801
 

 
 H^' 
 
 London. PiibhsLfJ livJolm V.iu \">< . i
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS ; 
 
 OR, 
 
 THE BOTANY OF THE BOHEREENS. 
 
 BY 
 
 RICHARD DOWDEN (RICHARD). 
 
 LONDON: 
 JOHN VAN VOORST, PATERNOSTER ROW. 
 
 MDCCCLII.
 
 LONDON: 
 T. E. METCALF, PRINTER, 63, SNOW HILL.
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 THIS Botanical appropriation of some half-hours 
 of husbanded leisure does not require much expla- 
 nation or apology. Scientific works on Native 
 Botany are not scarce; but as I have made some 
 time pleasant by composing and compiling the fol- 
 lowing botanical chit-chat, if I can interest per- 
 sons who have a little leisure in a similar resource, 
 I shall have effected two objects one, the gather- 
 ing up of my own desultory notices on plants, 
 and the other, that of inducing some of my read- 
 ers to ramble among our wild flowers, and by 
 learning them attain to loving them. Let me 
 here, in the way of dedication, say, that I seek to 
 return through others a portion of what I have 
 most liberally received, although restrained by 
 my niggard opportunity from repaying any fair 
 portion of what I owe to the chief promoter of 
 scientific acquirement in Cork. The venerable 
 
 2091 21 7
 
 iv PREFACE. 
 
 and Rev. Thos. Dix Hincks, LL.D., has invited 
 many persons to enter the paths of knowledge, 
 whose eminent or humble progress had his aid 
 and encouragement ; if the example of philan- 
 thropist, philosopher, and scholar, could aid 
 teachings, his life is an illustration of all these 
 excellencies. To develop and produce in full ac- 
 tivity that law of our nature which delights to 
 recognise the Creator's goodness in especial, and 
 all his attributes generally, in the things he has 
 created and pronounced "very good," was the 
 constant, the intelligent, the happy labour in 
 which Dr. Hincks was successful. All the mem- 
 bers of his family give testimony to his diligence : 
 the name is associated with scholarship in its 
 widest diffusion ; but with the branch of know- 
 ledge Dr. Hincks most preferred, Botany, we 
 have most to do at present. It is the cheapest 
 of sciences, not requiring any costly apparatus 
 for its acquirement ; its application for profitable 
 knowledge in agriculture, horticulture, or ar- 
 boriculture, is too obvious to require statement 
 here. I have most to do with plant-history as a 
 pleasure; as a means of meeting more acquaint- 
 ances in the fields ; as a kind of knowledge which 
 may be called up by the convalescent in search
 
 PKEFACE. V 
 
 of health, or by the wanderer on long and weary 
 roads, which he might without some such pastime 
 have found tedious enough to travel. But the 
 fields and flowers ought also to be places and 
 creatures bringing intelligent pleasures to the 
 joyous and the energetic. A way-side acquaint- 
 ance with the creations of vegetable life is a great 
 boon. Like an intimacy with human beings, a 
 familiar knowledge of the birth, parentage, and 
 habits of plants makes us love them, bidding us 
 take a vivid interest in all we know and recog- 
 nise about them. 
 
 Any hearty pursuit is generally a pleasure : 
 Burns, when he objurgates the evils of Despon- 
 dency, declares the value of a purpose, showing 
 that, even when we do not seek an eminently 
 high attainment, an innocent' object vigorously 
 aimed at, is of itself in vigoration: 
 
 " Happy ye sons of busy life, 
 Who, equal to the bustling strife, 
 
 No other view regard : 
 Even when the wished end's deny'd, 
 Yet while the busy means are ply'd, 
 
 They bring their own reward." 
 
 The powerful and the active of our race may 
 have a ready and energetic pleasure in useful
 
 VI PREFACE. 
 
 occupations ; but these resources have quiet at- 
 tractions also for persons of less physical power. 
 The valetudinarian, who knows how to improve 
 his hours of debility-inflicted leisure, enjoys a 
 deep sense of thankfulness if he has been taught 
 to apply any acquirements in science or literature, 
 so as to perceive that many hours of uneasiness 
 are thus soothed and made calm nay, almost 
 pleasurable to him. Vivacity of enjoyment he 
 may not attain to, but how sincere must be his 
 gratitude to find that he can abandon his weary 
 languors, and wander away into fields and among 
 flowers by means of the love of Botanical Lite- 
 rature, and that when his too sensitive frame 
 may not be permitted to encounter them ex- 
 cept by recollection and in idea. The notes of 
 this little work were gathered at such a season. 
 During the Spring of 1847, the third year of our 
 potato scarcity, and the second of our famine, 
 fever raged among the poor ; and fitly because 
 those who had more of this world's goods than 
 others should not forget their perishing brethren, 
 the disease spread into all classes. Anxiety of 
 mind and over-exertion predisposed some to 
 the malady, unknown or unnoticed causes ex- 
 posed others, and among the numerous sufferers
 
 PREFACE. Vll 
 
 I was one. After having been brought very 
 near to death, I was sent back to the duties 
 of this life once more, my long and virulent 
 fever resulted in little acute suffering, but in 
 much prostration ; death, however, would have 
 been a little thing compared to the sufferings 
 which might, and which commonly do, attend 
 this disease ; I, on the contrary, was spared all 
 acute distress, even when in the worst state. 
 Convalescent, and capable of feeling gratitude, 
 I rejoiced to perceive with a heartiness of 
 sincere acknowledgment beyond expression, the 
 deep thankfulness which my comparatively easy, 
 though dilatory, recovery, induced. During that 
 period of caution and carefulness, my hours 
 of debility were often stolen away by mak- 
 ing notes for my Botany in the Bohereens ; and 
 now that I have been enabled with renewed 
 vigour to take open air " Walks after Wild 
 Flowers," I want, as before hinted, to pay my 
 debt of thankfulness by see"king to give to others 
 the enjoyment of a profitable pleasure, which to 
 me was a solace and support during Nature's 
 very enfeebled extremity. 
 
 The appearance of this botanical gathering in 
 a letter-like style, is accounted for by its first
 
 Vlll PREFACR 
 
 having "leafed" in "The Cork Magazine/' then 
 more ambitiously in "The Advocate," a Dub- 
 lin Journal of considerable scientific promotive- 
 ness; it has at length culminated to a high 
 point of honour in the hands of a London Pub- 
 lisher, but owes much of its scientific accuracy 
 to Mr. C. C. Babington, of Cambridge, who has 
 kindly examined the printer's proofsheets and 
 favoured me with remarks upon them. Now as 
 a volume it is offered, with good hope, to the 
 healthy in their healthiest rambles, and for the 
 delicate as a stimulant towards gentle exertion, 
 that best restorative of energy the wild-wood 
 walk, with a pleasant pursuit to aid its interest. 
 This volume is intended as a familiar descrip- 
 tion of native plants, containing from the Crow- 
 foots to the Crossworts inclusive. 
 
 KICHARD DOWDEN (RICHARD). 
 
 CORK, April, 1852. 
 
 N.B. I have also to thank a kind lady friend 
 for the pretty and tasteful illustrative vignette 
 which ushers in these pages; but I may not 
 give her name to the reader without hurting her 
 modest secrecy.
 
 WALKS AFTEE WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 INTRODUCTION INTO THE GREEN LANES; INVITATION TO AN AC- 
 QUAINTANCE WITH THE BEAUTIES OF OUR WILD-FLOWERS, AND 
 
 THEIR FAMILIAR HISTORIES. THE LOVE OF FLOWERS COEVAL 
 
 WITH OUR RACE J WE RETAIN THAT PORTION OF OUR PRIMITIVE 
 TENDENCY AS ENJOYED IN PARADISE ; IT IS AN EMANATION OF 
 OUR BEST NATURE WHICH OUGHT TO BE ENCOURAGED AND 
 EDUCATED. "LITTLE-ROADS," THE "BOHEREENS" OF THE AN- 
 CIENT CELTIC TONGUE ARE THE BEST PLACES TO BOTANIZE ; 
 " ROADLETS," AS THEY MAY BE TRANSLATED GIVE SHELTER TO 
 PLANTS, AND KINDLY INVITE THE VISITOR WHO SEEKS THEIR 
 INTIMACY. THE NATURAL ORDER OF GROUPING IS RECOM- 
 MENDED ; IT GENERALIZES, WHILE THE LINN^AN SYSTEM 
 HARDLY DOES MORE THAN INDIVIDUALIZE THE VEGETABLE FA- 
 MILY. THE BIOGRAPHY BEGUN WITH THE CROWFOOT-TKIBE 
 
 OF PLANTS; viz., VIRGIN'S BOWER, MEADOW RUE, FEATHERED 
 
 COLUMBINE OR GOLD-FLOWERED THALIA. PROPERTIES OF THE 
 DESCRIBED PLANTS: THEIR ADAPTATION IN SHRUBBERIES OR, 
 PARTERRES, ETC. 
 
 PERMIT me to introduce the reader to some sum- 
 mer-hours' rambling and ruralising; perhaps I 
 may thereby be able to add new inducements for 
 those who 
 
 " All the pleasure prove, 
 That hills and valleys, dale and field, 
 And all the craggy mountains yield;" 
 
 or invite others to make leisure and form acquaint- 
 ances among the wild aborigines of our green
 
 2 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 lanes and hedges, natives who love the soil and 
 nourish there who neither emigrate nor become 
 absentees, but present themselves as Irish phe- 
 nomena, the true adscripta gleba, yet urgent 
 with health, vigour, and beauty. It is true, we 
 have not the Italian May of Thompson's "Seasons" 
 to compel us abroad ; and even when our soft Irish 
 Lady Summer brightens on us, she often comes 
 with 
 
 " The tear and the smile in her eye." 
 
 Well, then, let us pay earnest court to the beauti- 
 ful Inconstant, recognise all her kindly influences, 
 and follow her flowery track, which, even with 
 the dewy shower on it, is full of bloom and rich- 
 ness. It is but permitting nature to have pro- 
 per sway, when we yield to the impulse which 
 speaks in us whispering thus to "love fields and 
 flowers/' Look at the child in the meadow, see 
 how he accumulates an exuberant store of daisies 
 and cowslips he makes himself affluent with the 
 gold and silver riches of the field; and this is 
 merely the instinctive love of forms of beauty and 
 gayest colours. He first indulges the susceptibility 
 for gratification by the eye; as he advances in 
 knowledge and observation, he adds to the value 
 of his Flora the luxury of perfume; the violet and 
 the woodbine have now a new power to entice 
 him, they are scented ; but he goes farther, he be- 
 comes to a certain extent a biographer of flowers ; 
 he learns something of their history and of the 
 sentiment which they illustrate, although he does 
 not know that he is thus far a botanist. The 
 love of living creatures is natural to us ; we begin 
 with our own species, continue it to animals, and
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 3 
 
 then even to vegetable existences we become not 
 indifferent. 
 
 We acknowledge with delight the almost ani- 
 mate breathing which exhales from the rose ; and 
 we expatiate on the elegant contour of the lady- 
 like lilly. To these instinctive recognitions of the 
 life of the vegetable world, must be added others 
 of sentiment and association ; our hours of delight 
 have often been enjoyed in green fields and gar- 
 dens ; and even those who have been but rarely 
 permitted to make visits where rural felicity had 
 its free flow, are still true believers in the Eden 
 which verdure and flowers and fresh air can so 
 well imitate. No wonder Adam and Eve left 
 their garden with regret ; Milton gave us our 
 grand-ancestor's farewell to it : 
 
 " Must I then leave thee, Paradise ? thus leave 
 Thee, native soil, these happy walks and shades, 
 Fit haunt of gods?" 
 
 " Flowers, 
 
 Which I bred up with tender hand, 
 From the first opening bud, and gave ye names, 
 Who now shall rear ye to the sun, or rank 
 Your tribes?" 
 
 " With what to sight or smell was sweet 
 How shall I part 1 " 
 
 Shakspeare, who recorded human nature in his 
 gaiety as well as in his pathos, has made even the 
 sensualist Falstaffa subject for our sympathies, 
 by reviving in him his susceptibility for earlier 
 and purer tastes ; in his dying hour, it is told of 
 him, that the thoughts of his childhood and its 
 pleasures were restored to him : 
 
 " He babbled of green fields."
 
 4 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 I once saw in the great city of London the love 
 of nature pourtrayed. A poor woman came with a 
 child into Covent Garden market to make her 
 small purchase ; some grass had fallen from a fruit 
 basket it was fresh and green; she gathered a 
 small bunch of it like a nosegay in her hand, and 
 solicitously asked permission to take it ; it was 
 given her, she placed it in her child's bosom, 
 thanked the donor, dropped a tear and departed. 
 It was a scene for Sterne to have witnessed and 
 soliloquised on ; he would have imagined how the 
 narrow city lane which had blanched the pale thin 
 woman's cheek, had yet with its sickly air failed 
 to destroy her love of the country, and had still 
 left to her associations with rural happiness so 
 powerful, as to make the freshness of that bunch 
 of grass win a tear from her sensibility to this rus 
 in urbe in miniature. I want to give pleasure to 
 pedestrians ; I want to make them god-fathers 
 and god-mothers to all the new births of the teem- 
 ing spring, and to call them by their names, and 
 know them, and by taking knowledge of them to 
 love them. I want every summer-flower to be 
 appreciated ; and the seed and fruit of autumn to 
 be understood and welcomed ; as to winter, when 
 it comes, for the season which is truly naked and 
 bare never comes in our emerald isle, the " dead 
 season" is yet fully alive to him who observes 
 nature even as it 
 
 " Grows again tow'rd earth." 
 
 The celebrated Bishop Berkley wrote from 
 Cloyne, and said," in this country where there is 
 no winter ;" and surely he was scarcely too lauda-
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. O 
 
 tory of our country's south-eastern climate, for 
 at Cloyne the grass is green always, the golden 
 furze is "unprofitably gay," and "the daisy never 
 dies." The good Bishop's meteorology was more 
 evinced by facts than were his cures infallible 
 by tar-water. With this introduction, then, let 
 us begin our " Walks after Wild Flowers." The 
 Linnsean system of Botany is the easiest for a 
 beginner, who wants to learn species and genus ; 
 and for that purpose the best book extant on 
 Irish Botany is Lady Kane's " Flora of Ireland ;" 
 but as my labour is intended to be more a bo- 
 tanical biography than a systematic production, 
 I follow Dr. Mackay's "Flora Hibernica," and 
 adopt the method which is called that of " The 
 natural orders in Botany." We begin our tour 
 through the vegetable world with the flowering 
 plants, whose blossoming is obvious, and which 
 are of course more attractive than those whose 
 fructification is more obscure. Perhaps it may 
 be undervaluing the knowledge of many readers, 
 to invite them to the study of plants by ana- 
 logies with our own structure ; but let them tell 
 young children about it, let them give the little 
 philosophers this message, and they will be pleased 
 with the result ; tell these young inquirers that 
 plants are alive, that, although their life is of a 
 different kind from ours, 
 
 " Full nature swarms with life." 
 
 Tell them that they can find in plants the woody 
 fibre, giving them rigidity and strength like bones ; 
 vessels circulating juices like blood to nourish and 
 repair, leaves for lungs, and a skin which can
 
 6 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 perspire to preserve health ; rosy blossoms which 
 laugh ; and seeds or buds, the little infants which, 
 under the vivifying influence of light, water, and 
 air, spring into active existence, and perpetuate 
 the beautiful and interesting flowery races. Now 
 for " St. Patrick's Park ;" our native plants are 
 those which are found so certainly wild as to 
 leave no doubt that they are inhabitants of the 
 country ; we also claim some as natives, which if 
 only naturalized, are distributed in places remote 
 from cultivation, and as there is no record of their 
 introduction, we receive them into our community 
 as true Hibernians. 
 
 The first natural order of flowering plants, is 
 that which has the Ranunculus as its typical 
 leader ; all this group have more or less of the 
 qualities and structure which are most perfectly 
 exhibited in the leading and name-giving plant. 
 They are therefore called the Ranunculus or 
 Crowfoot family. The first plant in this order 
 is the Clematis, so called from the Greek word 
 " Klema," a shoot of a vine, because the stems 
 twine like a vine ; this genus is divided into spe- 
 cies of which we can claim but one as native ; 
 it is called Vitalba, Vita-alba, the white vine, 
 either from the light green colour of its leaves, or 
 from the snowy head of down which its seeds 
 bear, and which is called " the old man's beard " 
 the leaves spread like wings from the angular 
 woody branches, which wreath themselves firmly 
 into the boughs of trees; and making a good shade 
 it deserves its name, " Virgin's Bower." It is also 
 called " Viorna," via way, and " ornaav," to orna- 
 ment, from its gay festoons being highly decora-
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 7 
 
 tive and graceful, making it well deserve another 
 pleasing character, namely, " The Traveller's Joy." 
 If you want to construct an almost extempora- 
 neous bower, plant sufficiently firmly the skele- 
 tons of a couple or three dead forest-trees, at 
 their feet then insert your Clematis, and you shall 
 see what " a climber 'tis." In even one season it 
 will throw its lightly verdant skreen quite over 
 your rustic seat. It is a rampant rambler, and 
 though in its youth it sustains itself upon these 
 aged trees, in a few years it will support their 
 decaying branches by its firm but curiously 
 wreathed, contorted, and lithe limbs, " pliant yet 
 strong ;" the toughness of its " withies" enables it 
 to be used for binding bundles or faggots of brush- 
 wood, called in Ireland a "brusna;" the word is 
 from the same Celtic root that gives origin to the 
 Latin "bruscus" and the French "brusque," the 
 connexion is obvious. If the woody limbs are cut 
 across they are full of air vessels, and worthy of 
 being examined by a microscope. When dried, 
 boys light one end of the twigs of Clematis wood, 
 and smoke them as some do ratan. It is likely 
 that the smoke of this acrid shrub, may have some 
 slightly stimulating power to recommend its use 
 in this way. This species of Clematis has not a 
 showy blossom ; its flower-leaves being of a green- 
 ish white, as are also its numerous stamens the 
 little thread-like bundles amidst the blossom- 
 leaves ; but this temporary deficiency is richly com- 
 pensated when its seeds arrive at some size, as they 
 are then furnished with delicate silky tails, shin- 
 ing with that colour described by Shakspeare as, 
 
 " The Silver with her virgin hue."
 
 8 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 They are beautifully woven with a pearly fea- 
 thering, and if kept for a dried bouquet, should 
 be hung with the heads downward, to prevent 
 their tufts from being too diffuse, and thus losing 
 some of their most elegant tufted and rotund 
 form. This plant will clamber to the height of 
 twenty or thirty feet, to hang its tassels in the 
 autumn sun ; it blooms in July, and its blos- 
 soms are said to have an almond scent ; it is 
 very slight, however, and the blooms must be in 
 great quantity to have it perceived ; it is conse- 
 quently a trifling, unimposing characteristic, and 
 is diminished still more in value by comparison 
 with the powerfully sweet smell of another spe- 
 cies, the Clematis Flammula, whose hawthorn 
 odour will perfume a large garden when it ex- 
 hales strongest in a fine evening ; this latter is 
 a native of the continent of Europe, though a 
 welcome visitor in our island-gardens, where it 
 might, from blossom and perfume, be called au- 
 tumnal Hawthorn. The author of "The Journal of 
 a Naturalist" says, that the awned seeds of the old 
 man's beard are gathered by mice, probably with 
 a view to line their nests, as the seeds are very 
 small, and could give but little food. The shining, 
 pale-green curls of silk, worthy to be hair of mer- 
 maids, become grey as winter advances, but if the 
 once vigorous flower-branch, in late October ex- 
 hibits a hoary head, and at last becomes dis- 
 figured and bald, it is not until its progeny of 
 seeds has been distributed on the winds, and 
 borne up by gossamer parachutes to pinnacles 
 of old castles and crevices in mountain cliffs, to 
 take up an abode ; choosing chiefly, however,
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 9 
 
 for a cradle our plentiful and picturesque lime- 
 stone rocks, shortly after to adorn their rugged 
 eminences with graceful wreathings and varied 
 verdant clusterings. The stem of the leaf itself is 
 
 " A tendril accustomed to cling; 
 Let it grow where it will, cannot flourish alone, 
 
 But will lean to the nearest and kindliest thing 
 It can twine with itself, and make closely its own." 
 
 The salient shoots seem to project themselves 
 with their expanded arms into the air, seeking 
 some friendly support to clasp and adhere to. The 
 succulent young shoots have not the great acrid- 
 ness of the more advanced branches, neither is 
 this species of Clematis so deleterious as others of 
 the tribe, though probably the bruised leaves would 
 blister tender parts of the skin, on account of its 
 juices being undoubtedly more or less poisonous. 
 Paper has been made from the seed-feathering; 
 but probably in a commercial point of view it 
 would not be worth gathering for that purpose. 
 
 In a green state this plant has been used to 
 stimulate the skin, and, like all acrid poisons, it 
 may be used to blister or irritate in different de- 
 grees, but lunar caustic and other more convenient 
 applications have rendered such escharotics unne- 
 cessary, and we will chiefly attend to it in its 
 more elegant and rural uses, and know it when 
 we meet it as the best " arbour-vine," which can 
 make it an inviting retreat to 
 
 " Steal into the pleached bower, 
 Where Honey-suckles, ripened by the sun, 
 Forbid the sun to enter ; like favourites, 
 Made proud by princes, that advance their pride 
 Against the power that bred it." Shakspeare.
 
