties of the Crucifixion. Whether the Hyssop of Scripture is the Hyssopus officinalis is still a question, but at the present time the most modern research has decided that it is.

FOOTNOTES:

INSANE ROOT.

It is very possible that Shakespeare had no particular plant in view, but simply referred to any of the many narcotic plants which, when given in excess, would "take the reason prisoner." The critics have suggested many plants—the Hemlock, the Henbane, the Belladonna, the Mandrake, &c., each one strengthening his opinion from coeval writers. In this uncertainty I should incline to the Henbane from the following description by Gerard and Lyte. "This herbe is called . . . of Apuleia-Mania" (Lyte). "Henbane is called . . . of Pythagoras, Zoroaster, and Apuleius, Insana" (Gerard).

IVY.

The rich evergreen of "the Ivy never sear" (Milton) recommended it to the Romans to be joined with the Bay in the chaplets of poets—

And in mediæval times it was used with Holly for Christmas decorations, so that Bullein called it "the womens Christmas Herbe." But the old writers always assumed a curious rivalry between the two—

And there is a well-known carol of the time of Henry VI., which tells of the contest between the two, and of the mastery of the Holly; it is in eight stanzas, of which I extract the last four—

[131] Thus the Ivy was not allowed the same honour inside the houses of our ancestors as the Holly, but it held its place outside the houses as a sign of good cheer to be had within. The custom is now extinct, but formerly an Ivy bush (called a tod of Ivy) was universally hung out in front of taverns in England, as it still is in Brittany and Normandy. Hence arose two proverbs—"Good wine needs no bush," i.e., the reputation is sufficiently good without further advertisement; and "An owl in an Ivy bush," as "perhaps denoting originally the union of wisdom or prudence with conviviality, as 'Be merry and wise.'"—Nares.

The Ivy was a plant as much admired by our grandfathers of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries as it is now by us. Spenser was evidently fond of it—

F. Q., vi, v, 25.

In another place he speaks of it as—

And in another place—

Virgil's Gnat.

Chaucer describes it as—

And in the same poem he prettily describes it as—

As a wild plant, the Ivy is found in Europe, Asia, and Africa, but not in America, and wherever it is found it loves to cover old walls and buildings, and trees of every sort, [132]with its close and rich drapery and clusters of black fruit,[132:1] and where it once establishes itself it is always beautiful, but not always harmless. Both on trees and buildings it requires very close watching. It will very soon destroy soft-wooded trees, such as the Poplar and the Ash, by its tight embrace, not by sucking out the sap, but by preventing the outward growth of the shoots, and checking—and at length preventing—the flow of sap; and in buildings it is no doubt beneficial as long as it is closely watched and kept in place, but if allowed to drive its roots into joints, or to grow under roofs, the swelling roots and branches will soon displace any masonry, and cause immense mischief.

We have only one species of Ivy in England, and there are only two real species recognized by present botanists, but there are infinite varieties, and many of them very beautiful. These variegated Ivies were known to the Greeks and Romans, and were highly prized by them, one especially with white fruit (at present not known) was the type of beauty. No higher praise could be given to a beauty than that she was "Hedera formosior alba." These varieties are scarcely mentioned by Gerard and Parkinson, and probably were not much valued; they are now in greater repute, and nothing will surpass them for rapidly and effectually covering any bare spaces.

I need scarcely add that the Ivy is so completely hardy that it will grow in any aspect and in any soil; that its flowers are the staple food of bees in the late autumn; and that all the varieties grow easily from cuttings at almost any time of the year.

FOOTNOTES:

KECKSIES.

Kecksies or Kecks are the dried and withered stems of the Hemlock, and the name is occasionally applied to the [133]living plant. It seems also to have been used for any dry weeds—

"The Tournament of Tottenham," in
Ritson's Ancient Songs and Ballads.

KNOT-GRASS.

The Knot-grass is the Polygonum aviculare, a British weed, low, straggling, and many-jointed, hence its name of Knot-grass. There is no doubt that this is the plant meant, and its connection with a dwarf is explained by the belief, probably derived from some unrecorded character detected by the "doctrine of signatures," that the growth of children could be stopped by a diet of Knot-grass. Steevens quotes Beaumont and Fletcher to this effect, and this will probably explain the epithet "hindering." But there may be another explanation. Johnston tells us that in the north, "being difficult to cut in the harvest time, or to pull in the process of weeding, it has obtained the sobriquet of the Deil's-lingels." From this it may well be called "hindering," just as the Ononis, from the same habit of catching the plough and harrow, has obtained the prettier name of "Rest-harrow."

But though Shakespeare's Knot-grass is undoubtedly the Polygonum, yet the name was also given to another plant, for this cannot be the plant mentioned by Milton—

In this case it must be one of the pasture Grasses, and may be Agrostis stolonifera, as it is said to be in Aubrey's "Natural History of Wilts" (Dr. Prior).

[134]

LADY-SMOCKS.