 10 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 I have dwelt long on Virgin's Bower because it is 
 desirable that sylvan seats should often present 
 their invitation to wanderers. Every view-point 
 has its power of contrast heightened by prevent- 
 ing the direct light from falling on the place you 
 look from ; to enhance then the vividness, and, 
 of course, the power of the prospect, to gratify 
 the taste by the decorative effect of a tasteful 
 rural structure, and to provide rest and shelter 
 at the vista summit of the wood-path, let it ter- 
 minate ornamentally and usefully in the elegance 
 of an arbour twined with Traveller's Joy. 
 
 The next genus of our native flowers is Thalic- 
 trum, called from the Greek word " Thallo" to be 
 verdant or flourishing ; the young shoots of the 
 plant being of a particularly vigorous green co- 
 lour. The species of this plant are rarely found 
 wild, so the young botanist had better go to gar- 
 dens to see the characters of it which are most 
 worthy of notice. There are four Irish species re- 
 corded : none of them have petals, that is blossom- 
 leaves; but the stamens, threads, or filaments, 
 on which the pollen-cases or anthers, are sus- 
 pended, are numerous and showy. The common 
 name, Meadow Rue, is given to it from the incised 
 leaves of the best known species being sea-green 
 in colour, and also formed somewhat like rue. 
 The blossom of the common rue has also a yellow 
 colour, like some of the plants we are examining. 
 
 The first species is the alpine Meadow Rue ; it is 
 found wild on alpine limestone rocks in Sligo, and, 
 as Lady Kane notices, also in Galway. It blossoms 
 with a simple terminal cluster of whitish flowers 
 in June, and grows about thirty-six inches high.
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 11 
 
 The lesser Meadow Rue has its leaves much 
 divided ; in botanical language, doubly -pinnated, 
 from pinncB, the quills of a wing : the sections or 
 leaflets are divided in threes, or ternate ; the 
 colour of the leaves at both sides is sea-green ; 
 the stems are zig-zag or bent-jointed ; the flowers 
 are pale purple, and form pendulous panicles in 
 July. It is worth being particular with this spe- 
 cies, because its discovery and examination may 
 add botanical interest to the other pleasures 
 which can be enjoyed in a ramble on the sand- 
 hills of Baldoyle, near Dublin, or amidst the mag- 
 nificent cliffs in the gap of Dunloe, during a tour 
 to Killarney. 
 
 The next species is the greater Meadow Rue, 
 which is more rare, and is only of scientific in- 
 terest : the Floral inquirer can therefore refer to 
 systematic books for its distinctions. 
 
 Lastly, we have the Thalictrum flavum, or yel- 
 lowish buff-colour-flowered species, the common 
 Meadow Rue, or Feathered Columbine of the gar- 
 dens : it is a striking looking herb, which has its 
 robust stem four feet high, erect and furrowed. 
 Its numerous branches are leafy, and the lobes of 
 the leaves vary in breadth ; its stalk and the foot- 
 stalks of the leaves are sometimes tinged with 
 purplish green. It blows in June and July, pro- 
 ducing to view its ornamental feathery panicles of 
 flowers, with the stamens profusely dusted with 
 yellow pollen, the fertilizing powder of the fructi- 
 fication. The bright yellowness of the anthers 
 prevents the cream-colour of the filament from 
 being much noticed. It is a quick grower. Thallo, 
 from which Thalictrum is derived, was the name
 
 12 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 of one of the Horse of the imaginative Greeks : 
 these Horse, Hours or Seasons, were daughters of 
 Sol and Chronis, the Sun and Time, the last be- 
 coming for the occasion a female. These smiling 
 Hours were dry-nurses to the goddess of Love, and 
 her dressers and fashioners ; they were born in 
 Spring, and ever drew up something vivacious and 
 beautiful in their path ; and mild and temperate 
 weather was looked for when they approached the 
 earth. The name of Thalia, given to one of the 
 muses, and also to one of the graces or charities, 
 is derived from the same Greek word Thallo, to 
 flourish verdantly ; because what is gay, amiable, 
 kind, and pleasant, ought never to wither, but 
 ought to remain vigorous and energetic for ever. 
 The Thalia of the poets " wore a robe of gold ;" 
 and our Thalictrum flavum, in like manner, is 
 rich in her yellow bloom. 
 
 This rampant-growing acquaintance of ours 
 will, in gardens, require a little restraint. It may 
 have its freedom in a shrubbery, but if you in- 
 dulge it with a flower-plateau residence, you will 
 have at times to lessen its license, and limit it at 
 the heels ; in fact, to dig up its too spreading 
 roots, and divide it, this proceeding will reveal 
 to you more of its character, these roots are of a 
 deep yellow, and have been used to dye of that 
 colour ; but the ancient medical doctrine of sig- 
 natures, or the idea that the colour of a plant 
 pointed out its uses, gave the yellow tint former- 
 ly a greater value ; the jaundice was supposed to 
 be cured by it, and the terminal "ictrum" or 
 " icterum," in its generic name, probably means 
 of, or for, " icterus," the jaundice.
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 13 
 
 On passing away from this plant, let us remark 
 how, though Pope says 
 
 " That all looks yellow to the jaundiced eye," 
 
 it is a poetical fiction ; the jaundiced eye looks 
 yellow to all, but the sufferer's sense of colour is 
 not altered by the stain in the small vessels of the 
 eye-balls. Agriculturally speaking, the Meadow 
 Rue is an acrid plant, nevertheless cattle eat it 
 when it gets mixed in grass : to grow weeds, 
 however, is a symptom of very bad farming. 
 
 I have spent thus much of time in inviting my 
 readers to become acquainted with our native 
 plants. T have avoided technical science, and 
 given them the mere gossip, for a " science-made- 
 easy," may perhaps have its use ; and at length a 
 well-informed love of nature, and of nature's wild 
 retreats, may be diffused; producing, as the au- 
 thor of the "Pleasures of Imagination" so well 
 describes 
 
 " Joy serene 
 
 As airs that fan the summer. Oh, attend 
 Whoe'er thou art whom these delights can touch, 
 Whose candid bosom the refining love 
 Of nature warms, oh ! listen to my song; 
 And I will guide thee to her favourite walks, 
 And teach thy solitude her voice to hear, 
 And point her loveliest features to thy view."
 
 14 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 NATIVE ANEMONES: WHITE, PINK, AND BLUE. POLYANDROUS 
 FLOWERS. -ACRID PLANTS EATEN BY GOATS; HOW THESE CA- 
 PRIOLATING CREATURES BRING DOWN MILK FROM THE MOUN- 
 TAINS. ORIGIN OF THE TINT OF THE ANEMONE BY OVID. 
 STORY OF VENUS AND ADONIS. RANUNCULUS : THE COM- 
 PANION OF INFANT FROGS. LEAVES CROWFOOTED. WONDERS 
 
 OF THE WATER CROWFOOT. WATER BUTTER-CUPS. BLISTERING 
 
 BUTTER-CUPS. FIGWORT CROWFOOT. SHOWERS OF WHEAT. 
 GOLDILOCKS. WICKED OR CELERY-LEAVED CROWFOOT : ITS ACRI- 
 MONIOUS SALT. KING-CUPS J AND DOUBLE-GARDEN KING-CUPS, 
 OR GOLDEN BACHELOR'S BUTTONS. CUCKOO-BUDS. BULBOUS 
 BUTTER-CUPS. HOW BUTTER IS MADE YELLOW IN SUMMER. 
 HAIRY CROWFOOT. CORN-FIELD CROWFOOT: IT IS VERY POI- 
 SONOUS WHEN GROWING. LITTLE -FLOWERED RANUNCULUS: 
 
 HOW TO TORTURE AWAY THE TOOTHACHE WITH IT. OBSERVA- 
 TIONS ON NATURAL GROUPINGS OF PLANTS. 
 
 THE next group of our wild flowers which we 
 must look for are the Anemones, named from the 
 Greek word " anemos," the Wind ; because our 
 native Anemones bloom in blustering March, 
 
 " When the stormy winds do blow." 
 
 Our first species is the Anemone nemorosa, the 
 Anemone of the woods. In early Spring it gives 
 its cheerful green leaves, purplish flower-stalk, 
 and white starry flowers, in profusion to the ad- 
 miration of the lover of the woodland brake. In 
 fine bright weather, the blossoms boldly expand 
 their healthy countenances to the vigour-giving 
 breeze, and look for purity of whiteness from the 
 face of " the blessed sun himself ;" but when day- 
 light has nearly departed, or in wet weather, the
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 15 
 
 blossom bends its head to protect itself, and pre- 
 sents its poll, if you take the flower as the plant's 
 face, like a cunning creature wisely turning its 
 back when there is " wet in the wind," to prevent 
 the pollen from being washed away, and thus 
 leaving its nascent progeny, the seeds, deprived 
 of the necessary stimulant to their growth and 
 perfection. There is a variety of this flower with 
 pink petals which has been found by the Lee, 
 under Mount-Desart ; also at Donnybrook ; at 
 Ballinhassig glen ; and I think I have got it at 
 the Bishop's brook, near Inch-a-Gaggin. The 
 whole plant of this variety is larger both in leaves 
 and blossoms than the white one. We next find 
 the Anemone Appenina, or Blue Mountain Ane- 
 mone : it is recorded as a native by Dr. Mackay. 
 He states that it is probably not indigenous, and 
 consequently can scarcely be sought for with suc- 
 cess in a state of nature ; but it is so pleasing a 
 flower, that it ought to be introduced in groves 
 along with its more usual relative. Its blossom, 
 as its familiar name indicates, is of a beautiful 
 light blue. 
 
 Appenina does not point to an exclusive moun- 
 tain residence, for in Italy, where it is very com- 
 mon, it is found plentifully in lowland woods. A 
 dry, light, loamy soil, with a good amount of vege- 
 table earth, is the best nurse of these Anemones, 
 when in gardens. We can only claim as visitors 
 those splendidly coloured varieties, which dazzle 
 the eye in flower knots in Spring plentifully, 
 but more sparingly in the Autumn; they are 
 denizens of more sun-bright lands than ours, 
 being introduced from the Levant and from Italy ;
 
 16 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 but even under their own bright skies they have 
 not attained the beauty that skill and fostering 
 has here conferred on them, the single flowers 
 having been made semi- double by culture. The 
 whole family have many stamens, which give 
 name to the Linnsean class Polyandria, from "po- 
 lus" many, and "aner," the male, or stamen in 
 Greek. These stamens or thread-like processes a 
 very high culture renders abortive, and changes 
 them into coloured blossom-leaves ; this is the great 
 object of the flower-propagator; he secures the 
 seeds of the plants which are undergoing this 
 change to partial sterility ; and by watching their 
 increase, gets rid of the more natural flowers, and 
 multiplies those which are richest in the beautiful 
 monstrosity sought for. But if every stamen 
 "incrassates" into a petal, the plant cannot per- 
 fect seed ; and such is the case of the fully double 
 variety of our wood-anemone ; but this lovely 
 child of our groves compensates its deficiency in 
 two ways; its vivacious roots are plentiful, and 
 the ivory-white carving which crowns its hand- 
 some blossom-stalk, remains much longer to gra- 
 tify the pleased observer, than that of its simpler 
 grand-parent. 
 
 The Anemone is an acrid plant, horses and 
 swine refuse it ; sheep will, if allowed, crop it ; 
 but it has on them a drastic deleterious effect. 
 Goats, however, who eat many coarse things, 
 seem to enjoy as a stimulant this herbage, which 
 would be an acute poison to other animals. 
 Apropos to goats, D' line Chevrette Sauvage, these 
 capri seem as if they could secrete milk out of a 
 bundle of "botheens" (walking-sticks); who has
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. IV 
 
 not seen them on some mountain's side, clipping 
 off the arid briars for a breakfast. Among our 
 Irish Alps, climbing through the Gap of Dunloe, 
 a guide once told us that " the mountain goats 
 were used like the people ; that they had to 
 scramble and struggle all day in the cliffy hills 
 for their poor food, and in the evening they were 
 brought in and milked, to fatten calves, who were 
 botches at gathering the last tuft of dry grass on 
 the precipices." 
 
 This ingenious way of mowing the mountain 
 peaks was amusing; but the poor goats why do 
 they come in the evenings to have their " udders 
 drawn dry" in this manner ? 
 
 A coadjutor guide explained the puzzle in this 
 manner: 
 
 " Now Jack, mind, Jenny Gower is not such an 
 omadhaun as you make her ; she gathers sense 
 from those butter-tenants of the hills, who get 
 knowing in trade in Cork all the way. In decent 
 weather, your honour, Jenny gets milk enough for 
 her kids, and a little to spare, and she comes 
 down quite natural at night, and swops her sur- 
 plus for a grain of meal with the hill-farmer ; 
 sure you wouldn't see so sprightly and lively a 
 beast as Jenny to be a soft fool like that ! " 
 
 When the Anemone is withering, the leaves and 
 sometimes the petals are sprinkled with a small 
 fungus, for which see " Sowerby's British Fungi." 
 Passing from this plant of 
 
 " Blossoms white, tinted with sanguine hue," 
 
 we ask leave to use the poetry which describes 
 the origin of another anemone, the Pulsatilla, as
 
 18 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 we find it in Ovid's Metamorphoses, in the story 
 of Venus and Adonis : 
 
 "Thus cautious Venus school'd her fav'rite boy; 
 But youthful heat all cautions will destroy. 
 His faithful hounds led by the tainted wind, 
 Lodged in thick covert, chanced a boar to find ; 
 The callow hero show'd a manly heart, 
 And pierc'd the savage with a side-long dart ; 
 The flying savage, wounded, turn'd again 
 Wrench'd out the gory dart and foam'd with pain ; 
 But now too late to fly the boar he strove. 
 
 On the discolour' d grass Adonis lay, 
 
 The monster trampling o'er his beauteous prey 
 
 Fair Cytherea, Cyprus scarce in view, 
 
 Heard from afar his groans, and own'd them true, 
 
 With cruel blows she beat her guiltless breast, 
 
 The Fates upbraided, and her love confest ; 
 
 For thee, lost youth, my tears and restless pain 
 
 Shall in immortal monuments remain : 
 
 Then on the blood sweet nectar she bestows ; 
 
 The scented blood in little bubbles rose : 
 
 Short time ensued 'till where the blood was shed, 
 
 A flower began to rear its purply head : 
 
 Such as on Punic* apples is revealed, 
 
 Or in the filmy rind but half concealed. 
 
 Still here the fate of lovely forms we see 
 
 So sudden fades the sweet Anemone, 
 
 The feeble stems to stormy blasts a prey, 
 
 Their sickly beauties droop and pine away ; 
 
 The winds forbid the flowers to flourish long, 
 
 Which owe to winds their name f in Grecian song." 
 
 This is the Pasque or Paschal flower, bloom- 
 ing as it does about the period of the Paschal 
 Supper, at the beginning of the Spring, or Good 
 Friday. 
 
 * Punica Granatum Punic Grains, the Pomegranate or Apple 
 of Grains. 
 
 t Anemos, Anemone.
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 19 
 
 Salmon, the herbalist, calls it Apium Sardoni- 
 cum, it being a poison which if eaten produces 
 that fearful grinning distortion called Eisus Sar- 
 donicus. Its cut leaves caused it to be called 
 Broad Parsley. A more agreeable association shall 
 be now attached to one of its familiar names, 
 "Laughing Parsley/' viz., that its pleasant green, 
 and cheerful face, induce gaiety and laughter in 
 the vigorous rambles of hardy March. 
 
 The next genus that meets us is Eanuncu- 
 lus ; so called from "rana," the Latin for a frog, 
 and the affix " unculus," which is met in our 
 adopted word " homunculus" and used as a dimi- 
 nutive, indicating an imperfect birth, like frog- 
 spawn. This name shows that a great number of 
 these plants nourish where animals living in hu- 
 mid places are found ; water, marshes, or damp 
 fields, giving the most luxuriant of the group a 
 habitation. The origin of the popular name is 
 obvious ; if we place the upper side of a crowfoot 
 leaf on a flat surface, the toes of the " vegetable 
 crow" spread out, while the stalk gives us the 
 shin to hold by. 
 
 Ranunculus aquatilis Water Crowfoot. This 
 beautiful decoration of ponds and streams, or 
 even of the more still parts of large rivers, is 
 one of those interesting plants which make our 
 early summer-botany delightful. It rises from 
 its oozy bed on long green stems, covered with a 
 coat of mucor, which makes them smooth for the 
 water to glide by easily, acting as a lubricating 
 and yielding, but very secure, sheathing; this en- 
 velope is of a slightly brownish colour. Above, 
 the point where the roots are embedded in the
 
 20 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWEES. 
 
 mud, hangs a fringe of rootlets, ready, as the sup- 
 porting water gets shallow, to extend the root- 
 ing adhesions of the stalk. At the joints of the 
 stalks are found bladder-like investments, these 
 are pairs of stipules, which are translucent, and 
 adhere round the stems. This word stipule may 
 be derived from the Latin stips, a small Roman 
 coin, and the disks of these stipulse have some 
 resemblance to it. The lightness of the plant 
 sustains a large portion of its herbage afloat on 
 the water, and thus it enjoys a copious supply of 
 light and air, stimulants which give vigour and 
 vitality universally. Looking at the structure of 
 this very attractive naiad, it seems to be in part 
 sustained by the flatness of the palmate leaves, 
 laid, like the closed fingers of a good swimmer, on 
 the surface of the water ; but the leaves below the 
 surface are by a most interesting provision of na- 
 ture, cut into bundles of capillary threads, green 
 water-hair, through which the stream runs with- 
 out disturbing the vegetable from its miry adhe- 
 sion. When the field botanist looks at the green 
 leaves, and snowy petals, of the water-crowfoot, 
 let these provident adaptations of its curious con- 
 trivances make part of his intelligent pleasure. 
 This plant, which in May and June is like a float- 
 ing strawberry bed, has considerable variety in 
 the form of its uncut leaves, and in the length of 
 the capillary ones ; also in the number of them 
 which are divided, and this diversity seems to be 
 caused by the richness of the ground it roots in, 
 or by the heat and light of the season. The white 
 blossom has a yellowish claw, by which it ad- 
 heres to the receptacle for the seeds. With re-
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 21 
 
 spect to its qualities, it is the least acrid of the 
 whole genus. Dr. Pulteney says in the Linnaean 
 Transactions, that it is not only innoxious to 
 cattle, but that it is nutritious ; and that on the 
 borders of the Avon, the cottagers partly sup- 
 port their cows on it. Cattle, he says, are so 
 extremely fond of it that the farmers have to re- 
 strict its use, and not to allow them to eat per 
 day more than twenty pounds of it. It is ex- 
 tremely curious that this aquatic species of Ran- 
 unculus should be harmless, while we have um- 
 bellate plants which are harmless when growing 
 on dry land, but become most poisonous when 
 growing in water. This beautiful strawberry 
 bank, which comes down to bathe in the sunny 
 stream, is called in our poetical Celtic tongue, 
 " Lionan Abhan," water-ladies ; and lady-like 
 flowers they are on the sparkling waters. 
 
 The Ranunculus hederaceous, Ivy-leaved Ran- 
 unculus, is a diminutive species, and the small- 
 est Ivy-leaves we have, would be an overgrown 
 similitude to its little kidney-shaped leaves. It is 
 an amphibious reptile-like creature, inhabiting 
 the plashy margins of streams, and living like a 
 true Rana, in a moist abode, between land and 
 water ; thus located it crawls about, enjoying a 
 succulent liveliness, and showing its little white 
 blossoms from June to September. 
 
 Ranunculus Lingua, Tongue-leaved Crowfoot or 
 great Spear-wort ; the leaf represents a very, very 
 long tongue indeed, but we must bear with many 
 such similitudes : its leaves are in fact spear-shaped, 
 slightly sawed or notched on the edges, and to a 
 certain extent clasping the stout upright stem. It
 
 22 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 lias fine showy gold-coloured blossoms, and is one 
 of the handsomest of our butter-cups. It blows in 
 July, growing in muddy ditches, out of which soil 
 it rises boldly and attractively. It is an acrid plant, 
 like most of the tribe, and its poisonous charac- 
 ter is not modified by its growing in more or less 
 wet places. The caustic principle of the crowfoots 
 has not been traced to acid or alkali ; its power is 
 increased by being combined with ardent spirits 
 or sugar, but is rendered inert by slight heating 
 or drying, which accounts for these plants being 
 harmless, except as wasteful weeds, when cut in 
 hay and dried. 
 
 Ranunculus Flammula, the Ranunculus which 
 causes a little flame on the skin, or an inflamma- 
 tion. The leaves bruised and applied to the sur- 
 face will raise a blister in about half an hour. 
 This is a sore which it is difficult to heal, and 
 consequently the application may be found useful 
 when a lasting vesication or running sore is sur- 
 gically required. This plant may be readily re- 
 cognised on the sides of lakes and muddy ditches, 
 by being of a less robust character than its neigh- 
 bour, Ranunculus Lingua. It is accordingly rightly 
 named the lesser Spearwort ; the blossoms are 
 small and of a light gold-yellow ; the honey-pore 
 or nectary in the claw of the petals is very small. 
 The long fibrous perennial roots run deep in the 
 ground, and from them spring numerous round, 
 branched, leafy, smooth, hollow stems, spreading 
 in every direction, and sometimes lying prostrate. 
 Dr. Withering, the naturalist, recommended the 
 distilled water of Ranunculus Flammula as pre- 
 ferable to any other means for producing instant
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 23 
 
 vomiting in case of poisoning. Lightfoot describes 
 an ingenious but simple method of using the 
 bruised leaves as a blister ; he says that in the 
 Scottish Isles, they fill a limpet shell with the cat- 
 aplasm, and bind it on the part ; the cup-form of 
 the shell neatly defining the place of the blister. 
 
 Ranunculus Ficaria, Figwort-Crowfoot or Pile- 
 wort : the leaves have somewhat the colour and 
 form of a flattened green fig. Its acrid property 
 has led to its use as a stimulant plaster for in- 
 dolent tumours, from which it derives its popu- 
 lar name. This is a welcome wild flower in ; April. 
 The glossy healthy green of its heart-shaped 
 leaves, resembling those of a garden cyclamen, 
 first invite admiration ; and then comes its at- 
 tractive, lively, shining, golden, yellow petals, 
 supported by the yellowish-green calyx which re- 
 cently formed the curious pix, in which was trea- 
 sured the yet unopened flower. If you want to 
 transplant this wildling into the bank of some 
 shady stream in your grove, take care to get up 
 its tuberous roots, or your " first -of -April work" 
 will be worthy of the day, you will lose your 
 plant, and be an April-fool. These little tubers 
 are often exposed to view by the washing of con- 
 tiguous streams, or the rain ; and then, they look 
 somewhat like grains of wheat ; this appearance 
 has given origin to the assertion that it has rained 
 wheat. The young leaves of this plant are boil- 
 ed by the common people in some parts of Sweden, 
 and safely eaten for greens. It is, however, a proof 
 of the deficiency of good vegetables, to see such 
 small substitutes made use of. The seeds of this 
 Ranunculus are commonly infertile, but the plant
 
 24 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 produces bulbs in the anils of its leaves, and they 
 falling, grow in this viviparous manner. This 
 flower loves the light and sun-shine, and closes 
 its blossoms, for want of their cheering influence, 
 from about five in the evening, till near nine in 
 the morning ; and also during wet or very gloomy 
 weather: its Celtic name Grian, the sun, tells 
 this point in its history. Annually we see its 
 golden-varnished starry flowers lose their attrac- 
 tion, become pallid, then dead-white, and finally 
 fall off, having perfected but few seeds ; but there 
 is a store of life in its pear-shaped tuberous roots, 
 the fascicles of which are like those of the Or- 
 chises, renewed year by year. 
 
 Ranunculus auricomus. From "aureus," gold, 
 and "coma," a lock of hair : Goldilocks, 
 
 " Her sunny locks hang on her temples like a golden fleece. " 
 
 This plant prefers woods and places which are not 
 swampy for its residence : it does not dislike shade, 
 but generally finds a dry soil most congenial to 
 its habits. The leaves are smooth, those near the 
 root kidney-shaped; on the flower-stalks they are 
 much divided. It is about a foot high. Its flowers, 
 one on each stalklet, are of a deep bright yellow, 
 and its stamens purple. It blooms in April and 
 May. It is worth while to examine with a micro- 
 scope its honey-pore, which is situated at the bot- 
 tom of the claw of the petal, and is not hidden 
 by any sheath. Often, the seasons being cold, the 
 corolla is not developed at all ; the calyx then 
 becomes more deeply coloured than usual ; and 
 within its cincture the stamens fertilize the seeds. 
 This plant differs remarkably from the most gene-
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. ZO 
 
 ral effect of the Ranunculus tribe, viz., it is not 
 at all acrid, and is consequently called Sweet 
 Wood-Crowfoot. 
 
 Ranunculus sceleratus, a Latin surname, attri- 
 butes to the next crowfoot, nourishing in muddy 
 banks, a dozen evil qualities. Its most innocent 
 discredit is the consequence of its chosen home, 
 being thence called the dirty, denied, or polluted 
 crowfoot; its feet are always in muddy drains 
 or dykes; the partially drained portions of our 
 newly reclaimed parks are full of it. Secondly, 
 it is "scelerate," because it is acrid, nipping or 
 biting ; if chewed it inflames the tongue ; even 
 the distilled water of it is intensely acrimonious, 
 and as it cools it deposits crystals which are very 
 insoluble, and have the curious property of being 
 inflammable. Yet with all this acute acridity, it 
 is singular that if the plant be boiled, and the wa- 
 ter thrown off, the vegetable is wholesome ; and 
 the shepherds in Wallachia use it for food. The 
 third meaning of " scelerate" applies to it the 
 character of being unnatural, cruel, mischievous, 
 and roguish. It is one of the most virulent of 
 all our native plants ; the juice is so acrid that 
 if slightly rubbed to the skin, it reddens it ; if the 
 application is continued, it causes a blister and a 
 sore. Mr. Francis says, that he himself saw a 
 begging-impostor producing inflammation by this 
 means; this branch of vagrant malingering has 
 not as yet been acquired in Ireland. Popularly, 
 this is called Celery-leaved Crowfoot; its Latin 
 name, though not allied to celery in property, is 
 in sound, and the two words may make a kind 
 of memory-aid for one another. It is called thus
 
 26 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 because the lower leaves resemble celery in their 
 deep green colour and glossy smoothness. The 
 stem is round, hollow, and has a pithy whiteness 
 within ; the plant is stout, and for so a herbaceous 
 structure looks shrubby. The flowers, which ap- 
 pear in June, and succeed each other until Au- 
 gust, are very small, but of a good bright yellow. 
 Being an annual, it may be eradicated by pre- 
 venting it from perfecting its copious supply of 
 seeds. 
 
 We have examined the green and snow-white 
 Scarf of our streams, these pearly plants which 
 cling closely by them. The "starry eye" from 
 the damp dell we have scrutinized ; and shining 
 in the marsh, we have seen a plant telling us 
 
 " All is not gold that glistens." 
 
 We have followed a bright sylvan into the grove, 
 and now emerging 
 
 " Through the flowery mead, 
 When lavish Nature, with her best attire, 
 Clothes the gay Spring," 
 
 we enter on terra firma, and commence our ex- 
 amination of the pasture-growing species. First 
 comes the Ranunculus acris; this crowfoot, acrid 
 by pre-eminence among those which adorn the 
 meadows, grows everywhere. In fine Summer it 
 is a showy vigorous-looking plant ; all its colours 
 have an enlivening intensity ; an old author intro- 
 duces it as emblematic of the manhood of the 
 months ; he says, " June is drawn in a mantle of 
 dark grass-green, and upon his head a garland of 
 bents, KING-CUPS, and maiden hair." 
 
 King-Cups are not unsung. We have a poet
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 27 
 
 for them, George Darley, who gives them a place 
 in a " May-day Melody," as follows: 
 
 " See this bank which the cowslip and cuckoo-bud strews, 
 
 To engage your bright looks, gentle Queen of the May; 
 And a carpet of moss for your delicate shoes, 
 And woodbine enwreath'd in a canopy gay. 
 
 " See this garland of red-maiden posies for you, 
 
 A beautiful wreath fit for beauty alone ; 
 Here 's a king-cup of gold, brimming over with dew, 
 To be kiss'd by a lip just as fresh as its own. 
 
 " Here are bracelets of pearl * from the stream in the dale, 
 
 That the nymph of the water on you can bestow ; 
 Here 's a white-lily fan, your rich blushes to veil, 
 Or lie on your bosom, like snow upon snow. 
 
 " Here is myrtle sustain'd by a jessamine band, 
 
 To show the fond twining of beauty and youth ; 
 Take these emblems of love in your exquisite hand, 
 For one is the evergreen Sceptre of Truth. 
 
 " Then around you we '11 dance, and in honour will sing, 
 
 While by melody guided we wander away, 
 Where the hills and the valleys and woodlands shall ring 
 With your choral chaunt, lovely Queen of the May !" 
 
 Beginning at its root we find it thick and 
 elongated, and with many fibres. The stem is 
 boldly erect and about two feet high clothed with 
 stoutish hairs ; the calyx spreads, but is not rolled 
 back under its large full golden corolla. Such is 
 its splendour, but alas } though Gay tells us, 
 
 " Fair is the king-cup that in meadow blows," 
 
 we are obliged to reveal its mischievous charac- 
 ter. Cattle will not eat it when green. Its lower 
 leaves are sometimes blotched with a suspicious 
 lurid dark hue ; and it is so very acrid, that Curtis 
 says, even pulling up the plant with bare hands 
 
 * White Water Ranunculus blossoms.
 
 28 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 has produced inflammation on a delicate skin. 
 And still there is a drop of honey at the bot- 
 tom of this royal vase, which the industrious 
 bees secure without danger. In the " Shepherd's 
 Oracles," we are told it was worn by lovers at 
 betrothing time ; and its golden colour was dedi- 
 cated to Hymen in more classical history. Old 
 Quarles says, 
 
 " Love-sick swains 
 
 Compose rush-rings and myrtle-berry chains, 
 And stuck with glorious king-cups in their bonnets, 
 Adorn'd with laurel-slips, chaunt their love sonnets." 
 
 A variety of this plant has become double, and 
 long been an inhabitant of gardens, as one of the 
 flowers called Yellow Bachelors' Buttons. 
 
 Ranunculus repens, Creeping Crowfoot ; repens 
 et repentini, Crawling Upstarts ; the shoots crawl 
 about the grounds, and then thrust themselves 
 up into notoriety. It is a very common plant ; 
 the leaves are of a paler green than those of se- 
 veral other species, and the yellow of the blos- 
 som is less deep. This plant also blisters the 
 skin ; it grows stoutly in meadows and in waste 
 shady places. It flowers in May, June, July, and 
 August. It is the cuckoo-bud of Shakspeare, so 
 called from its gaiety in early Summer, accom- 
 panying the arrival of the cuckoo in the groves, 
 
 " When daisies pied, and violets blue, 
 And cuckoo-buds of yellow hue, 
 Do paint the meadows with delight." 
 
 And again in King Lear we have it noticed as 
 the cuckoo flower. 
 
 We have next the Ranunculus bulbosus. The 
 root is short, with few fibres, and no offsets; it is
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 29 
 
 roundish and solid, perennial by means of form- 
 ing a new bulb for next year on the top of the old 
 one ; this root is the most acrid part of the plant, 
 for although the juice of the herbage is stimu- 
 lant and produces sneezing, the root will blister, 
 and it is said with as much certainty, and far less 
 suffering, than Spanish flies. This is our com- 
 monest field butter-cup. It was once supposed 
 to give butter that lively yellow tint which in- 
 dicates superior quality ; but cows do not eat 
 much of this weed ; the fine colour of the butter 
 when butter-cups blow, proceeds from the vigor- 
 ous health of the cattle, who have then plenty 
 of good grass, which, improving the quality of the 
 milk, enriches the butter. Energy and health 
 always co-exist. Plants revel in the breezes, the 
 showers, and the sun-shine ; and animals get vi- 
 vid colours, both externally and in all their secre- 
 tions, from these health-giving stimulants. 
 
 It should be remarked, that acrid as it is, pigs 
 will plough a coarse common all over to get at its 
 roots, and they are said to eat it without harm ; 
 it would be well, however, when permitting these 
 animals to eat what poisons others, to be cautious 
 of mistaken statements, which may be costly in 
 their consequences. 
 
 Ranunculus hirsutus, the Hairy Pale Crowfoot, 
 is rather a rare Irish plant : when found, it shows 
 its erect vigour on moist grounds, but as it some- 
 times obtrudes itself on the borders of cultivation, 
 it is well to know that it is an annual. It is re- 
 ported that a top-dressing of wood or coal ashes 
 will exterminate it, but it may be surely eradi- 
 cated by preventing it from perfecting its seeds.
 
 SO WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 The plant wears a silky down as a slight cover- 
 ing, but the calyx or flower-cup is regularly hairy. 
 This large species affords facility for noticing, that 
 when the flowers are only a little opened, there 
 are on the stalk two little palish-yellow leaves, 
 which seem like supports or brackets to the more 
 prominent structure above : these appendages are 
 " bracts ;" they fall off when the next tier, the caly- 
 cine-leaves, enlarge : these again in their turn bend 
 back from the petals, allowing them superiority 
 and the fullest expansion of their tawnj^-golden 
 beauty to the enriching sun-shine of heaven. 
 
 Ranunculus arvensis, from "arvum" a plough- 
 ed field, the Corn Crowfoot. It is found chiefly 
 in corn-fields and cultivated grounds. It is very 
 different from the butter-cups in appearance ; the 
 leaves are pale green, and divided into strap- 
 shaped lobes ; the plant is slightly hairy in every 
 part, the root is annual, the stem erect and 
 branched, the blossom leaves are small, and of a 
 pale yellow. It may be remarked here, that in 
 making a hortus-siccus, or garden of dried plants, 
 the petals of the bright gold-coloured crowfoots 
 may be fastened with mixed paste and gum to 
 paper, and they will retain their distinguishing 
 shades of colour, if not much exposed to light. 
 The seeds of this species are remarkably armed 
 on the sides with strong spines. This plant 
 should be carefully eradicated from corn-fields. 
 It is, says Sir James Edward Smith, very acrid 
 and dangerous to cattle, though they are said to 
 eat it greedily. M. Brugnon, who has given a 
 particular account of its qualities, relates, that 
 three ounces of its juice killed a dog in four mi-
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 31 
 
 nutes. Near Turin several sheep were killed by 
 eating it, which first led to an investigation of 
 its effects. Cholic, with inflammation of the sto- 
 mach, were the marked results, which effects were 
 best removed by pouring vinegar down the ani- 
 mals' throats. This poison seems to act in para- 
 lyzing the nerves of the stomach, and also in an 
 acrid ulcerating effect, as black spots were found 
 in the stomachs of the sheep. 
 
 Our last Irish Kanunculus is R parviflorus, Lit- 
 tle-flowered. This small plant resembles some of 
 our wild geraniums in its leaves and stems. The 
 leaves are thus roundly heart-shaped, scalloped 
 on the edges, and hairy. It grows in rather a 
 trailing attitude, on coarse arable ground and 
 gravelly or rocky places. Its height is about six 
 to nine inches. The little leaves of the corolla 
 are yellow; the seeds are armed at the sides with 
 hooked prickles. It flowers in May and June. 
 We have not much to record about this diminu- 
 tive plant. Old Gerarde, who found a use for 
 everything, tell us, " that many do use to tie a 
 little of the herb, stamped with salt, unto any of 
 the fingers, against the pain of the toothache ;" 
 and he accounts for the cure very cleverly, viz., 
 "which medicine seldome faileth, for it causeth 
 greater pain in the finger than was in the tooth, 
 by means whereof the greater paine taketh awaye 
 the lesse." 
 
 In a sketchy biography of plants like this, sci- 
 entific readers will miss much of that precision 
 and minute distinction which systematic accounts 
 contain; but these matters would be out of place 
 if too largely offered for popular reading. Our
 
 32 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 garden Ranunculus, in all its splendour and va- 
 riety, is a native of the Levant ; and we cannot 
 here add even " a peep at the parterre/' to vary 
 our " wander after wild flowers ;" yet it may be 
 hoped that some persons will make themselves 
 well acquainted with the rural inhabitants of 
 their neighbourhoods, which acquirement will to 
 a certain extent, give an insight into the habits 
 and treatment necessary for the splendid foreign 
 Ranunculus, who is everywhere invited to show 
 in gardens 
 
 " The blazing brightness of her beauty's beam." 
 
 In general, the necessities of a natural group of 
 plants have some relations to one another ; or at 
 least there are sub-series, which may be pretty 
 safely associated ; and as most of the introduced 
 species have types that are natives, observations 
 on their places of flourishing are a good help to 
 successful gardening.
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 33 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 GLOBE-FLOWER. IMPRESSIONS OF LEAVES. MARSH-MARIGOLD. 
 
 NATIVE CAPERS. THE GOWAN. HELLEBORE. CHRISTMAS ROSE I 
 
 ITS POISONOUS QUALITIES. ITALIAN POISON COMPOUNDERS 
 SPOKEN OP BY SHAKSPEARE. COLUMBINE OR DOVE-PLANT.' 
 BARBERRY ; FICTION IMPUTES TO IT GIVING RED-RUST TO WHEAT. 
 IRRITABILITY OF ITS STAMENS, AND OTHER CURIOUS CIRCUM- 
 STANCES RELATING TO IT. 
 
 THE next genus of the order Ranunculus with 
 which we meet, is " Trollius," so called by Conrad 
 Gesner, because the flower is a sphere, and the 
 German word Trolen, means round. To "troll," 
 which may be translated to "trundle," sing or 
 send round, was a word in general use in the six- 
 teenth and seventeenth centuries ; Caliban says 
 in the Tempest 
 
 " Let us be jocund : will you troll the catch 
 You taught me, but while ere 1 " 
 
 Our Irish species the Trollius europseus, is, as 
 its specific name indicates, distributed over the 
 temperate parts of Europe. It is not a wild 
 plant in the province of Munster ; but is to be 
 found in most gardens, where it is perhaps a lit- 
 tle coarsely herbaceous for high finish and select 
 floriculture ; in a grove it is an admirable de- 
 coration, as its size is not out of keeping with 
 shrubs and trees. The making a collection of 
 portraits of leaves is an agreeable amusement; 
 and those that are crowfoot-formed answer well 
 for this purpose. Of course the pencil produces
 
 34 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 the highest order of work in delineations ; but 
 there is an extemporaneous method of getting up 
 a Leaf-Picture Cabinet, which requires only a 
 little neatness and patience to be effectual. 
 Lampblack and sweet oil rubbed together make 
 the printing ink, which is to be smoothly painted 
 on stout paper ; on this, carefully expand the 
 leaf you want to copy ; its most nerve-marked 
 side being undermost ; cover your work with a 
 protecting bit of tissue-paper ; over which, lay a 
 smooth piece of flannel, and with your fingers 
 press it on the leaf, so as to colour all its elevated 
 points. Spread it in a natural form on white 
 paper, place thick blotting-paper over it, rub the 
 outside, and you will possess a good papyro-graph 
 to " remember you " of your pretty leaves when 
 snow may hide them in the grove, or rain prevent 
 your visiting them. 
 
 The Globe-flower raises its very elegant silvery- 
 gold balloon, from its green bed in June and 
 July, but in sheltered groves it keeps blooming 
 until October. Its blossom-leaves drop soon, and 
 expose to view its very rough bundle of green 
 seeds ; yet, as it has several blooms on one stem, 
 it is useful in the " beau-pot," being of that 
 soft, pale, moonlight yellow, which suits most 
 colours. 
 
 This plant, in common with its natural order, is 
 slightly acrid. It likes a rich, moist soil, but 
 loves a good strong light to flourish under, de- 
 riving vigour and colour, as the moon receives her 
 light, 
 
 " And her pale fire she snatches from the sun."
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 35 
 
 Let us take leave of this gentle terrene orb, with 
 an apostrophe fitting her merits, 
 
 " Sweet moon, I thank thee for thy sunny beams." 
 
 We now come to a plant which we can easily 
 find in its natural home. How welcome is the 
 glowing flower of our common marsh-marigold, 
 like our well-known garden pot-herb after which 
 it is named, it was formerly worn as a nosegay, 
 its strength of colour, overbearing its somewhat 
 coarse robustness of form; "glorious John" Dryden 
 records its floral fame thus 
 
 "And get soft Hyacinths with iron-blue. 
 To shade marsh-marigolds of shining hue." 
 
 In "sturdy March" out it brings its golden 
 blossoms, and continues to bloom until June. The 
 stout stems of this plant are creeping, and where 
 they touch the soft soil, they are fringed with 
 rootlets. The succulent leaves are large and 
 roundly-heart-shaped, crenated or crimped at the 
 edges, and much veined on the shining upper sur- 
 face. Goats and sheep eat these leaves ; cows, who 
 have been much confined, will ignorantly crop 
 them; but it is found to be an acrid poison to 
 these animals. It is one of the plants called by 
 the Scotch go wans 
 
 " We twa have rin about the braes, 
 And pu'd the gowans fine." BURNS. 
 
 A double variety has been found and intro- 
 duced into gardens, in them it grows well in rich 
 moist earth, not always requiring a mud-bank 
 habitation. Its name in Botanical Science is 
 " Caltha," from the Greek Kalathos, a cup ; and 
 in the early Summer, it is gay to see the sunlight
 
 36 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 brightening its golden chalice, as it touches the 
 crystal of some sparkling stream. 
 
 " Hark, hark ! the lark at heaven's gate sings 
 And Phoebus 'gins arise, 
 His steeds to water at these springs, 
 On chaliced flowers that lies." 
 
 Shakspeare, who saw everything, and felt every- 
 thing that was lovely, must have seen this one 
 of nature's translations ; this Kalathos is English- 
 ed into a chalice at our brooks ; by its fine hue, 
 illustrating a word of similar sound, and appro- 
 priate meaning, being our native " Kalanthe," or 
 beautiful flower. 
 
 The gowan of Scotland may be traced to its 
 home, and identified as the Caltha palustris, or 
 marsh-marigold, in a sweet song of Allen Ram- 
 say's, from which we take three verses : 
 
 "0 Katy wiltu' gang wi' me, 
 
 And leave the dinsome town awhile ? 
 For blossoms sprout from ilka tree, 
 
 And a' the summer 's gaun to smile. 
 The mavis, nightingale, and lark, 
 
 The bleating lambs and whistling hind 
 In ilka dale, greenshaw, and park, 
 
 Will nourish health and glad your mind. 
 
 " Soon as the clear, goodman of day, 
 
 Bends to his morning draught of dew, 
 We'll gae to some burnside and play, 
 
 And gather flow'rs as bright as you. 
 We 11 pull the daisies on the green, 
 
 The lucken gowans frae the bog, 
 Between-whiles lowly we will lean 
 
 And rest upon the velvet fog. 
 