Lady-smocks are the flowers of Cardamine pratensis, the pretty early meadow flower of which children are so fond, and of which the popularity is shown by its many names: Lady-smocks, Cuckoo-flower,[134:1] Meadow Cress, Pinks, Spinks, Bog-spinks, and May-flower, and "in Northfolke, Canterbury Bells." The origin of the name is not very clear. It is generally explained from the resemblance of the flowers to smocks hung out to dry, but the resemblance seems to me rather far-fetched. According to another explanation, "the Lady-smock, a corruption of Our Lady's-smock, is so called from its first flowering about Lady-tide. It is a pretty purplish white, tetradynamous plant, which blows from Lady-tide till the end of May, and which during the latter end of April covers the moist meadows with its silvery-white, which looks at a distance like a white sheet spread over the fields."—Circle of the Seasons. Those who adopt this view called the plant Our Lady's-smock, but I cannot find that name in any old writers. Drayton, coeval with Shakespeare, says—

And Isaac Walton, in the next century, drew that pleasant picture of himself sitting quietly by the waterside—"looking down the meadows I could see here a boy gathering Lilies and Lady-smocks, and there a girl cropping Culverkeys and Cowslips."[134:2]

[135]There is a double variety of the Lady-smock which makes a handsome garden plant, and there is a remarkable botanical curiosity connected with the plant which should be noticed. The plant often produces in the autumn small plants upon the leaves, and by the means of these little parasites the plant is increased, and even if the leaves are detached from the plant, and laid upon moist congenial soil, young plants will be produced. This is a process that is well known to gardeners in the propagation of Begonias, and it is familiar to us in the proliferous Ferns, where young plants are produced on the surface or tips of the fronds; and Dr. Masters records "the same condition as a teratological occurrence in the leaves of Hyacinthus Pouzolsii, Drosera intermedia, Arabis pumila, Chelidonum majus, Chirita Sinensis, Epicia bicolor, Zamia, &c."—Vegetable Teratology, p. 170.

FOOTNOTES:

LARK'S HEELS.

Lark's heels is one of the many names of the Garden Delphinium, otherwise called Larkspur, Larksclaw, Larkstoes.

LAUREL.

This is one of the plants which Shakespeare borrowed from the classical writers; it is not the Laurel of our day, which was not introduced till after his death,[136:1] but the Laurea Apollinis, the Laurea Delphica—

that is, the Bay. This is the tree mentioned by Gower—

Conf. Aman. lib. terc.

There can be little doubt that the Laurel of Chaucer also was the Bay, the—

He also spoke of it as the emblem of enduring freshness—

The Marchaundes Tale.

The Laurel in Lyte's "Herbal" (the Lauriel or Lourye) seems to be the Daphne Laureola. But unconsciously Chaucer and Shakespeare spoke with more botanical accuracy than we do, the Bay being a true Laurel, while the Laurel is a Cherry (see Bay).

FOOTNOTES:

[137]

LAVENDER.

The mention of Lavender always recalls Walton's pleasant picture of "an honest ale-house, where we shall find a cleanly room, Lavender in the windows, and twenty ballads stuck against the wall, and my hostess, I may tell you, is both cleanly and handsome and civil." Whether it is from this familiar, old-fashioned picture, or from some inherent charm in the plant, it is hard to say, but it is certain that the smell of Lavender is always associated with cleanliness and freshness.[137:1]

It is not a British plant, but is a native of the South of Europe in dry and barren places, and it was introduced into England in the sixteenth century, but it probably was not a common plant in Shakespeare's time, for though it is mentioned by Spenser as "the Lavender still gray" ("Muiopotmos"), and by Gerard as growing in his garden, it is not mentioned by Bacon in his list of sweet-smelling plants. The fine aromatic smell is found in all parts of the shrub, but the essential oil is only produced from the flowers. As a garden plant it is found in every garden, but its growth as an extensive field crop is chiefly confined to the neighbourhood of Mitcham and Carshalton in Surrey; and there at the time of the picking of the flowers, and still more in the later autumn when the old woody plants are burned, the air for a long distance is strongly and most pleasantly impregnated with the delicate perfume.

FOOTNOTES:

LEATHERCOAT, see Apple.

[138]

LEEK.

We can scarcely understand the very high value that was placed on Leeks in olden times. By the Egyptians the plant was almost considered sacred, "Porrum et cæpe nefas violare et frangere morsu" (Juvenal); we know how Leeks were relished in Egypt by the Israelites; and among the Greeks they "appear to have constituted so important a part in ancient gardens, that the term πρασιά, or a bed, derived its name from πρασον, the Greek word for Onion," or Leek[138:1] (Daubeny); while among the Anglo-Saxons it was very much the same. The name is pure Anglo-Saxon, and originally meant any vegetable; then it was restricted to any bulbous vegetable, before it was finally further restricted to our Leek; and "its importance was considered so much above that of any other vegetable, that leac-tun, the Leek-garden, became the common name of the kitchen garden, and leac-ward, the Leek-keeper, was used to designate the gardener" (Wright). The plant in those days gave its name [139]to the Broad Leek which is our present Leek, the Yne Leek or Onion, the Garleek (Garlick), and others of the same tribe, while it was applied to other plants of very different families, as the Hollow Leek (Corydalis cava), and the House Leek (Sempervivum tectorum).

It seems to have been considered the hardiest of all flowers. In the account of the Great Frost of 1608, "this one infallible token" is given in proof of its severity. "The Leek whose courage hath ever been so undaunted that he hath borne up his lusty head in all storms, and could never be compelled to shrink for hail, snow, frost, or showers, is now by the violence and cruelty of this weather beaten unto the earth, being rotted, dead, disgraced, and trod upon."

Its popularity still continues among the Welsh, by whom it is still, I believe, very largely cultivated; but it does not seem to have been much valued in England in Shakespeare's time, for Gerard has but little to say of its virtues, but much of its "hurts." "It hateth the body, ingendreth naughty blood, causeth troublesome and terrible dreames, offendeth the eyes, dulleth the sight, &c." Nor does Parkinson give a much more favourable account. "Our dainty eye now refuseth them wholly, in all sorts except the poorest; they are used with us sometimes in Lent to make pottage, and is a great and generall feeding in Wales with the vulgar gentlemen." It was even used as the proverbial expression of worthlessness, as in the "Roumaunt of the Rose," where the author says, speaking of "Phiciciens and Advocates"—