 " There's up beyond a pleasant glen, 
 
 A wee piece from my father's tow'r, 
 A canny saft and flowery den, 
 
 Which circling birks have made a bow'r.
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 37 
 
 " Whene'er the sun grows high and warm, 
 
 We'll to that caller shade remove, 
 There I will lock thee in mine arm, 
 And love and kiss and kiss and love." 
 
 The Caltha palustris is exuberant in "palus- 
 trial," or partly submerged places, on the margins 
 of fresh-water rivers, in ozier marshes, and by the 
 sides of lazy streams. Young people should be 
 warned not to put any part of the plant in their 
 mouths, as they are somewhat acrid. The young 
 buds have been pickled for capers, but in our 
 country, if the mutton could be had, the people 
 would find " capers" in themselves, which would 
 be the most piquant sauce to appetite, and would 
 invigorate their stomachs, without the acridity of 
 the Caltha-bud, made pungent in vinegar. The 
 juice of the petals, boiled with alum, makes a 
 transitory yellow dye. 
 
 Our next genus of native plant is Helleborus ; 
 its name is constructed from the Greek " elein," 
 to injure, and " bora," food, indicating its poison- 
 ous nature. The meaning of viridis, the second 
 part of the name of our species, is obvious ; it 
 is all green, even the blossoms, which are of a 
 yellowish-green colour. It is a rare discovery in 
 Ireland for the amateur botanist. The Flora of 
 our country records that "it is found in two 
 places near Middleton, which are, perhaps, the 
 only stations in Ireland where it exists in a truly 
 wild state/' 
 
 The English Flora contains a second species of 
 this genus, which is not a wild native of Ireland, 
 although it is found very generally in gardens. It 
 has been confounded with our plant by the old
 
 38 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 botanists, because it has similar poisonous proper- 
 ties ; these qualities we will examine generally, 
 without making a minute botanical distinction 
 between the plants. They have both been called 
 veratrum ; now the Veratrum, or white hellebore 
 of modern pharmacologists, is found in a totally 
 different tribe of plants, and is nearly allied to 
 the Squill, so well known for its useful nauseating 
 power, as a cure for coughs. We cannot properly 
 notice the alkaline principle " veratria" here, be- 
 cause it has not been found in hellebore, although 
 the action of it on the system is very similar. The 
 Christmas-rose, called from the colour of its roots, 
 black hellebore, has been chemically examined ; 
 its power lies chiefly in an acrid volatile oil, and 
 the constitution of our plant may be generally 
 indicated by attending to that of its near neigh- 
 bour. The hellebores afforded the ancient phar- 
 maciens quite a world to revel in ; first the names 
 were a pleasure to them ; ver-atrum, " the green- 
 black," "Flore viridi, radix niger." Burton, in 
 his anatomy of melancholy, expatiates extensively 
 on it as one of the potential melanagoga, or " go- 
 your-way-melancholy" plants; he says it scatter- 
 eth black choler, and is a renowned plant, which 
 all antiquity so much used and admired : even the 
 first discoverer of it, we are told by Pliny, had 
 " black" in his name, Melam-podius, an old Greek 
 Blackfoot. This gentleman was a Bucolic, and 
 having observed that some mad goats of his eat 
 hellebore, and walked staidly after, he gave it to 
 two rather wildish daughters of a king in Arcadia, 
 and sobered them for ever. It would be impossi- 
 ble to tell all the vagaries which this plant has
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 39 
 
 cured ; beginning with Hercules and coming down 
 to dancing Dutch wives and Spanish grandees, 
 performing undignified voltas. One celebrated 
 physician administered it, he says, six hundred 
 times without offence, and yet, though flattered 
 as a "suave medicamentum, an easie" that may 
 be given to weaklings, it is far better to be cautious 
 of it; even in the hands of a mediciner it is of 
 very uncertain effect, its degree of acridity being 
 much altered by heat, dryness, and other casual- 
 ties; and as a judicious writer remarks, "it is 
 used by venturesome quacks in decoction and 
 coarse powder, to kill worms in the belly, which 
 it never faileth to do ; where it killeth not the 
 patient it would certainly kill the worms, but the 
 worst of it is, it will sometimes do both." The 
 desperate hazard of such drugs being ignorantly 
 employed is evident from this notice of its effects, 
 even where administered in quantities not fatal : 
 " with some it violently vomits and rendereth 
 heart-sick even to swooning; and if through 
 strength of nature they recover, some have lost 
 their hair, and the nails from their fingers and 
 toes, and the scarf-skin of the whole body has 
 peeled off from head to foot thereby." 
 
 These sad circumstances are not pleasant re- 
 cords, but as we have here and there an " Herb- 
 doctor" still, it is well to warn the public against 
 those modern Culpeppers. From this plant being 
 common in groves, children sometimes put it in 
 their mouths. At first the taste is warm and a 
 little biting, it then produces a cold numbness, a 
 property common to other narcotic-acrid vegetable 
 poisons ; the effect of having taken a portion of
 
 40 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 the plant into the stomach by mistake, may be 
 exhibited in all the stages from stupor and partial 
 poisoning, to death. It is reputed of certain Italian 
 drug-doctors, that they can poison, half-poison, 
 quarter-poison, or give a deadly potion, which 
 shall do their bidding in years to come. Poor 
 Juliet, when.provided with a means of temporary 
 death, doubted for a while, she says, 
 
 " What, if it be poison which the friar 
 Subtily has ministered, to have me dead." 
 
 Shakspeare's description of this process records 
 well the practice which many believe is often em- 
 ployed in various ways in our own time in Italy ; 
 and his account of what doctors would call the 
 Diagnosis, or looking into the knowledge of Juliet's 
 intended case, shows what narcotic poisoning in a 
 mild degree may be. The friar's description is well 
 
 known 
 
 " Take thou this phial, being then in bed, 
 And this distilled liquor drink thon off, 
 When presently through all thy veins shall run 
 A cold and drowsy humour, which shall seize 
 Each vital spirit, for no pulse shall keep 
 His natural progress, but surcease to beat. 
 No warmth, no breath, shall testify thou liv'st ; 
 The roses in thy lips and cheeks shall fail 
 To paly ashes, thy eyes' windows fall 
 Like death when he shuts up the day of life. 
 Each part deprived of supple government, 
 Shall stiff, and stark, and cold appear like death ; 
 And in this borrow' d likeness of shrunk death, 
 Thou shalt remain for two and forty hours." 
 
 The foetid hellebore or bear's-foot, so called 
 from the shape of its leaves, has constantly been 
 used by herbalists along with the green hellebore, 
 and is like it, found in groves, but is not a native 
 of Ireland. There is a period of the year, when
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 41 
 
 these plants are particularly dangerous to cattle ; 
 that is, when other herbage is very scarce. Dr. 
 Milne relates, that when the ground was covered 
 with snow, a flock of sheep, finding nothing else 
 green on the surface, ate plentifully of it, which 
 killed many of them ; a few recovered, however, 
 by getting an emetic of oil, which caused them to 
 eject the "felon-grass," a proper warning name 
 to denounce it by. To return to our own species ; 
 the green hellebore flowers in April and May, 
 and, as its usual residence indicates, will flourish 
 under the shade of trees. In accidental poisoning 
 with vegetable poisons, copious washings out of 
 the stomach, by whatever means is most promptly 
 accessible, is the surest hope for recovery, that is, 
 when professional assistance is delayed. 
 
 Next comes Aquilegia, from " aquila" an eagle, 
 and " lego," to gather or collect ; the spurs of the 
 blossom-bells being incurved, in the manner that 
 the eagle contracts its toes together to grasp, the 
 addition " vulgaris,"* would indicate its frequent 
 occurrence ; but in a state of nature it is a rare 
 plant in Ireland, though common in gardens. 
 Cultivators have recently produced some very 
 beautiful varieties, which are quite a revival of 
 position in favour of a flower that from sameness 
 was getting old-fashioned. Our English name 
 Columbine, from "columba" a dove, softens down 
 the figurative resemblance of our subject from the 
 eagle. If we separate one petal or bell from the 
 flower-cluster, it brings with it two blossom-leaves, 
 which are called sepals, and the combination 
 
 * Vulgaris, in Linnsean language, means well known, but not 
 vulgar in the usual sense.
 
 42 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 gives a floral dove, with sufficient accuracy 
 for poetical imagination. Our beautiful popular 
 phrase gillum-bawn in the Celtic, white dove 
 in English, probably originates the more learn- 
 ed Latin word Columbanus. When found wild, 
 this bloom is of the lightest blue colour, and 
 shades of blue pervade in the tinting of our rock- 
 pigeons, and some others of the Columbidese. In 
 gardens it is mostly double, and of a great va- 
 riety of tints. Withering observes that the 
 elongated and incurved nectary or honey-horn of 
 this flower, seems to bid defiance to the entrance 
 of the bee, in search of the hidden treasure ; but 
 the admirable ingenuity of the sagacious insect is 
 not to be thus defeated, for, on ascertaining the 
 impracticability of effecting his usual admission, 
 he penetrates both calyx and blossom near the 
 depot of honey, and thus extracts the latent 
 sweets without further difficulty. Mr. Phillips no- 
 tices in his "Flora Historica," that the Columbine 
 has three distinct modes of doubling its flowers ; 
 first, multiplication of the petals by conversion of 
 the nectaries, next, by the increase of the nec- 
 taries to the exclusion of the petals, and also by 
 the multiplication of nectaries, while the proper 
 petals remain; so various are the means by which 
 beauty can be increased in this dove-plant. We 
 have in Brown's "British Pastorals" a record that 
 our plant was in former times the insignia of a 
 deserted lover; why? except that a deprived dove 
 seems to pine is not very evident, the poet says 
 
 ' The columbine by lonely wand'rer taken, 
 Is then ascribed to such as are forsaken." 
 
 The columbine flower in its wild bloom is of the
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 43 
 
 colour of the breast of the columba or ring-dove, 
 a more or less purply blue ; a shade which suits 
 brilliant complexions, in ladies' dress, as we find 
 in the following scrap of a very pretty old poem : 
 
 " The good Sir Topas 
 He had, as antique stories tell, 
 A daughter cleped Dowsabell, 
 
 A maiden faire and free. 
 And for she was her father's heire, 
 Full well conn'd was she in the leyre 
 
 And mickle courtesie. 
 
 
 
 " She ware a frock of frolic greene, 
 Might well beseme a mayden queene* 
 
 Which seemly was to see. 
 A hood to that, so neate and fine 
 In colour like the Columbine, 
 Wroughte full featously.'' 
 
 Extract from " Mickle Drayton." 
 
 The second natural order of our native plants 
 presents us with but one genus and one species, 
 the Barberry. The berry of this shrub is not 
 " barbed," consequently we must find some other 
 origin for its name. For want of a barbed berry, 
 although its branches are very thorny, we are in- 
 formed that the Arabic designation of it is ber- 
 benys, in Latin made berberis, and in English 
 barberry, by adopting the style of each language 
 which it passes into. Bochart says the name is 
 derived from the Phoenician word " barrar," the 
 shining of a shell, which is given it from the lus- 
 trous gloss of the leaves in some of the species. 
 It was formerly common in hedges, but has been 
 industriously eradicated, in consequence of the 
 notion that a fungus which appears on its leaves 
 originates red-rust in wheat. Most of these 
 
 * Queen Elizabeth.
 
 44 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 fungi, however, have their inhabitiveness strongly 
 marked by their modes of residence ; they usu- 
 ally adopt some species of plants for their fixed 
 home ; at times they range as widely as the ex- 
 tent of a genus, but to ramble from berberis to 
 ceralia would be an exploit new in the history of 
 fungoid excursions. As a general rule, though 
 not universally strict, each creature has its own 
 special parasite, a moss, lichen, fungus, or insect 
 assailer, and does not need to borrow from its 
 neighbours. We cannot, then, without good 
 proof, believe that the red-rust of the Barberry 
 infects wheat, but if we consider how important 
 open dry air and the full action of the sun is to 
 the healthy perfection of this chief festoon in 
 Ceres' wreath, we can readily perceive why close 
 high hedges around corn-fields can injure the 
 vigour of the crops, and expose them to parasitic 
 attacks. The Barberry is a common shrubbery 
 ornament, and in all stages of its growth it de- 
 serves selection ; its early vigorous shoots, its blos- 
 soms, its leaves, all recommend it. Its spines have 
 a curious origin ; they are abortive leaves, the pri- 
 mary ones being converted into this well-known 
 armature. In the flower is a most interesting in- 
 stance of irritability. The stamens when the 
 flowers first open are in a recumbent position, 
 lying close-pressed back upon the petals. You 
 may shake the flower, or touch the top of the 
 stamens without producing any change, but if you 
 touch one of the filaments near its origin with a 
 pin, or for convenience with one of the thorns of 
 the stem, the stamen springs up, and strikes its 
 anther against the stigma, which then has depo-
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 45 
 
 sited on it the fertilizing powder, and this effect 
 may be produced on each stamen in succession, 
 until the whole group become bundled round the 
 central column or stigma. It would be worthy 
 of notice to ascertain whether this stimulation is 
 indispensable ; whether insects always have to do 
 the duty of the pin, or whether the pollen when 
 ripe is scattered independently of such agency. 
 Dr. Lindley adds that if you dose the Barberry 
 blossom with laudanum or any opiate, the sta- 
 mens become stupified and lose their elasticity, 
 and if you poison the plant with any substance, 
 such as arsenic, which in animals produces in- 
 flammation, a sort of vegetable inflammation is 
 the result. The learned professor concludes this 
 subject by saying " We are not, however, on 
 that account to conclude that this plant ap- 
 proaches animals in nature, but merely, that the 
 principle of life which pervades all animated na- 
 ture is the same in its essence, and is affected in 
 a similar manner by similar causes, whether it 
 exist in an animal or in a vegetable." The fruit of 
 the Barberry, when made into a conserve with 
 sugar, gives that sapid flavour of a pleasant sour 
 with sweet, which is agreeable to many palates. 
 
 There have been new species and improved 
 varieties introduced, of which the fruit is larger 
 and more succulent. The acid to which they owe 
 their piquancy is the oxalic. The colour yellow 
 pervades this plant in many of its structures, the 
 blossom is of that tint. The wood is yellow ; the 
 yellow roots are bitter and astringent, and if 
 boiled with a mordant will dye yellow ; and again, 
 the deep yellow-coloured inner bark was con-
 
 46 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 sidered as a specific for the jaundice in the days 
 when the doctrine of " the affections of colours " 
 held sway. The leaves of the Barberry partake 
 of the same pleasant acid with the fruit, which 
 is so intense in the wild berry that birds will 
 not eat it. We may conclude the description 
 of a plant full of curious interest by saying, that 
 a few blossoms are agreeable to smell, but too 
 many are heavy and oppressive. Withering goes 
 at great length into the elastic property of the 
 stamens of this flower, and it is well worth while 
 to read his remarks carefully. He gives addition- 
 al facts, viz., that there is a small explosion at the 
 bursting of the pollen-pod or anther ; that the 
 action of the sun through a burning-glass will 
 produce the effect ; that when the flowers are 
 electrified and sparks drawn from them by the 
 approach of a metallic body, the stamens imme- 
 diately spring towards the pistil Mr. Henfrey 
 adds that the stamens which have touched the 
 pistils slowly return to their former position. 
 Whether fecundation takes place without exte- 
 rior aid or not, there is a sufficient provision in 
 this blossom to induce it artificially, rf it may be 
 so called, each petal has near its base two honey- 
 bearing glands, and between every two of these 
 glands a stamen is placed, so that when insects 
 seek to extract the honey, they must touch the 
 lower and irritable part of the filament. All these 
 wonders have caused Withering to express his 
 admiration in the language of the poet Cowley 
 
 "If we could open and inbend our eye, 
 We all, like Moses, should espy, 
 Even in a bush, the radiant Deity."
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 CHAPTEE IV. 
 
 THE WHITE WATER-LILY; HOW IT ILLUSTRATES MORPHOLOGY: 
 ITS CULTURE: ITS SEED NARCOTIC-BITTER: THE SLEEP OF ITS 
 
 FLOWERS. YELLOW WATER-LILY. THE POPPIES OR PAP-MAKING 
 
 SEEDS. HYBRID POPPY. PRICKLY POPPY. SMOOTH -HEADED 
 
 POPPY. TARQUIN AND JUNIUS BRUTUS; CUTTING OFF SLEEPY 
 
 HEADS. DIVINATION BY POPPIES.- RED POPPY. OIL OF POP- 
 PIES. OPIUM PRODUCING POPPY. DIACODIUM. POPPY SEEDS 
 
 EATABLE. OPIUM AND OPIUM EATING. NEPENTHE AND OTHER 
 "BREWED ENCHANTMENTS." 
 
 WELCOME to the White Water-lily. Queen of our 
 native naiads, well named 
 
 " The fairest of the naiad throng." 
 
 See how she bathes her limbs in bright streams, 
 and expands her brownish-green and full green 
 drapery, partly laid in broad plaits, while some 
 leaves are flat and smoothly shining on the 
 ripply waters. This plant has no proper stem ; 
 the succulent leaf-stalks rise stoutly from the 
 root, and sustain their shield-formed leaves up to 
 the light and air. In June and July the white 
 stars of the Nymphcea alba appear ; sometimes 
 the blossom -leaves seem slightly tinted within 
 with rose-colour, which, with the white succu- 
 lency of their structure, gives them almost the 
 tone of flesh to a painter's eye : thus imagination 
 may people the silent lakes, and see 
 
 " The streams send up bright shapes, 
 That, from their lilied hair, 
 Wring out the sparkling waters."
 
 48 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 The yellow clustering stamens within the snowy 
 cup give richness to the flower, while its almond- 
 like odour adds to its abundant attractions. The 
 flower of the White Water-lily is one of the most 
 illustrative exhibitions of the modern doctrine of 
 the morphology of plants. This principle is ex- 
 plained by the derivation of the w^ord from the 
 Greek "morphoa" to invest with a form. The 
 statement was recently a theory, but is now ge- 
 nerally received as a fact, that all the organs of 
 plants are modifications of leaves. 
 
 We commence in this case with the outside 
 floral envelope of the Nymphsea alba, and we 
 find it of a greenish colour like a leaf, but ap- 
 plied to the purpose of a calyx ; a whorl of 
 petals come next, in which the green tint dis- 
 appears ; within this group appear smaller petals, 
 showing rudiments of anthers at their points, 
 and this character increases, while the petal-like 
 structure grows less, until the innermost bundle 
 shows perfect anthers, with the diminished pe- 
 tals changed to flat and narrow filaments. The 
 announcement of this physiological law drew 
 from the able and witty Bishop Whately a com- 
 parison, in which he said that all fire-irons were 
 but a poker modified, the tongs being a poker 
 with a limb produced, and a shovel a poker 
 with its terminal end expanded. So much for 
 archiepiscopal morphography. The flower stems 
 are porous, with small tubes like bamboo stalks, 
 and they transpire their moisture so rapidly, 
 that even water at the lower part of them will 
 not, when picked, prevent them from wither- 
 ing and becoming flaccid. To keep the flower
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 49 
 
 open any time it should touch the water, and 
 show itself, as Darwin says 
 
 " As nymphs emerging leave their sparkling streams." 
 
 The Water-lily may be transplanted from its 
 wild home into aquatic gardens, by placing its 
 thick prostrate stems in a basket, covering them 
 in earth, and fastening the basket with stones 
 where it will be well submerged. It may be re- 
 marked that these stems have a bitterish astrin- 
 gent taste, and used to be formerly employed for 
 dyeing grey and brown ; their astringent quality 
 recommended them also as a medical tonic ; they 
 probably contain tannin and gallic acid. Let us 
 now notice the object for which 
 
 " The water-lily to the light 
 Her chalice rears of silver bright." 
 
 It is to perfect the pollen, and scatter it on the 
 stigma ; the light stimulates this process, and be- 
 sides, if it was performed beneath the water, the 
 fertilizing dust would be washed away ; this func- 
 tion perfected, the seed-vessels retract, and ripen 
 their seeds within more or less watery submer- 
 sion. The seeds are numerous, and have an 
 opium-like bitterness, which some people enjoy. 
 I have seen them eaten, but, like the taste for 
 most narcotic bitters, the haut-gout is not natural, 
 and must be cultivated. The greater number of 
 the flowers of Nymphsea alba raise themselves, 
 and expand their snowy stars on the water as 
 the sun gains strength, that is by about seven 
 o'clock on brilliant Summer mornings. They close 
 again in the evening, commencing to retire about
 
 50 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 five o'clock, according to their degree of exposure 
 to light ; and so they sleep through the hours of 
 darkness, when a few blossoms, which seem to 
 have lost their sensibility, remain over-blown, 
 while others do not re-open with the morning 
 ray. These seem to be the flowers whose impreg- 
 nation being complete do not require to guard 
 their stamens any longer. Moore beautifully ver- 
 sifies this process : 
 
 " Those virgin lilies all the night 
 
 Bathing their beauties in the lake, 
 That they may rise more fresh and bright 
 
 When their beloved sun's awake." , 
 
 Herrick, the very sweet old English poet, wrote 
 an address to nymphs drinking at a fountain ; 
 and he solicits a draught from them, in which 
 he notices the water-queen's beauty of colour 
 as being surpassed by the ladies he apostro- 
 phises : 
 
 "Reach with your whiter hands to me 
 
 Some crystal of the spring, 
 And I about the cup shall see 
 Fresh lilies flourishing." 
 
 We may add, that the purity in the unspotted 
 beauty of the Nymphsea alba, and the cool bed of 
 water where she reposes, or beneath which she 
 sometimes retires, has given to her, in olden 
 times, the sentimental attribute of inducing that 
 chastity of which this vestal flower is so pleas- 
 ingly emblematical But all our naiads are not 
 snowy-white, and we come now to a yellow 
 nymph, Nuphar lutea. This name was used by 
 Dioscorides, and is, probably, the Arabic name, 
 " Noufar" The Yellow Water-lily is common in
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 51 
 
 slow streams and ponds ; in July it opens its cup- 
 shaped blossom, richly gilt inside, but with the 
 outside of its large and thick sepals, or outside 
 blossom-leaves, green ; the petals or interior blos- 
 som-leaves are numerous, but small ; and the 
 thick club-headed stigma in the middle of the 
 yellow stamens is an imposing part of the flower. 
 The blossom has a smell which, when strong, 
 somewhat resembles ardent spirits, and is too op- 
 pressive for most persons' taste ; in a less amount 
 the odour is not disagreeable, being then rather 
 like that of almonds. 
 
 It is interesting to observe how refined habits 
 educate even the senses. We find in less po- 
 lished times that strong coarse odours were 
 much liked by a class of the community who 
 now would be nauseated by them. Certainly, 
 the sentiment conveyed by the name " Brandy- 
 bottles/' which this flower got in olden time from 
 its smell, is very repulsive ; and I regret to make 
 any unpleasant association with our flower, ex- 
 cept for the just purpose of showing that educa- 
 tion has a large range of application, when even 
 our senses can have their wants modified and re- 
 fined by moral training. The leaf-stalks contain 
 a considerable quantity of starch, as do also the 
 seeds. Some persons boil the seeds, when they 
 are said to have a pleasant nutty flavour. The 
 leaves have been used as a styptic. Linnaeus 
 says swine are fond of them and of the prostrate 
 stems; goats, sheep, cows, and horses refuse them. 
 These prostrate stems, rubbed with milk, are a 
 reputed poison for crickets and cockroaches ; also 
 the smoke of them when burning is fatal to these
 
 52 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 domestic pests. The whole herb has been em- 
 ployed in tanning. The infusion of the part 
 formerly known as the root in water, was long 
 considered a specific in eruptive complaints. The 
 Greeks use the flowers in making a cordial. 
 
 We found in our white lily a water queen, in 
 all her delicacy of beauty, softness, and sweet- 
 ness ; we must make this yellow-coloured chief- 
 tain her king he is all a warrior, 
 
 " In golden armour, glorioxis to behold, 
 The rivets of his arms are nail'd with gold." 
 
 Finally, mark the interesting provision to pre- 
 serve a free aeration to the juices of the nyniphtea. 
 Mr. Henfrey states the fact, that in air-growing 
 leaves the upper faces have generally a thicker 
 cuticle, and are either devoid of, or slightly sup- 
 plied with, stomates or breathing spiracles. The 
 under surface possessing this facility copiously, 
 rain does not embarrass the aeration of the plant 
 through the leaves ; but now for our floating 
 water-lily : the under surfaces of her leaves are 
 covered with the fluid on which they float, conse- 
 quently the pierced epidermis is placed uppermost 
 and in contact with the air ; but from its shining 
 surface and slightly rounded line of form, water, 
 rain, or dew does not remain on it to hinder the 
 vegetative respiration. 
 
 The fourth order of native plants consists of 
 the Papaveracese, so called from the Celtic word 
 "papa," the soft food given to infants, and ab- 
 breviated into pap, in which the seeds of the 
 poppy were boiled to cause sleep. The change of 
 the vowel "a" into "o" is not uncommon; "papa"
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 53 
 
 is altered into " pope " in our common language ; 
 and "pappa" is thus corrupted into "poppy." 
 Swift softens the hard word " pap" in his " Baby 
 Lyric," "pappy in the saucepan;" and shows 
 its sleep-producing quality in his well-known 
 chorus, " Niddy-noddy, niddy-noddy." 
 
 The first Irish species in this group is the Hy- 
 brid Poppy. It is a true species, not double- 
 bred, and I cannot discover the origin of this 
 specific name. It perfects all its seeds, while 
 flowers, which are the results of mixed species, 
 are usually more or less imperfect in their seed- 
 forming ; yet it must have been once thought to 
 have been double-bred, because it was popularly 
 called " Mongrel poppy." Its most obvious char- 
 acter is contained in its common name, " Round 
 rough-headed poppy." The stem is leafy, and the 
 leaves are much subdivided. It is rather a rare 
 Irish plant, is to be looked for in sandy fields, and 
 shows its red crumpled petals in June ; the an- 
 thers are, in accordance with Withering's descrip- 
 tion, " of a pleasing blue ;" the pollen gives them 
 also that colour, as related by some authors, 
 this statement requires proof. The capsules are 
 bristly, and the seeds escape under the radiated 
 lid which covers the seed-box ; they can be dusted 
 out, as if from a natural pepper caster. 
 
 The seeds have a pleasant, nut-like taste ; they 
 may have been a good addition to children's food 
 when boiled, because of their mild oily contents, 
 but in them there is nothing soporific ; if a som- 
 nific effect was ever produced by them, it must 
 be from bits of the capsules being boiled with 
 them, otherwise it could be only the emollient
 
 54 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 and soothing effect of warm oily food that induced 
 the sleep in infants, for which it had such reputa- 
 tion that Lord Bacon spoke of its effects as "bene- 
 dictum." The use of these plants in producing 
 sleep is of the greatest antiquity, and the modes 
 of its application were various. Virgil tells us 
 that the very water which dropped from the 
 leaves was soporific. He says 
 
 " And poppy shedding slumberous dews around." 
 
 The boiled heads of the poppies were applied as 
 soothers in case of pain, and with good result ; 
 but whether so weak an infusion of opium acted 
 from its narcotic effect, or because it was a warm 
 stupe, remains for proof; the application being 
 usually made to the feet and legs, makes the lat- 
 ter explanation most probable. 
 
 The next species is the Long-headed prickly 
 Poppy, or, according to science, "Argemone," from 
 " argemon," a disease of the tissues of the eye, 
 for which the infusion of this plant was con- 
 sidered to be a cure ; and, probably, its emol- 
 lient power did allay inflammation. It appears 
 on gravelly or sandy soils, in June, with its red 
 blossoms, which are so transient that the petals 
 usually fall off within six hours ; sometimes it 
 is found semi-double, and then the blossoms 
 last longer. Blossoms being the apparatus which 
 guard the perpetuation, by seeds of flower- 
 bearing plants, when the pollen is distributed 
 on the stigma, their duty is over, and they fall 
 off. Double, or semi-double flowers, not hav- 
 ing the means for the discharge of this function, 
 the blossoms seem to delay for a process which, as
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 55 
 
 it does not occur, at length they tire and fall, like 
 deciduous leaves, not connected with the fructi- 
 fication of the plant at all. The blue stamens 
 are a pleasing combination with the red petals 
 and deeply-cut green leaves of our flower. 
 
 We have now the long Smooth-headed Poppy ; 
 its Latin specific name is "dubium," so called 
 from the general resemblance of four of the spe- 
 cies, which to superficial observers must cause 
 doubt about their distinctions. This plant, with 
 its scarlet leaves and yellow stamens, is not rare 
 in corn-fields and sandy places in June. The 
 bristles are closely pressed to the stalk, which dis- 
 tinguishes it very clearly from the common red 
 poppy, whose bristles stand erect, and with which 
 it is most likely to be confounded. 
 
 Among the various uses to which poppy heads 
 have been applied, we have an ancient story 
 worth remembering : 
 
 Tarquin the Proud was ordered by an oracle 
 to offer heads to the Lares or household gods ; 
 he sacrificed human victims to them ; but Junius 
 Brutus, after the expulsion of the Tarquins, obey- 
 ed the letter of the oracle in a milder spirit, and 
 substituted poppy heads as the victims. 
 
 Theocritus tells us that the red poppy was used 
 formerly for making love prognostics ; but it 
 must have been sleepy work, not fitted for our 
 go-a-head times. The mode of this divination is 
 told thus : 
 
 " By a prophetic poppy leaf I found 
 Your changed affection ; for it gave no sound, 
 Though in my hand struck hollow as it lay, 
 But quickly withered, like your love, away."
 
 56 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 There are a whole series of curious operations 
 to be noticed in the fructification of the poppy. 
 Paley observes that, while growing, the head 
 hangs down, a rigid curvature in the upper part 
 of the stem giving it that position, in which rain 
 and moisture quickly run off it ; but when it has 
 attained its full size, and is ready to open, it erects 
 itself, and presents its flower to the genial influ- 
 ence of the sun's rays. It may be added, that 
 when the petals first fall off, the seed-vessel which 
 rises in the centre is completely closed ; but as the 
 seeds ripen, the sides of the capsule shrink, while 
 the radiate lid remains of its first size ; this causes 
 an opening under the cover, which lets in dry air, 
 and also forms an aperture for the ripe seeds to 
 be shaken out through by the wind, or the falling 
 of the seed-vessels. 
 
 Of the common Red Poppy, the Papavar Rhoaas, 
 rose-like poppy, Loudon says, that this specific 
 name is derived from "reo," to fall, or flow, in 
 Greek, in allusion to its fugacious flowers ; but 
 there is a more probable origin of the appellation ; 
 if the skin be broken, there flows from it a red- 
 dish juice. This dazzling ornament of corn fields 
 is abundant to excess in many parts of Ireland ; 
 less so in Munster, however, than in Leinster ; but 
 the changing of the seed of corn to different parts 
 of the country will soon distribute the corn- weeds 
 universally. Its blossoms make a gorgeous show 
 in July, with its intense red petals and purple 
 stamens. It would be now considered a vulgar 
 flower in bouquets, but in early days full colour 
 was prized in ornament. Virgil gives an invita- 
 tion thus :
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 57 
 
 " 0, come ! The nymphs for thee in baskets bring 
 Their lilied stores ; for thee, the blooming spring 
 The white-arm'd naiad rilies; violets pale, 
 The poppies flush, and dill, which scents the gale." 
 
 The flower which is so justly admired in gar- 
 dens, under the name of the French Poppy, is a 
 double variety of this species ; it sports into a 
 great number of colours, from its original red, 
 even to a purple, and almost black. With this 
 sombre plant we may make a home for Somnus 
 himself, the drowsy son of Erebus and Nox. The 
 central palish petals of our double flower may be 
 his downy bed, where he reposes, and the outside 
 darker and larger leaves shall be his black cur- 
 tains, making thick airs and sleepy thoughts 
 
 about him : 
 
 "A listless climate, 
 Was nought around but images of rest, 
 
 Sleep-soothing groves, and quiet lawns between, 
 And flowery beds that slumberous influence prestt, 
 From poppies breath' d, and beds of pleasant green." 
 
 And yet the glowing corn-rose was formerly con- 
 sidered an emblem of joyousness, from the bright- 
 ness of its petals ; these gorgeous flower-leaves 
 the Apis papaveris, or drapery bee, chooses for 
 hangings for her apartments. This insect (which 
 is not known to inhabit our country) dexterously 
 cuts out the petals of the half-expanded flowers, 
 straightens the folds, and then hangs the walls 
 of her cell with this splendid tapestry. 
 
 The uses of this poppy are similar to those of 
 the other species; the petals have, when made 
 into infusion, a slight opiate power, all parts of 
 the plant except the seeds being 
 
 " Pregnant with Lethean juice."
 
 58 WALKS AFTEK WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 They yield a fine red colour, and used to be 
 made into a soothing syrup ; but syrup of poppies 
 has given way to the more direct use of opium. 
 Oil of poppies has been drawn from these seeds, 
 of which Linnaeus says 30,000 have been found 
 in one head. The oil is sweet. Gerarde records 
 that in his day it was considered pleasant and 
 delightful to be eaten ; it is, however, chiefly pro- 
 cured from the large white poppy. A curious 
 account of violent controversies respecting the 
 wholesomeness of this oil will be found in the 
 Library of Entertaining Knowledge, in the vo- 
 lume called " Material of Manufactures ;" but it 
 is too long to quote here. In classic lore, we find 
 that the poppy was sacred to Ceres, the well- 
 known goddess of rural productions. It might 
 be that this plant was devoted as a victim to the 
 parent of agriculture, because it was a trouble- 
 some weed in corn ; but from its being held in the 
 hand of the goddess along with ears of wheat, and 
 also worn as a wreath in her Egyptian character 
 as Isis, it is more probable that it was propitiatory, 
 and also indicative of its value as an oil-producing 
 plant ; her worship in thankfulness was held 
 
 " As tempered suns arise, 
 
 Sweet beamed, and shedding through the lucid clouds 
 A pleasing calm : white, broad, and brown below, 
 Extensive harvests hang the heavy head. 
 Rich, silent, deep, they stand : for, not a gale 
 Rolls its light billows o'er the bending plain: 
 A calm of plenty ; till the ruffled air 
 Falls from its poise, and gives the breeze to blow : 
 Rent is the fleecy mantle of the sky, 
 And back, by fits, the shadows sweep along 
 A gaily chequer 'd, heart-expanding view, 
 Far as the circling eye can shoot around, 
 Unbounded, tossing in a flood of com."
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 59 
 
 We now come to the Papaver somniferum, by 
 eminence above all its congeners, the Sleep-pro- 
 ducing Poppy. It is a very handsome plant in all 
 stages of its growth ; the leaves are smooth, and 
 clasp the stalk, for a considerable way, in their 
 sea-green drapery. A bed of the common white 
 poppy in full blow is indeed a magnificent show, 
 and well worth placing in a spare corner of gar- 
 dens, for the exhibition it makes in July. This 
 plant sports in colour, from its handsomest ap- 
 pearance, which is the snowy white, into various 
 shades of pink and purple, and then appears in 
 our gardens as a robust, rather coarse, shrubby 
 annual. As is the case throughout the order, 
 every part of this plant, the seeds excepted, 
 abounds with a white milky juice, which has a 
 heavy, nauseous smell, well known as the nar- 
 cotic odour. It would take a large book to give 
 a full account of the production, uses, and abuses 
 of opium ; consequently, we must abbreviate very 
 strictly. The mildest form in which opium has 
 been given is as syrup of poppy-heads. "Diaco- 
 dium," the divine, or excellent poppy -juice 
 " dia," of the gods, and "koademos," madness or 
 stupefaction, that which can inflict these calami- 
 ties potentially, and unfortunately quite as much 
 in modern times as old ones. The Celtic origin 
 of the word is "paipeu," or "baibeu," an infant; 
 and its services have been dedicated mischiev- 
 ously even at the very threshold of human life ; 
 children, when suffering internally or externally, 
 from uneasiness or pain, will cry and this, to an 
 indolent mother, or a careless nurse, is very pro- 
 voking; a nursery, by such nurturers, is sought
 
 60 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 to be made in accordance with Thompson's de- 
 scription of listless ease, viz. : 
 
 " A pleasing place of drowsy-head it was, 
 Of dreams that wave before the half-shut eye ; 
 And of gay castles in the clouds that pass, 
 For ever flashing round a Summer sky. 
 There eke the soft delights, that witchingly 
 Instil a wanton sweetness through the breast ; 
 And the calm pleasures always hover 'd nigh; 
 But whatever smack'd of 'noyance or unrest, 
 Was far, far off expelled from this delicious nest." 
 
 It must have been delightful to a deputy-mo- 
 ther, in mediaeval times, to be able to give a busy 
 bantling a syrupy dose which would put it to 
 sleep, even with strings too tightly bound on it, 
 or a pin sticking a little way into its back, the 
 dear ; and as to injuring its stomach by these 
 frequent slight poisonings, pooh ! that was too 
 learned to be believed in. 
 
 Mr. Alexander Forsyth, of Devon, the eminent 
 horticulturist, has lately, in the Gardener's Maga- 
 zine, re-called attention to the utility of poppy 
 seeds as food. 
 
 Poppy-seeds-seasoning, a queer cure, we read of: 
 
 Sterne, in a letter from Montpellier, dated 
 Feb. 1, 1764, writes as follows: 
 
 "P.S. My physicians have almost poisoned me 
 with what they call 'bouillons refraichissants' 
 'tis a cock flayed alive, and boiled with poppy 
 seeds, then pounded in a mortar, and passed 
 through a sieve. There is to be one crawfish in 
 it, and I was gravely told it must be a male one 
 a female would do me more hurt than good." 
 
 So much for French simples ; and although 
 nearly a century has elapsed since these doctrines
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 61 
 
 were in their glory, they have still their advo- 
 cates. 
 
 While treating of the capsule of the poppy, let 
 us notice that the seeds make excellent food 
 for cage-birds. It is well known that opium is 
 derived from this plant by slitting the seed-ves- 
 sel before it is ripe, and saving the milky exuda- 
 tion, which is afterwards evaporated to dryness. 
 It is said that so strong is the poisonous effect 
 of this plant, that persons employed in saving 
 the extract suffer much injury even from its ex- 
 halation ; and, further, that walking for some 
 time between rows of poppies gives a disagreeable 
 general perception of narcotism, which 
 
 " Sends forth a sleepy horror through the blood." 
 
 Attempts have been made to manufacture opium 
 in England, but its profitable culture must depend 
 on that fast-decaying support protecting duties. 
 The details of this culture and preparation are to 
 be found in most accounts of the drug. The 
 active chemical principle of opium is morphia; 
 for its more minute history readers are referred 
 to chemical and pharmaceutical works. Dr. Mac- 
 nish, in his Anatomy of Drunkenness, gives a his- 
 tory of opium well worth attending to. He says 
 it aggravates whatever passion predominates at 
 the time of its use, whether it be love, hatred, 
 benevolence, or revenge. Lord Kames tells of 
 fanatical faquirs who, in paroxysms produced by 
 opium, committed frightful butcheries one man 
 of them having murdered seventeen Dutch sailors 
 in a very short space of time. The brutal ferocity 
 of the Malays, when infuriated by opium drunk-
 
 62 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 enness, is well known under the name of " run- 
 ning a muck." It is certain that the excitement 
 of opium is, at first, highly pleasurable to most 
 opium eaters ; but the fearful accounts of its de- 
 praving results on both body and mind, ought to 
 cause those who believe that their powers were 
 given them for nobler purposes than for sensual 
 debauchery, to avoid a criminal temporary enjoy- 
 ment. At no great distance of time from his 
 initiation the opium eater has to keep himself 
 perpetually drunk to avoid the horrors of casual 
 sobriety ; but even more immediately the evil is 
 felt ; for, although wild ecstacies attend its drunk- 
 enness, it is well known that the gloomy agonies 
 of recovery are fearful. It is related in mytho- 
 logy that some prepared and flavoured infusion 
 of opium was what the gods debauched themselves 
 with 
 
 " There each deep draughts, as deep he thirsted, drew ; 
 
 It was a fountain of nepenthe rare, 
 Whence, as Dan Homer sings, huge pleasance grew, 
 And sweet oblivion of all earthly care, 
 Fair glorious waking thoughts, and gorgeous dreams 
 more fair." 
 
 The Asiatic and African pharmaciens have al- 
 ways had a reputation for skill in their adminis- 
 tration to inordinate sensuality. Travellers of all 
 ages, and historians in prose and verse, have 
 agreed in this testimony. Milton alludes to such 
 potations in Comus, thus 
 
 "And first behold this cordial julap here, 
 That flames and dances in the crystal bounds, 
 With spirits of balm and fragrant syrups mixed 
 Not that nepenthes, which the wife of Phone, 
 In Egypt, gave to Jove-born Helena, 
 Is of such power to stir up joy as this."
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 63 
 
 It is stated of the Easterns, that their brewers 
 and distillers in the opium trade can compound 
 electuaries and potions calculated to produce all 
 kinds and degrees of intoxication beginning with 
 frivolous and inane merriment, and varying into 
 sottish repose, idiotic voluptuousness, or a frantic 
 excitement bordering on incurable madness. One 
 of these poisonous pastes is called "hatchis"; and, 
 like our wines, it has purchasers among luxurious 
 sensualists, who pay enormous prices for it if it 
 bears the name of some notable compounder. 
 Meaner compotations take the places of our whis- 
 key, gin, and porter, in the Eastern taverns, 
 where men can, for a very small sum, destroy 
 both body and mind for the sake of a depraved 
 insanity. 
 
 In a popular work, " The Memoirs of the Eng- 
 lish Opium Eater," is a vividly painful account 
 of the fascination which draws victims into habits 
 of confirmed indulgence in opium-intoxication ; 
 the terrible results which are the consequence are 
 also effectively described; the construction of the 
 story is called romance, but the sad facts it re- 
 lates are consistent with truth, for the agonizing 
 sufferings of the opium-drunkard cannot be over- 
 painted. The passive pleasurableness, and lan- 
 guishing enjoyment ; the excitements of fancy, 
 and vehemence of an unreal but imagined toni- 
 city of body ; the ambiency of the whole frame, 
 and the extravagant feelings of temporary power 
 all give way to a frightful anxiety, introducing 
 phantoms of horror and disgust. The imagina- 
 tion, still exalted, takes a gloomy aspect, and, 
 from those visions of Elysian character, a tan-
 
 64 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 gible hell crawls up before the victim. Not rea- 
 son, observation, nor comparison, will subdue the 
 morbid romance ; it is in vain to handle sur- 
 rounding subjects, or to stare with tortured wake- 
 Mness in anxious desire to correct this night- 
 mare, and banish these most terrible forms. It 
 is the distracted nerves which are furiously 
 disordered, and now they chastise the sufferer 
 unrelentingly. Sleep is abolished ; maddening 
 wakefulness and frightful day-dreams seize the 
 mind ; peevishness is uncontrollable, except when 
 imbecile rage absorbs it. Nausea comes on; ver- 
 tigo whirls the Ixion of the hour ; and at length 
 the wearied and debased creature falls, body and 
 mind, into a cadaverous collapse, to await his 
 slow and painful recovery. 
 
 It is well known that opium eaters are very 
 subject, also, to sudden death, and no wonder 
 persons who exhaust the nervous energy by such 
 intense excitements and revulsions, may well fear 
 that its power shall be suddenly interrupted : 
 because all continuous vehement operations which 
 stimulate to excess the springs of organic life, 
 must be dangerous to its ordinary endurance. 
 But these are only the physical consequences of 
 the induced madness called intoxication the in- 
 tellectual and moral devastation it makes it is 
 needless to dilate on ; it is not from ignorance of 
 the villainy which the drunkard commits against 
 himself that the crime continues so widely mis- 
 chievous, but because the brute often overcomes 
 the man. Oh, then for a courage like that of 
 the lady in Milton's " Comus;" let the tempted cry 
 aloud, and make that cry a vow,
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 65 
 
 " Mercy guard me ! 
 
 Hence with thy brew'd enchantments, foul deceiver ; 
 Hast thou betrayed my credulous innocence 
 With vizor 'd falsehood and base forgery, 
 And would 'st thou seek again to trap me here 
 With liquorish baits fit to ensnare a brute ! 
 Were it a draught for Juno when she banquets, 
 I would not taste thy treasonous offer : none 
 But such as are good men can give good things ; 
 And that which is not good is not delicious 
 To a well-govern'd and wise appetite." 
 
 Here is well depicted a woman's courageous 
 cautiousness ; refinement in manners, and cor- 
 rectness in morals rise together for her pre- 
 servation ; and in the growing reformation to 
 sobriety, women, in practice as well as in poetry, 
 have taken the lead. We are horrified now at 
 the idea of a " drunken lady." May our repug- 
 nance be quickly extended to such beastliness 
 and degradation in any one. Many persons who 
 drink intoxicating potions would scorn the child- 
 ish indulgence of excess in some palateable syrup ; 
 but is it more dignified to take inebriating com- 
 pounds to induce excitement and drunken sen- 
 suality? Opium and its compounds have no 
 recommendations for the palate ; they are in- 
 tensely bitter. Consequently their attractions 
 must be confined to their inebriating effects, for 
 the value of their " brew'd enchantments." Slaves 
 to their seductions will swallow them, inducing 
 fierce frenzy, to be succeeded by misery and imbe- 
 cility. Oh, let the wise have a good courage and 
 despise every drunkenness-making drug ; keeping 
 the taste, the feelings, and the judgment, ready 
 for purer, more refined, and more elevated en- 
 joyments.
 
 66 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 WELSH POPPY : HOW IT OPENS I ITS BLOSSOMS ARE EVANESCENT. 
 
 YELLOW-HORNED POPPY. OVID'S STORY OF GLAUCUS. 
 
 DANGERS IN GETTING THIS FLOWER OUT OF OOZY GROUND. 
 
 GREAT CELANDINE; A CURE FOR WEAK EYES. FUMITORY: THE 
 SMOKE OF THE EARTH : SPECIES : THE CAPREOLATA, OR CLAM- 
 BERING ; THE FUMITORY OF THE SHOPS AND THE SMALL 
 FUMITORY. 
 
 MECONOPSIS is the generic name given to the 
 next division of the Poppy-worts ; the Greek 
 construction is, " mukon" a poppy, and "opsis," 
 a resemblance, because it has several of the cha- 
 racteristics of the other poppies. Its specific name 
 is "cambrica," i. e., belonging to Wales, where 
 the plant has been plentifully found. It might 
 be thought that this name originated in its de- 
 licate cambric-like petals, and they would deserve 
 the distinction well. If, indeed, the dropped 
 vowel, "i," was restored to its place, the word 
 would be cambriaca, and its meaning would be 
 more limited and obvious. 
 
 The Welsh poppy is easily distinguished from 
 its relations, though its pedigree is pure ; it is 
 no upstart annual, and its perennial existence 
 puts it, heraldically, in a rank with the abori- 
 gines of the Principality that region of family 
 descents. 
 
 " If it be true, as Welshmen say, 
 Honour depends on pedigree, 
 
 Then, stand by clear the way 
 Retire, ye sons of haughty power ; 
 And you, ye spawns of old Glendower, 
 
 Come, let me have fair play."
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 67 
 
 It is a rare plant in Ireland, and in the county 
 of Cork has been found only by one botanist, a 
 lady, Miss Ball, who has made most valuable ad- 
 ditions to our natural history. Its yellow flowers 
 are handsome, and it is worth introducing into 
 shrubberies ; in the parterre it would be rivalled 
 too successfully by Eschscholzia, which is neater, 
 and equally showy. It blows in June. 
 
 The rapidity with which the poppies open 
 their blossoms is a highly interesting subject for 
 observation. Withering notices it nearly thus : 
 The entomologist makes the birth of the butter- 
 fly, and her rapid development to perfection, a 
 phenomenon of pleasing surprise ; we may add 
 a similar birth in the floral world, and show the 
 poppy flower springing into her winged life in a 
 minute. She lies concealed and singularly folded 
 in her sea-green mantle, until her maturity ar- 
 rives. Then the warm sun invigorates her ener- 
 gies, she bursts through her coverings, and 
 with some force casts her rejected mantle from 
 her; her silken drapery loses its wrinkled folds, 
 spreads its beauty in the light, and we wonder 
 how so small a cell could have confined so fully 
 and richly costumed an inhabitant. The fragile 
 evanescence of the full-blown poppy is well de- 
 scribed in one of Burn's beautiful and natural 
 allegories, viz. : 
 
 " As bees fly home with loads of treasure, 
 The minutes wing'd their way with pleasure, 
 But pleasures are like poppies spread, 
 You seize the flow'r, its bloom is shed ; 
 Or like the snow-falls on the river, 
 A moment white then sinks for ever ;
 
 68 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 Or like the borealis race, 
 That flit e'er you can point their place ; 
 Or like the rainbow's lovely form 
 Vanishing amid the storm." 
 
 The yellow horned-poppy is the Glaucium lute- 
 urn, so called from its sea-green stalk and leaves, 
 and its showy yellow blossom. Its stem con- 
 tains a yellow milky juice, which has the poison- 
 ous qualities of the milk of other poppies. The 
 pods are narrow, and being from six to ten inches 
 long, they are a very remarkable feature in the 
 plant ; curved, like horns, they give it the name 
 of horned-poppy. 
 
 When the botanist visits the sea-shore to make 
 a prisoner of Glaucus, his history ought to be 
 remembered : he was a son of Neptune, and of 
 Nais, an ocean nymph ; but he resided, as a sailor 
 would say, in-shore ; his nature, however, had 
 some control on his habits, and he was fond of 
 fishing. So, one day, he laid some of his prey in 
 sea-grass, on the strand, the animals nibbled it, 
 and got such vigour from their native food, as to 
 be able, in spite of the exhaustion from having 
 been netted, to leap into the sea. Glaucus, 
 amazed at this exploit, was curious to test the 
 invigorating power of the dilisk, he eat some, 
 and his father's and mother's aquatic propensi- 
 ties seized him ; he boldly leaped into the sea ; 
 and for his faith and courage, he was received a 
 denizen among the sea-gods. In their territory 
 he still shows his royal descent by wearing a 
 golden robe, and yet, from old affection, high 
 above it, he still bears his long and curved fishing- 
 rod, with its point bent, as if a captive fish ever
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 69 
 
 strained it. Ovid makes Glaucus tell his story 
 thus : 
 
 " As o'er the deep I rode, 
 
 New to the seas, and late received a god : 
 
 And I myself but late a mortal was ; 
 
 E'en then, in sea, and seas alone, I joy'd ; 
 
 The seas my hours and all my cares employ'd. 
 
 In meshes, now, the twinkling prey I drew, 
 
 Now skilfully the slender line I threw, 
 
 And silent sat the moving float to view. 
 
 Not far from shore there lies a verdant mead, 
 
 With herbage half, and half with water, spread ; 
 
 My scaly prize in order all display' d, 
 
 By number, on the green sward there I laid ; 
 
 Strange to behold ! yet, what avails a lie 1 
 
 I saw them bite the grass as I sat by ; 
 
 Then, sudden, darting o'er the verdant plain, 
 
 They spread their fins as in their native main : 
 
 I paused, with wonder struck, while all my prey 
 
 Left their new master, and regain'd the sea. 
 
 Amaz'd within my secret self, I sought 
 
 What god, what herb, the miracle had wrought ; 
 
 But sure no herbs have pow'r like this, I cried; 
 
 And straight I pluck'd some neighb'ring herbs and tried ; 
 
 Scarce had I bit, and prov'd the wondrous taste, 
 
 When strong convulsions shook my troubled breast ; 
 
 I felt my heart grow fond of something strange, 
 
 And my whole nature lab'ring with a change ; 
 
 Restless I grew, and every place forsook, 
 
 And still upon the seas I bent my look ; 
 
 Farewell for ever ! farewell, land ! I said, 
 
 And plung'd amidst the waves my sinking head. 
 
 The gentle powers, who that low empire keep, 
 
 Received me as a brother of the deep." 
 
 It will be remarked that this Glaucus was am- 
 phibious, he inhabited both land and sea ; Scylla, 
 whom he loved, was turned into a rock on the 
 shore, with howling waves around her ; this 
 Prince Triton, therefore, never goes far to sea, 
 but inhabits salt sands, marine cliffs, and places 
 where the earth and ocean border each other.
 
 70 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 It should be remembered that where fresh- 
 water streams discharge themselves into the sea, 
 there is generally a miry deposit, which is very 
 dangerous ; and though it is sometimes covered 
 with a firm-looking coat of sea-sand, this is de- 
 ceitful, and only hides " the slimy bottom of the 
 deep." Let those, then, who would capture this 
 attractive oceanid beware of the accident which 
 occurred once to a botanist who was engaged in 
 this pursuit. In Dungarven there is " a meeting 
 of the waters;" where, 
 
 " Upon the beach a winding bay there lies." 
 
 In his season the horned-poppy bloomed, in great 
 glory, on the sandy margin of the tide ; and our 
 collector dashed at his gay prize quite delighted, 
 when suddenly the smooth sand proved treach- 
 erous ; first his feet and then his legs sunk 
 through the yielding surface, which, though 
 plashy and fluid, was not water in which a 
 swimmer could progress. It was almost night- 
 fall, and no help was near the solitary shore ; 
 the vision of Clarence's shipwreck seemed his 
 fate; and he had to contemplate 
 
 " What pain it was to drown 
 What dreadful noise of waters in his ears, 
 What sights of ugly death within his eyes." 
 
 The beleagured botanist saw quickly that he 
 had a choice of dangers before him ; if he scram- 
 bled towards the land he would be more deeply 
 engulphed in the unsupporting mire ; if he rushed 
 backward he had a deep and craggy fall to ha- 
 zard, and with his clothes on, too, into the sea.
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 71 
 
 He felt himself sinking, but his " sore agony" 
 supplied invention he flung himself quickly at 
 full length, and extending his arms, rolled him- 
 self over and over into the more hardened sand, 
 and thence drew himself into the deeper water, 
 which was also the safer pait of the shore, where 
 he dared to raise himself again, and to be deeply 
 grateful for his wonderful extrication. 
 
 In concluding this sketch of the poppy group 
 of plants, we would repeat again, and earnestly, 
 let those who desire a sound mind in a sound 
 body, abjure narcotics. No doubt opium in small 
 doses, gives a transient increase of energy to 
 mind and body. It quickens the pulse, and sets 
 imagination on an unsteady velocipede ; but it 
 is at a fearful expense that these pleasures are 
 gained. The corporeal frame is heated, a burn- 
 ing thirst is excited, which parches the mouth, 
 and dries up the fevered salivary glands ; it di- 
 minishes, to a most injurious extent, all the secre- 
 tions and excretions, those of the skin excepted, 
 which last are unnaturally and distressingly in- 
 creased, and a sense of sinking languor and las- 
 situde follows, with a frightful fear of idiotic im- 
 becility of mind supervening, which is but little 
 alleviated by the occasional exacerbations of a 
 querulous and contemptibly impotent frenzy. 
 
 The next genus of our native plants is called 
 Chelidonium, from the Greek word " kelidon," 
 a swallow ; " because," says an old writer, " it 
 beginneth to spring and flower at the coming of 
 the swallows, and withers at their return ;" but 
 more, Pliny writeth that it was first found out 
 by swallows, and hath healed the eyes, and re-
 
 72 WALKS AFTEE WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 stored sight to their young ones that have had 
 harm in their eyes, or have been blind ; but or- 
 nithology has failed to supply any origin for this 
 story. Most popular names of plants have some 
 discoverable foundation, even though fancy may 
 have exaggerated it ; this, however, is a failure. 
 No one has observed the swallow using the swal- 
 low-wort either as food, as physic, or as an escha- 
 riotic to remove any film from his eyes. To be 
 sure, as in one of those sun-birds, who live in 
 brightness, the nictitating membrane, or eye- 
 sheath, may be thicker and more developed than 
 in others, as we know that of the eagle to be ; 
 but what ancient observer is there who has seen 
 the swallow's eye covered with its natural film, 
 and by error has pronounced the caustic of the 
 Chelidonium as its proper surgery ? When sick 
 and enfeebled, the sustaining muscles of that cu- 
 rious semi-transparent duplex eye-lid loose their 
 tension, and it extends itself upon the eye ; but 
 this happens to most birds when they are feeble, 
 or dying, and is not peculiar to the swallow. 
 Again, mythology, our frequent resource, almost 
 fails us here ; we have certainly poor Progne 
 metamorphised into a swallow : 
 
 " Around the smoky roof she ever flies." 
 
 And Ovid tells us that, from her injuries, 
 
 " In Progne's breast the rising passions boil 
 And burst in anger." 
 
 Hers was a most cruelly provoked jealousy, and 
 quite intense enough to freeze her blood " to jaun- 
 diced bile, and arid yellow drops," such as is that
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 73 
 
 of the swallow-wort ; but the poetical applica- 
 tion is still very imperfect, so we pass on to pro- 
 saic facts. 
 
 The acrimonious yellow, or orange milk of this 
 plant, will, like other such vegetable exudations, 
 destroy the vitality of warts, and was formerly 
 much employed as a general eschariotic. Thus, 
 returning to its use about the eyes, I have seen 
 its juice applied with houey to remove films ; but 
 it is to be feared that there was as much damage 
 done by irritating the eye-lids with this virulent 
 compound, as there could be good done in re- 
 moving the cloud from the eye-balls. When eva- 
 porated, this milky emulsion deposits a kind of 
 gum-resin. The plant is now nearly banished 
 from tasteful gardens, and from the herbary it is 
 disappearing. It has wandered from these fa- 
 voured homes into waste places, near villages, 
 but is well known still among herb-women and 
 herb-gatherers (who are usually men in Eng- 
 land), as Great Celandine, the English form of 
 Ghelidonium majus. Its juice may be applied 
 as a fly poison, which is less dangerous about 
 apartments than some which are in general use. 
 The old alchemic doctors held that it was good 
 to "superstifle the jaundice/' because of its in- 
 tense yellow-orange colour. 
 
 We now enter on the fifth order of our native 
 plants, the Fumitory family, or Fume-worts, and 
 our first subject has been separated as the genus 
 " Corydalis" a Greek word, meaning a lark, be- 
 cause there is a spur at the base of the corolla, 
 which being somewhat extended from it, like the 
 hinder toe of a lark, is a remarkable object.
 
 74 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 This plant usually chooses a sylvan retire- 
 ment, clambering through lowly hedges, in rocky 
 wildernesses, and on scrubby sands. It is very 
 shy of letting its retirement be known ; and yet 
 it has, from its peeping curiosity, peered over the 
 tops of thatched cabins, and often strays with 
 caution, clinging to the dangerous ruins of an- 
 cient castles and abbeys. It is called claviculata, 
 because the leaf-stalks terminate in a tendril, 
 which, from its windings, is compared to a key, 
 although its wreathings are more intricate and 
 various than those of the best patent lock, and 
 also are limited to the one purpose of making 
 fast, and binding this delicate plant to whatever 
 it can clasp; but the clavicle does not let go 
 like some ancient magic key, it can do, but not 
 undo consequently we will derive it from clavi, 
 a claw or clamp. The slight stalk of this incon- 
 spicuous twiner is reddish, and the leaflets (three 
 on each foot-stalk) are pale green ; the blossoms 
 are of a faint yellow and tubular they appear 
 in June. Its present English name is White 
 Climbing Corydalis. In early Spring, sings 
 Thompson : 
 
 "The lenient air 
 
 Delicious breathes : the penetrative sun, 
 His force deep-darting to the dark retreat 
 Of vegetation, sets the steaming power 
 At large, to wander o'er the verdant earth 
 In various hues, but chiefly the gay green ! 
 United light and shade ! where the sight dwells 
 With growing strength, and ever new delight." 
 
 Now, at this exuberant season, when the early 
 riser walks in the newly ploughed and harrowed 
 field, or in the paths of richer garden ground,
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWEES. 75 
 
 the Fumitory will be found rising through the re- 
 cently dug earth, and so suddenly, that it seems 
 to emanate, attracted by the influence of the sun 
 and moisture, along with the visible transpiring 
 of earth-born 
 
 " Vapour, and mist, and exhalation hot." 
 
 But this smoke of the earth has a truer cause 
 for its designation; if pulled up, the stalk near 
 the root, and the root when crushed in the opera- 
 tion, smell very strongly of smoke. This name, 
 so happily applied, shows the attention of the 
 old observers, to whom we are indebted for many 
 popular designations, without which facts of this 
 kind might often escape superficial notice. The 
 general herbage of the plant has not this fume, it is 
 when the mass of stalk is broken near the root, 
 that the smell is strongest, and is perceived very 
 distinctly. Our first species in this genus is the 
 capreolata ; so called from its clambering habit, 
 and wild untrained vigour of growth, which are 
 likened to the characteristics of a goat, the Latin 
 name of that animal being our English word, 
 "caper," and conveys accurately the idea here 
 intended. It is also called ramping fumitory, be- 
 cause of the rampant robustness, and wild diffuse 
 vegetation, as it rambles up through brakes to 
 three feet of elevation, and winds itself in loose 
 masses round every support. The stalks are very 
 succulent, the leaves pea-green, the flowers, pale 
 pink, tipped with dark red, and the whole blos- 
 som is larger than that of the other species. 
 This vagrant gipsy blows during all the time 
 from May to August, and is a vivacious wild-
 
 76 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 ing, running in and out, up and across the hedges, 
 ever deserving from her curvets and caprioles, 
 the praise of our ballad lines, viz. : 
 
 " See how she dances, capers and prances, 
 See how she dances, every inch of her." 
 
 Our next species is the Fumaria officinalis ; 
 it was used by herbalists, and its expressed juice 
 was sold in their shops, or officinse ; we retain 
 the same word in naming our offices for trade. 
 It was considered a useful antiscorbutic ; and, 
 indeed, any harmless vegetable must have been 
 useful, and even required as an alterative, at a 
 period when those who could afford the price of 
 animal food, had, from the bad management of 
 pasture or other feeding, no supply of fresh 
 meat from October until April, and hard salt 
 provisions produced various and distressing cu- 
 taneous diseases. The juice of the common 
 fumitory is slightly bitter, and its operation pro- 
 duces perspiration, thus causing action on the 
 skin. This is so common a plant in the dug 
 ground of vegetable gardens and potato fields, 
 that it would be needlessly occupying space to 
 do more than refer the observer to its sea-green, 
 parsley-cut leaves, and its pinky raceme of blos- 
 soms, which appear for eight or ten months of our 
 mild year. Cows and sheep eat it probably they 
 like its slightly saline flavour ; it was used as a 
 cosmetic by ladies, to remove freckles ; however, 
 happily, the fairest portion of the creation have 
 generally discovered, and wisely applied, the pre- 
 scription of that celebrated naturalist Ray, which 
 is as follows :
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 77 
 
 " No better cosmetics than a strict temperance 
 and purity, modesty and humility, a gracious 
 temper, and calmness of spirit. No true beauty 
 without the signatures of these graces in the very 
 countenance." 
 
 Lastly, we have the small-flowered fumitory, 
 the parviflora ; its distinction is chiefly indi- 
 cated in its name ; its flowers and all its parts 
 are smaller than the preceding species.* It is a 
 rare plant in Ireland. There is a little point of 
 historical interest about it as a French plant 
 viz., the son of the lady to whom Rousseau ad- 
 dressed his very pleasing letters on botany, trans- 
 mitted numerous specimens of it to Mr. Sowerby. 
 That follower of Flora, M. de Lessert, having 
 caught from his mother a love of the interesting 
 science so eloquently introduced to her, which 
 made him an ardent and very able botanist. The 
 flowers of this Fumitory are of a deep rose colour, 
 and the leaves of a yellowish green; but, indeed, 
 under circumstances favourable or otherwise, the 
 species change their shades a good deal; in moist, 
 sunshiny weather, all their tints are more vivid, 
 and when the atmosphere is arid their hues be- 
 come languid and dilute. Burton gives the Fumi- 
 tory as a plant " not to be omitted by those who 
 are misaffected with melancholy, because it will 
 much help and ease the spleen." In this old and 
 curious author we find a chapter touching on 
 " how the body works on the mind." Thus, " hu- 
 mour of melancholy," he says, " is begotten by the 
 distemperature of some in ward part;" and he adds, 
 
 * It is very doubtful what the Irish plant called pa/rviflora is, 
 perhaps Vaillantii or micrantha.
 
 78 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 most charitably and wisely, too, " melancholy 
 which shall be caused by such infirmities deserves 
 to be pitied of all men, and to be respected with 
 tender compassion, because coming from an inevit- 
 able cause." 
 
 "The spleen with sullen vapours clouds the brain, 
 And binds the spirits in its heavy chain; 
 Howe'er the cause fantastic may appear, 
 Th' effect is real, and the pain sincere." 
 
 Shakspeare notices the rich but unproductive 
 soil which is given up to the Fumitory and other 
 weeds in consequence of war having suspended 
 agricultural industry in France. The Duke of 
 Burgundy speaks, in Henry the Fifth, of the 
 country thus : 
 
 " Her fallow leas, 
 
 The darnel, hemlocks, and rank Fumitory 
 Shoot up on."
 
 79 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 CROSS-WORT PLANTS. STOCK-GILLYFLOWER. WALL-FLOWERS. 
 
 WATER-CRESSES. CRESSONARIAS OR CRESS GARDENS. YELLOW 
 
 ROCKET. CREEPING CRESS. ANNUAL WATER ROCKET. WATER 
 
 BADISH. CRESS EATING MAKES PEOPLE INTELLIGENT. 
 
 A VERY numerous family of native plants now 
 invites attention from the field-botanist, by pre- 
 senting the number four to the observer in vari- 
 ous parts of their construction. Thus, the green 
 calyx, or outer flower-cup, is quadriparite ; the 
 blossom-leaves are also four in number, from 
 which circumstance the whole assemblage of 
 plants so formed are called Cruciferce this name 
 being formed from crux, a cross, and fero, to bear 
 or carry. They are the cross-bearers, and the 
 holy-day processionists of the floral world. Even 
 within the blossom the love of the number four 
 is adhered to. There are six stamens with their 
 delicately-suspended pollen-pods, but four of these 
 overtop the remaining two, from which fact this 
 group obtains its Linnsean name, Tetradynamia, 
 derived from tetras (four), and duiiamis (power), 
 four having eminence over two, and the seeds 
 have those first ready with ripened pollen-pods 
 to secure their fertilization. Four of the anthers 
 being on longer stalks than the other two, are 
 presented thus more fully to light and air, and 
 ripen sooner; if the early pollen should be washed 
 away by rain, the shorter two stamens follow, 
 and present their anthers in a few days more,
 
 80 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 ripened and prepared in succession, to supply the 
 injury. 
 
 Of our native crossworts the first genus is 
 now called Matthiola, after Peter Andrew Mat- 
 tioli, an Italian physician, who wrote a com- 
 mentary on the works of Dioscorides. This ge- 
 nus has been separated from Cheiranthus, under 
 which name it will be found in the older authors. 
 The one species found wild in Ireland, M. sinuata, 
 is so named from the lower leaves being scal- 
 loped on the sides into small sinuses, or bays, 
 like the well known oak-leaf. It bears many 
 adjective names, which are desciiptive, such as 
 incanus, " downy," it being all over covered 
 with a cottony down ; or, as Lord Bacon calls 
 it, a " velvet rind," both on stem and leaves ; this 
 name, however, is now restricted to a more hoary 
 species, which is not a native of Ireland. The 
 native species is a bold and handsome flower, 
 where it occurs on the sandy shores ; and as it 
 is easily propagated by seed, gentlemen residing 
 near the sea would do well to decorate their ma- 
 rine boundaries, by sowing freely this fine bien- 
 nial plant. " Stock," in its appellation, describes 
 its robust trunk ; it is the same word as stake, 
 stick, &c. The term " gillyflower" has descended 
 to us through a series of transmutations. Its 
 Latin form is Caryophyllus, the clove-bearing 
 flower, from the well known fragrancy of that 
 spice, which the perfume of the gillyflower is 
 like ; it then took the French costume, and be- 
 came known under the softer word "girofle," 
 from which our early poets constructed the 
 English "gilofre," almost, indeed, our modern
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 81 
 
 word. Sir John Mandeville, the traveller, de- 
 scribes the clove-tree as a plant bearing " clove- 
 gilofres." Chaucer says : 
 
 "And many a clove-gilofre, 
 And nutmeg, to put in ale ;" 
 
 probably, however, this was the clove-pink, the 
 aromatic smell of which is very strong, with 
 which flowers more chaffy, and less succulent, 
 would not break up, as the petals of the stock 
 must very soon in a drink, and give it a dis- 
 agreeable flavour. 
 
 The fine sea-side resident we treat of now, 
 breathes the invigorating salt air on marine 
 coasts, in its woolly pilot-coat, showing from 
 May to August its purply-blue visage, tinted as 
 if from its favourite sea-hue, when ruffled into 
 its deeper shadowings. Like a true Neptunian, 
 it also bears a three-toothed sceptre or trident; 
 its long siliques being armed with a triplet of 
 prongs in a remarkable manner. Some flowers 
 do not emit any perceptible perfume by day ; 
 perhaps the amount then given off by them is 
 too quickly exhaled to be caught by human 
 organs, and becomes thus an incense somewhere 
 in the upper ambient ether, which is sometimes 
 recovered on earth, in the form of scented dews ; 
 or it may be that the atmosphere is rendered too 
 dry by the glowing sunshine, and does not pre- 
 sent these odours in a dissolved state to our per- 
 ceptions. The cause is uncertain, but the fact we 
 know ; and thus our sea-flower hoards her sweet 
 treasure of fragrance until evening, or else chooses
 
 82 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 a shadowy, moist day on which to yield up this 
 most intrinsic of her attractions, when 
 
 -" Gentle gales, 
 
 Fanning their odoriferous wings, dispense 
 These balmy spoils." 
 
 Our beautiful cultivated gillyflowers are not 
 descendants of this sea-coast straggler. "The 
 lavish stock that scents the garden round" has 
 its parentage from the Matthiola incana, which 
 is an English species, not in our Irish Flora, but 
 whose varieties are naturalized among us every- 
 where, blooming of every shade of red and purple, 
 and sometimes of a pure white, as thus noticed 
 by Gay 
 
 " Fair is the gillyflower of gardens sweet." 
 
 Lastly, the ancient florists called our plant 
 " White Violet," because of the downy white- 
 ness on its leaves and stems, and the purplish, 
 or violet colour of its petals, as also its pleasing 
 evening odour. 
 
 The Arabians have a reddish aromatic flower 
 which is among them exceedingly prized ; it is 
 called "Scheyry," which name is said to have 
 been appropriated to our next genus in the word 
 Cheiranthus. We have, however, another deri- 
 vation, which carries an idea with it, and accord- 
 ingly aids memory ; cheir being the Greek for 
 hand, and anthos for flower, we translate it a 
 hand-flower. Its specific distinction is also a re- 
 petition of the Greek word " cheiri." If we had 
 leave we would soften it into " cheery," the true 
 characteristic of this hand-flower, and of which 
 children, who get at it, seem to think they can
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 83 
 
 never pick enough. This plant was also called 
 from its Italian name " gilloflower," or yellow 
 flower ; not as some read it, July flower, which 
 would most unjustly limit its bloom to a month, 
 when its gay golden beauties shine aloft for six 
 or eight months, according to the openness of the 
 season. Its designation, from its mural residence, 
 is obvious. It is the wall-flower Burns introduces 
 into the scenery of a vision of former times, of 
 which we adopt an extract, viz. : 
 
 " As I stood by yon roofless tower, 
 
 Where wall-flow'r scents the dewy air, 
 And howlet mourns hi ivy bower, 
 
 Telling the midnight moon her care 
 
 " By heedless chance I turned mine eyes, 
 And, by the moon-beam, shook to see 
 A stern and stalwart ghost arise, 
 Attir'd as minstrels used to be. 
 
 " He sang with joy his former day ; 
 
 He, weeping, wail'd his latter times ; 
 But what he said, it was no play 
 I will not venture it in rhymes." 
 
 Say that we give personality to our flower, as 
 it appears tinted by the yellow light of a glow- 
 ing land ; the daughter of some Saracenic chief in 
 Spain of old, who, having fled her home for love 
 of a red-cross knight, now fearlessly hangs on 
 the castle wall, where her warrior climbs the out- 
 ward rampart to woo his lady bright. 
 
 She is somewhat wind-worn from rude expo- 
 sure, " the negligence of nature ;" but yet 
 
 " Arabia cannot boast 
 A fuller gale of joy, than liberal thence 
 Breathes thro' the sense, and takes the ravish'd souL"
 
 84 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 This personation in flowers was frequently 
 adopted by early poets, and the wall-flower, ad- 
 hering to the ruined grandeur of other days, was 
 considered emblematic of constancy under trial. 
 The romance, then, is easily imagined of Asiatic 
 complexion, "pale in her golden light/' though 
 ruin has fallen on her lord's lofty towers, she 
 clings to his home amidst all the storms of fate, 
 watching faithfully. The lady hangs over the 
 castle wall a gallant soldier, yet breathing 
 sweetness a knight and troubadour he scales 
 the walls. His cheek of deeper colour, " stained 
 with iron-brown" mark, with his dinted armour, 
 shows how bravery won his way "with power 
 into his lady's bower." A bloody warrior, though 
 it seems unseemly in our days, secured admiration 
 and love from the gentlest in olden time, as we 
 shall hereby see 
 
 " Glowing with, love, on fire for fame, 
 
 A Troubadour that hated sorrow, 
 Beneath his lady's window came, 
 
 And thus he sung a bold good-morrow 
 ' My arm it is my country's right, 
 
 My heart is in my true love's bow'r, 
 Gaily for love and fame to fight, 
 
 Befits a gallant Troubadour.' 
 
 " And while he march'd with helm on head, 
 
 And harp in hand, the descant rung, 
 All faithful to his fav'rite maid, 
 
 The minstrel burthen still he sung 
 'My arm it is my country's right, 
 
 My heart is in my lady's bow'r, 
 Resolv'd for love and fame to fight, 
 
 I come a gallant Troubadour.' 
 " Alas, upon the bloody field, 
 
 He fell beneath the foeman's glaive, 
 But then, reclining on his shield, 
 
 Dying, he sung his exulting stave ;
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 85 
 
 ' My life it is my countiy's right, 
 
 My heart is in my lady's bow'r, 
 For love and fame to bleed in fight, 
 
 Becomes the valiant Troubadour.' " 
 
 The sanguine stain won thus turned the yel- 
 low flower into the crimson bloody warrior; but 
 this deep variety shows less tonic colours in a 
 wild state, and gives little idea of our rich and 
 intensely fragrant garden-flower. Speaking from 
 their rustic home, they must admit the want of 
 higher culture, and say in the words of Shak- 
 speare, being but tawny, 
 
 " We are but warriors for the working-day." 
 
 The poets of nature are all full of praises and 
 sentimental attributions to our flower, but, for 
 want of space here, we must deny ourselves the 
 repetition of some beautiful passages very illus- 
 tratively applied to it in " The Little English 
 Flora," and also in that delightful little work 
 before named, " Flowers and their Associations." 
 
 It is under other connexions in the cruciferous 
 family that the economic applications of this 
 group as vegetables are most observable : but it 
 may not be generally known, that the tonic and 
 somewhat pungent bitterness of this Cheiranthus 
 has recommended its use as a cure for rot in 
 sheep, for which purpose it has been occasion- 
 ally sown in pasture lands. There was a white 
 double wall-flower in very limited cultivation in 
 the county of Cork about thirty years ago ; it 
 was singularly beautiful and delightfully fra- 
 grant. Two gentlemen, in different parts of the 
 county, possessed plants, but I believe both have
 
 86 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 lost this variety. Those who remember its fine 
 qualities regret its disappearance very much; 
 perhaps this notice may recover it for florists 
 who prize a good flower. 
 
 We close our history of the wall-flower by no- 
 ticing the virtues which the flowers have, accord- 
 ing to Hill the naturalist. He says, " An infusion 
 of them when fresh is good against headache and 
 nervous disorders. That they are good to steep 
 in oil, to which they give a cordial warmth, and 
 which is good against pains in the limbs;" but 
 these are antique benefits of doubtful power. We 
 adopt the more unquestionable charm with which 
 our plant, 
 
 " Crown' d, 
 Breathes aromatic fragrancies around." 
 
 The next native genus of cross-petaled vege- 
 tables is Nasturtium, a name very properly given 
 to these biting plants, from each of them being a 
 nasus tortus, or nose-twitcher. Pliny records 
 that it puts the nose into convulsions ; and the 
 designation is at least as old as his time. 
 
 Nasturti^lm officinale is the first species ; it got 
 its place among officinal, or shop herbs, from its 
 undoubted wholesome properties. In times not 
 very remote animal food was " saved," as the pro- 
 cess too flatteringly used to be called, in October. 
 Salted intensely, and much of its nourishing juices 
 destroyed, this hard, indigestible, fiery stuff was 
 eaten during all the time up to the following 
 April or May, and the consequence was, that cuta^ 
 neous eruptions often relieved while they gave 
 warning of a disordered state in the stomachs and 
 the blood of thousands of all ranks, nay, even of
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 87 
 
 the opulent, because their appetites were more 
 gratified in quantity than by quality. This made 
 fresh vegetable food of great consequence in 
 Spring and early Summer; and much edible her- 
 bage bore the general name of salads; thus we 
 find then 1 alterative value recited by Chaucer 
 
 " After that they went about 
 Gathering plesant salades, which they made ete 
 For to refreshe all grete, unkindely hete." 
 
 This " hete" might have been merely " hotnesse," 
 but a general cool state of body and blood would 
 prevent its unpleasant recurrence. Our popular 
 street-cry, announcing this vegetable for sale, has 
 been left us in rhyme by Swift 
 
 " Fine spring-water grass, fit for lad or lass," 
 
 using this familiar name with approbation, though 
 our ancient Irish botanist, Caleb Threlkeld, com- 
 plains of its being "called about the streets by the 
 abusive name of water-grass, while, as he says, 
 noble matrons make a soup of it, called lenten- 
 pottage, along with alexanders and nettles." 
 
 Pope, in " Homer," tells us of a very abstinent 
 royal fare similarly compounded, viz. : 
 
 " His court with nettles and with cresses stor'd, 
 With soups unbought, and salads blest his board." 
 
 Johnson derives the word "water-cress" from 
 the Latin cresco, to increase, because of the rapid 
 growth the plant makes. In Spring its vigorous 
 stems and green and violet-brown leaves give in- 
 dication of rapid vegetation, and also after being 
 cut down for Summer use, a new crop appears in
 
 88 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 Autumn, being in Shakspeare's words, " yet cres- 
 cive in his faculty ;" but our title may possibly 
 be adopted from the form of the cruciate white 
 flowers, and "water-cross" is not inappropriate to 
 the croissette-flowers, which, cresting the green 
 corymbs in Spring, become afterward elevated on 
 bold well-divided spikes, by the expanding light 
 and heat of the Summer. It is easier for young 
 field-botanists to have this plant pointed out to 
 them, than to convey to them its distinctions by 
 minute descriptions, which, indeed, except by 
 practical botanists, are easily forgotten. Rural 
 ramblers often take bread to the brook, pick their 
 fresh water-grass, and there eat it, one warning is 
 consequently here necessary ; the leaflets of the 
 cress are extended into a lengthened oval form, 
 when growing in very quickly-running streamlets, 
 and as they then resemble some of the leaves of 
 the poisonous Umbellate plants, it is well to be 
 cautious of eating what is deleterious or, of be- 
 ing alarmed without cause, where what is eaten is 
 wholesome. A thrifty mother, who could not 
 botanize the cress, or did not know its modifica- 
 tions, under circumstances, lost her labour when 
 she gave an emetic to her five children, who had 
 eaten a feast no more hurtful than the long-leaved 
 water-cress. This plant is a famous anti-scorbu- 
 tic; its expressed juice has had great repute; but 
 its corrective powers are more manifested when 
 it makes a part of diet, than as a " diet-drink ;" 
 its good effect on the cuticle has been partly attri- 
 buted to its containing sulphur, but I have not 
 found the notes of its analysis. 
 
 In Phillips's "History of Cultivated Yegeta-
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 89 
 
 bles" is a chapter on the cresses, full of histo- 
 rical anecdote. He quotes the Greek proverb 
 " Eat cress to learn more wit," showing that 
 it was thought to put life into the languid, 
 and to brighten dull understandings. " Xeno- 
 phon recommended the Persians to feed their 
 children with water-cresses, to make them grow 
 of better stature and of more active habits." The 
 Romans recommended cresses to be eaten with 
 vinegar, as a remedy for madness. Dodoens ob- 
 serves, that the sweetest milk and best butter are 
 produced from cows who feed in pastures abound- 
 ing with cresses and cuckoo-flowers ; in fact, 
 where any plants grow indicating good succu- 
 lent meadow ground. 
 
 Our old friend Gerarde's notion of their virtue 
 is worth all the rest put together. He says that 
 the eating of water-cresses restores their wonted 
 bloom to the cheeks of sickly young ladies. The 
 meadow-cress is said to be anti-spasmodic, and 
 the water-cress good against comatose or lethargic 
 habits, low spirits, and hypochondria ; in fact, it 
 was found to be a good alterative vegetable, and 
 thus it got its thousand various reputed powers, 
 until Lord Bacon gave it a general good cha- 
 racter, as being friendly to human life, its name 
 being properly "creses," good to increase the 
 young, and continue the older people. 
 
 We cannot take leave of this so much lauded 
 native plant without noticing what has been 
 done in its cultivation. " Cressonaria," as made 
 by nature's hands, disappear before the advance 
 of houses and reclaimed ground. This popular 
 plant has nevertheless been required to be sup-
 
 90 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 plied in the chiefest markets of the countries, and 
 this demand has been acceded to. Ireland has, 
 perhaps, too many natural cress-gardens still ; 
 although, since the time when they afforded a 
 venison-garnish in the thirteenth century, the 
 extent of their acreage must have been greatly 
 limited ; but wealthy England has begun, for some 
 time back, to re-create running shallow brooks, 
 on clayey and gravelled bottoms, so as to raise a 
 constant supply of this vegetable. We find in 
 the "Horticultural Transactions," that in the 
 year 1821 a gardener has laid down five acres 
 of a cressonaria ; and it is said since then to 
 have been increased to ten acres ; besides that, 
 several other gardeners cultivate the same crop 
 for the London breakfast-tables. Channels of 
 brick tiles are laid in parallel lines, about two 
 and a half feet asunder ; these receptacles being 
 prepared about six inches wide and nine inches 
 deep, in them is put proper soil, and water is 
 made to run slowly through them from end to 
 end, by means of a slight declination in the level. 
 These plants will not flourish perfectly with- 
 out clear water runs through them mud or 
 vegetable mucor injuring their vigour mate- 
 rially ; water of an inch bore will, if constant, 
 supply the wants of this vegetation. In Paris 
 and in Edinburgh the demand for water-cresses 
 has led to a similar expedient being adopted, 
 to supply humanity with green-feeding in these 
 towns. 
 
 The next Irish species of this genus is N. syl- 
 vestre, the sylvan very wild or wood-dwelling 
 Nasturtium; palustre is the name now most
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 91 
 
 commonly used.* It grows in waste places, not 
 in water, but on the rugged margin of stony 
 streams. It is called " creeping-cress," from its 
 roots wandering widely, and rooting as they run. 
 This yellow rocket is also* found in coarse moist 
 gravelly or stony places. " Rocket" may be de- 
 rived from rochetta, a wheel fire-work in the 
 Italian ; and the bright yellow flame-coloured 
 rotate blossoms of this flower sustain the idea 
 of a rochetta. The stem is curiously zig-zag, and 
 the pod-stalks and pods turn up like hooks, on 
 which to hang fairies' caps when the owners come 
 to a sylvan merry-making. 
 
 Our next species is Nasturtium terrestre, a 
 curious specific distinction for a plant which 
 grows along with the common water-cress in 
 plashy places, and bears the familiar name of 
 annual water-rocket. To be sure it will grow 
 on coarse damp ground, and is consequently more 
 terrestrial than its congeners. It is a somewhat 
 stiffish shrubby plant, with distinct stem leaves 
 of a lyrate form, which are of a blackish green, 
 but resembling much those of the oak-leaved 
 geranium. Its firm stalk and general aspect are 
 indeed less of a water than of a land vegetable, 
 which fact somewhat lessens the inappropriateness 
 of its specific name. It bears in June its incon- 
 spicuous yellowish-white blossoms ; but its many 
 podded branches are more noticeable. Several 
 of these cresses have been eaten, and some were 
 prized formerly for the very high acrid flavours, 
 which are now too sharp for the general palate. 
 With fish and meat, as a sauce garnish, no haut 
 * See Bab. Man. ed, 3, p. 20.
 
 92 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 gout was in ancient days deemed too strong, so 
 that the common water-cress being mild, other 
 plants of the same family were mixed with it, 
 to heighten its acrimony, and probably such a 
 garnish was that described as added to strong- 
 tasted food in our ancient Irish "Book of Rights," 
 viz.: "The venison of Naas the fish of the 
 Boyne the cresses of the kindly Brosnach." 
 
 The last species of this genus is the Nastur- 
 tium amphibium ; it grows close to water, on 
 margins of clay-bottomed streams, where it is 
 subject to frequent submersion. It is an inha- 
 bitant of land, but made vigorous by water ; and 
 so living by land and by water. It is called 
 water-radish, the root being fusiform and reddish, 
 which has the same meaning, although with the 
 vowel modified, as the Saxon word " raddish ;" 
 probably this is the water-radish to which Par- 
 nell alludes in his travestie of Homer, " The 
 Frogs and the Mice," viz. : 
 
 " The soul of great Prycarpax lives in me ; 
 But me no stalks nor waterish herbs delight, 
 Nor can the crimson radish charm my sight ; 
 The lake-resounding frog's selected care, 
 Which not a mouse of any taste can bear." 
 
 This plant grows two or three feet high, and the 
 leaves, which are submersed, often are deeply 
 divided, which is a provision for letting the water 
 run by, without taking such a hold on them as 
 to drag up the root ; while those leaves which 
 are aerial are entire, the incisions being reduced 
 to a mere serrature. The flowers, which appear 
 in July and August, are small, but of a distinct 
 yellow colour.
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 93 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 BITTER WINTER CRESS : DEDICATED TO ST. BARBARA. THE EARLY 
 WINTER-CRESS. THE FRINGED ROCK-CRESS. THE HAIRY ROCK- 
 CRESS. OUR LADY'S SMOCK, OR CUCKOO-FLOWER. WHITLOW- 
 GRASS. SCURVY-GRASS, THE THREE SPECIES DESCRIBED. 
 
 THE genus Barbarea, is called after St. Bar- 
 bara ; there is no reason given us why this lady 
 saint takes it under her special patronage ; she 
 presided over mountainous places when roads 
 were somewhat more precipitous than now, but 
 grand juries and relief committees, have surper- 
 seded the supernatural help for clambering cliffs 
 which formerly seemed indispensable. This is 
 probably the reason why our plant is now found 
 on stony places of low elevation, so commonly, 
 too, as to bear the specific name vulgaris, usually 
 and familiarly so designated, where, not seeking 
 any lofty position, it wanders in waste grounds, 
 over hedge-banks, and even into pastures. Still 
 there must have been a day when our Barbarea 
 had some higher dignity, as we find that St. Bar- 
 bara's intercessions were esteemed protective in 
 thunderstorms. " The yellow-haired god on the 
 biforked hill," and on "Helicon's banks," knew 
 where a plant grew, which drew the electric 
 stream quietly and innocuously away. The old 
 song tells us that 
 
 " Apollo next rose and said prythee ne'er quarrel, 
 Good king of the gods, with my vot'ries below, 
 Your thunder is useless " then showing his laurel, 
 Cry'd ' Sic evitabile fulmen,' you know
 
 94 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 Then over each, head 
 My laurels I'll spread 
 So my sons, from your crackers, no mischief shall dread." 
 
 As we have no classic laurel native on our 
 river banks or forked mountains, possibly, the 
 smooth and green leaves of our Barbarea must 
 supply its place ; and its golden yellow blossoms, 
 if not dedicated to Apollo, can be to St. Bar- 
 bara, remembering that if our elementary fulmi- 
 nation is less dangerous than those which the god 
 of genius warded away, we emit at times bright 
 corruscations of witty electric flame, pungent 
 and pervasive from among our people. This 
 Barbarea is a long-enduring plant, for it con- 
 tinues growing and green through the winter ; 
 it must have been a valuable member of the cress 
 family, when the prolonged raising of fresh vege- 
 tables was little known ; and as Saint Barbara's 
 day was in December, the plant that supplied a 
 warm bitter salad, at that scarce vegetable sea- 
 son, may, in gratitude, have been stamped with 
 this name of distinction ; although if the saint 
 herself eat much of this bitter herb, it would be 
 decidedly an exercise of palatial penance, requir- 
 ing some zeal and resolution. Its leaves are a 
 good specimen of the lyre-shaped structure ; and 
 its orange-yellow blossom, after having sported 
 into a double flower, is well known as the double- 
 yellow rocket of gardens. In its wild and single 
 state it is a handsome, rather shrubby-looking 
 plant, whose deep green leaves and golden blooms 
 make a striking contrast in the rural parterre. 
 It is an agricultural weed ; cows will eat it, sheep 
 are not fond of it, horses and swine refuse it. In
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 95 
 
 Sweden it is boiled like cabbage, and becomes 
 thereby less acrid ; eaten raw, its austere bitter- 
 ness and mucilagenous taste require a love of 
 strongly stimulating food to recommend it. Some- 
 times a small gnat perforates part of the blos- 
 som and causes irritation, attended by an extra 
 natural growth to supply the damage done the 
 structure is thus deranged, the excessive vege- 
 table development becomes remarkable, and is in 
 shape somewhat like the blossom of the hop. 
 
 The second native species of this genus is Bar- 
 barea prcecox, the precocious or early winter-cress. 
 It flowers from April to October. This is not a 
 common plant ; its stations are few and remote, 
 but where it is located it distributes its seeds 
 pretty freely. It grows on rubbishy corners of 
 fields, and on clayey hills ; its flowers are smaller 
 and paler than those of the vulgaris. The seed- 
 pods are nearly twice as long, and exactly square. 
 It is a smaller plant than its elder brother, and 
 of a milder flavour, being much less bitter. It 
 is known to English gardeners as the American 
 Cress, and is sent to table sometimes. It is not 
 much cultivated in Irish gardens. Caleb Threl- 
 keld, in his Irish Botany, says that leaves of the 
 Barbarea were "singular healers of old sordid 
 ulcers, and that though common about the fields, 
 his informant as to its virtue for the cure of a 
 sore leg brought it into his garden as soon as it 
 t had done the feat ;" and this was but a due re- 
 ward to the winter-cress for its good services. 
 We have before found that cresses of various 
 kinds were eaten with meat and fish by the 
 feasters of our ancient Irish times. We may
 
 96 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 add that their verdure and loveliness recom- 
 mended them to the notice of our early poets of 
 rural life. Edmund Ryan, commonly "Ned of 
 the Hills," names some water-cress in one of his 
 love elegies thus : 
 
 " Cresses waving in the stream, 
 
 Flowers its pleasing banks perfuming ; 
 
 How sweet its verdant margins seem, 
 In their rich luxuriance blooming." 
 
 The English people are much more attached to 
 salads and vegetables at their meals than we are, 
 probably because they have the means of eating 
 more animal food, which gives them a desire for 
 its balancing and correcting contrast. Among 
 those who could eat meat in Ireland, however, 
 cresses, as we have shown, were formerly known 
 and esteemed. 
 
 The following pretty poem is of rather uncer- 
 tain paternity, but is found in the original Irish, 
 and has been attributed to Carolan, the celebrated 
 harper poet and melodist. It mentions " cresses/' 
 and enables us to introduce it in connection with 
 that subject from Hardiman's Irish Minstrelsy : 
 
 TRANSLATION. 
 
 " The doves are pairing, and Summer is near: 
 Deck'd with clustering green-cresses the streamlets appear, 
 The blossoms are bursting the tops of the trees ; 
 And the hives are distilling the honey of bees. 
 
 " With fruits and green acorn the woodland is crown'd : 
 There damsels, fair damsels, are straying around, 
 Lowing herds, stately steeds, are near trout-peopled Lee 
 Fleecy sheep, graceful fawns, and I exiled from thee. 
 
 " The birds sweetly warble there frolic the lambs ; 
 For the warm-streaming milk the calves seek their dams; 
 Fish spring in thy stream, and leap high on thy shore ; 
 But I, and young Cormac, our exile deplore."
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 97 
 
 The next genus of cross-worts in our Irish 
 flora is Arabia, so called, says Dr. Mackay, be- 
 cause first recorded as Arabian plants. The old 
 mediciners of Arabia, the Saracenic doctors were 
 close observers; their herbal knowledge was ex- 
 tensive, and many plant practitioners of the six- 
 teenth century, in England and France, re-hashed 
 the Arabians, and encumbered their prescriptions, 
 so as to conceal the value of some receipts by their 
 superfluous and inane quackeries. The first spe- 
 cies is Arobis ciliata, the fringed rock-cress, so 
 called from the edges of its small green ovate 
 leaves having a row of hairs like eye-lashes ; also 
 from its cresting the dry crevices of rocks on the 
 sea-shore, or on inland cliffs. It is rather a scarce 
 plant; but one of its chosen residences is a place 
 of note, viz., the stony shore of Derrynane. It is 
 found in the English Botany under the name 
 Turritis alpina, because the leaves have a some- 
 what imbricated, or turretted superposition. This 
 may be a fair cause for the name, yet, as it clings 
 to mortar on lofty turrets, it may thence be called 
 the Turritis alpina. It sends forth its unimpos- 
 ing white blossoms in July and August. When 
 the pods of seed are ripe, a touch causes them to 
 burst, and scatter the seeds, so that many are 
 projected into crevices between stones, and are 
 deposited in the proper places for growing. It is 
 probable that the action of the sunshine on the 
 pods naturally produces this dispersion of the 
 " seeds, as it does in other plants with siliques, or 
 long pods. The only distinction of a popular 
 kind which separates this species from its con- 
 geners is, that the calyx, or blossom-cup, is tawny.
 
 98 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 Our next species in the genus Arabis is hir- 
 suta; compared with the previous plant it is hir- 
 sute, being covered all over with small hairs. It 
 is accordingly the Hairy-tower Mustard ; it grows 
 on walls, and on calcareous rocks ; its white 
 flowers appear in June, on a stiff straight stalk, 
 of a foot or more high. Its root is strong and 
 woody, which enables it to have a perennial life 
 in its dry and exposed habitation. The root- 
 leaves are egg-shaped and toothed, while the 
 stem-leaves are spear-shaped. This plant, like 
 many others, if cultivated, loses much of its hairi- 
 ness, and grows taller and more elegant. We see 
 that even a plant which, as a mountaineer, shows 
 something of a rugged exterior, when brought 
 within the pale of civility, assumes the character 
 which softening circumstances produce, indicates 
 also better intercourse, and declares the humane 
 polish in its aspect. 
 
 Our next genus is Cardamine, from " cardia," 
 the Greek for the heart, and "damas" to fortify. 
 These vegetables were supposed to strengthen and 
 give heartsomeness to those who used them. The 
 first species is the Cardamine amara, the large- 
 flowered Bitter-cress. The root-leaves are round- 
 ish, and the broad upper stem-leaves are angularly 
 toothed. The stem throws out roots close above 
 the ground. It exhibits its large white or cream- 
 coloured flowers in April and May, with pretty 
 purple anthers ; it is about a foot high, and greatly 
 decorates wettish meadows in the first month of 
 Summer. This plant throws up suckers which 
 may be divided and planted to ornament the 
 banks of ponds. As its specific name indicates, it
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 99 
 
 is bitter; but its bitterness is of that aromatic 
 kind which recommends cresses to general use; 
 and this vegetable would blend well in a salad. 
 Like many cruciferous plants, it contains an acrid 
 oil, and a large portion of nitrogened material; 
 the first property makes it anti-scorbutic, and the 
 second recommends it to ready assimilation in 
 the human stomach. When much of it is thrown 
 in a heap, it gives out ammonia, showing its 
 value as a manure. Sheep crop it readily, but 
 cows dislike its bitterness. Beautiful butterflies 
 live on the different cardamines, and those who 
 attend to native entomology, will do well to make 
 acquaintance with this genus of plants. 
 
 We now come to the species of Cardamine 
 which has attracted most notice by its beauty 
 and plentiful early bloom. The Cardamine pra- 
 tensis blows in fields which are a little boggy, 
 and in such profusion in May as to look like linen 
 bleaching. On this account it is likened to the 
 under-dress of the fairer part of the creation, 
 when placed to whiten in the soft sun-light of 
 the young Summer. Shakspeare records its sea- 
 sonable appearance 
 
 "When maidens bleach their Summer smocks;" 
 
 bleaching demanding a more lightsome season to 
 produce whiteness than 
 
 "When milk comes frozen home in pail; 
 When blood is nipped and ways be foul." 
 
 Our Lady's-smock. The prudery and uneasy 
 purism which chooses to take alarm at this old 
 name for our plant is as superfluously nice as was
 
 100 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 the French-millinery modesty which has intro- 
 duced to us the Greek word for winter-quarters, 
 cheimadion, Gallicized into the softened form of 
 chemise. Our old truth-telling title, shift, gave 
 us a wholesome, pure, and pleasing idea associated 
 with the intimate envelope of our British and 
 Irish fair companions. It told us explicitly of 
 many changes of raiment by the shift, fresh and 
 fair like its inhabitants ; while the chemise, or 
 winter-quarters, throws some doubt on the desir- 
 ably frequent prophylactic processes of the tidy, 
 query cleanly, grisettes of Gaul. 
 
 In the Ray papers for 1849, page 288, JuL 
 Miinter tells us of the propagation of our plant 
 by its leaves, and explains it thus : The hemis- 
 pherical nodule from which the new plant is de- 
 veloped occurs at the spot whence the three 
 principal nerves of the leaflets radiate into the 
 lea In addition to this a second bud frequently 
 rises from the middle of the central rib, and when 
 the leaves are separated from the plant they 
 live under water, and emit young plants. We 
 must add a Shakspearian legend about our deli- 
 cately tinted and shaded flower, and the origin of 
 its prettiest name. King Oberon tells us 
 
 "I saw 
 
 Flying between the cold earth and the moon 
 Cupid, all arm'd, a certain aim he took. 
 ***** 
 
 Yet mark'd I where the bolt of Cupid fell; 
 
 It fell upon a little western flower, 
 
 Before milk-white, now purple with love's wound ; 
 
 And maidens call it Love-in-idleness. 
 
 Fetch me that flower ; the herb I show'd thee once, 
 
 The juice of it on sleeping eye-lids laid
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 101 
 
 Will make the man or woman madly dote 
 Upon the next live creature that it sees." 
 
 Shakspeare is sweet and sentimental herein; 
 but our Swift riots in riddles, and here is one 
 
 "A long-ear'd beast, and a word for 'jeer/ 
 To the fairest of creatures is ever near." 
 
 My lady's toilet, told over in Swift's time, would 
 solve this secret ; and to go farther with our 
 readers, would be to edify them with the male- 
 diction, " Strike, you stupid," can't you guess? 
 
 The French and our ancestors religionized the 
 poetry of this flower ; it appears with them in 
 March, much about the period of the festival of the 
 annunciation to the Virgin, and this vegetable's 
 snowy-robe is called accordingly, " Chemise de 
 notre Dame," or " Our Lady's-smock." It is also 
 named the Cuckoo-flower, because with us, blow- 
 ing somewhat later in the year, the cuckoo often 
 clarions its " opening days ;" but indeed the flower 
 has more often to wait for him than he for her. 
 Shakspeare makes his "cuckoo-buds" yellow, and 
 describes the lady's -smock so accurately, and at 
 the same time poetically, as to forbid mistake; 
 and by his text we will correct all other poets. 
 Of Spring and young Summer he sings 
 
 " When daisies pied, and violets blue, 
 
 And lady-smocks all silver white, 
 And Cuckoo-birds of yellow hue, 
 
 Do paint the meadows with delight 
 The Cuckoo then on every tree, 
 
 Thus sings he Cuckoo." 
 
 It is probable that the cuckoo-buds alluded to 
 are those of the marsh-marigold, which inhabits
 
 102 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 the margins of slow-moving streams and dykes, 
 in wet meadows, making a part of the same flora 
 with the cardamines. It is a showy flower, and 
 its buds, when nearly bursting, are tipped with 
 a fine gold yellow, above an emerald green 
 cup. Our cardamine is from one to two feet 
 high ; its flowers, when fresh from nature's humid 
 care, have been slightly touched with blue ; the 
 sun turns this tint to a delicate rose colour ; and, 
 finally, it receives the snowy whiteness on which 
 its familiar name is founded. Sometimes this 
 plant sports into double flowers, and it is then 
 well deserving of a place in the garden. 
 
 Our last species of Cardamine is the Hairy 
 Lady's-smock. In it the naiads and dryads must 
 have done penance, otherwise these " delicates " 
 would have banished from their wardrobe so hir- 
 sute a garment. It is a low hardy plant, tufting 
 the ground with its lower leaves so densely as to 
 destroy any seeds of other vegetables which may 
 strive to grow under it. These lower stem-leaves 
 ; have also the rather remarkable property in the 
 history of native foliation, of growing and becom- 
 ing plants; the leaves, to succeed in this phe- 
 nomenon, must be sustained in life during the 
 process by remaining adherent to the parent, so 
 that the process is like the layering of pinks, ex- 
 cept that the leaf-stem is the bond of union, in- 
 stead of the stalk-stem. In the Cardamine 
 pratensis, the double variety most readily yields 
 to this cactus-like mode of increase, which goes to 
 show, in addition to other proofs, the very high 
 essential character of the leaf in the organism of 
 plants. This species is found in various soils and'
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 103 
 
 situations ; in wet places it is succulent, and about 
 a foot high. On dry gravelly spots it is from 
 three inches to nine in stature, and there it be- 
 comes more dense, tufted, and hairy. It is an 
 annual, and bears its small white blossoms from 
 March to June. Like the other species, it mixes 
 well as a warm bitterish cress among the mate- 
 rials of a salad. All the species of this genus have 
 been used as medical herbs. Ray, the naturalist, 
 gave the flowers in hysteric complaints. They 
 were certainly perfectly harmless, and in a com- 
 plaint of a nervous character they were well 
 fitted for giving hope to the patient a most 
 important curative aid and doing no harm to 
 the stomach. We find, in the history of " the 
 cures of cardamines," that one practitioner gave 
 the whole flowering tops to nervous patients, with 
 the same happy results as those who more cau- 
 tiously gave the floral leaves. This anomaly 
 confounded an afterward " mediciner," and no 
 wonder ; but he does not venture an explanation. 
 We have an accurate description of how to pre- 
 pare the flowers of Lady's-smock, by toasting 
 them on pewter dishes over a fire, and boiling the 
 powder, which is to be covered with leather, for 
 no cork is admissible in the bottle ; this is all very 
 imposingly pharmaceutical, and well contrived to 
 aggravate a willing belief in its powers; but a 
 knowledge of the dissipating effects of toasting on 
 the acrid oil which flavours these plants, would 
 lead us to think that the dose of twelve grains of 
 the powder three times daily must have contained 
 but an infinitessimal amount of any active pro- 
 perty. The time, labour, and vegetable accumu-
 
 104 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 lation devoted to these nostrums were marvellous, 
 and perhaps gave them value. It took a bushel 
 of the flower heads to make a quart of this one 
 precious cure an anciently-invented homoepathic 
 powder for epilepsy. It is more to our purpose, 
 however, to admit its claim as an anti-scorbutic 
 a property which it possesses in common with 
 nearly every edible cross- wort, or tetradynameous 
 plant. To produce this effect, however, they re- 
 quire to be used, not as drugs, but as diet-herbs. 
 
 The numerous order of cross- worts has been for 
 convenience divided into tribes ; and, as the next 
 group has something indicative in its divisional 
 epithet, it may be noticed. This tribe is the 
 Alyssinece, most of the plants belonging to it be- 
 ing good for stimulating languid sores, when ap- 
 plied as a poultice were imagined to have sprung 
 upon the rocks of the Illysus, a fountain of Arca- 
 dia, whose waters had the virtue of curing the 
 bite of a mad dog. The first genus of this tribe 
 is Draba, a mutation of the Greek word drabe 
 " acrid," a property of the leaves, and of many of 
 the species. 
 
 Our first native species is D. verna, the Spring 
 or common Whitlow-grass ; so called from hav- 
 ing been usually applied to those distressing in- 
 flammations as a poultice, and found, from its 
 stimulation, to be useful. In March and April, 
 the little green star of leaves, which clings to 
 the tops of clay banks and dry walls, throws up 
 the light stalk of white flowers which adorns it. 
 A gravel-pit is an excellent place to look for it, 
 or in the crevices of old bridges, adhering to the 
 mortar. This little annual plant, in the mouth
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 105 
 
 of May, splits open its seed-sheaths at the base 
 of the receptacle, and thus scatters the seeds 
 into cradles sufficiently secure to nurse them 
 for a new birth in a new year. It is to be no- 
 ticed, that it droops the tiny flowers to keep 
 its stamens from the chilly night-dews of our 
 early Spring. There was among our mediaeval 
 herbalists a great discussion whether this plant, 
 or some other allied species, was the true whit- 
 low-grass of the still more ancient herb-doctors; 
 but modem writers on medical botany have 
 slighted the plant and all inquiries respecting it. 
 The Draba verna has also received the Greek 
 name Erophila, a pretty express of its early 
 appearance, conveyed ' in the words " er" the 
 Spring, and "pkilo," to love. 
 
 Our next species is Draba mcana, or woolly 
 whitlow-grass. When young it is sheltered by a 
 slight woolly clothing ; but as it gets strong, and 
 the season advances, it drops its infantile protec- 
 tion, which was pranked on its leaves in cottony 
 stars. It bears its white notched petals in May 
 and June. These are succeeded by little seed- 
 pouches, which twist their backs from the sun, and 
 from this cause the plant is also called the twisted 
 padded whitlow-grass. It grows on cliffs and 
 rocks, and is a larger plant than the preceding. 
 
 The useful stimulating qualities of these herbs 
 as a cure for paronychia, may have been further 
 recommended by the resemblance of the seed-pod 
 to the " whitefiaw," or inflamed vesicle, which it 
 was intended to allay. The "white-Low," or 
 white-burning, is very sensibly understood by 
 those who have suffered its distress ; and even
 
 106 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 the little sac, though no bigger than a pea, with 
 its whitish-yellow colour, when encased under the 
 finger-nail, produces, as is well known, a very dis- 
 tressing amount of hot feverishness and acute pain. 
 The genus Cochlearia comes next in order. It 
 is named from the shape of the leaves of the 
 smaller species, which is somewhat like the bowl 
 of a spoon, of which cochlea is the Latin. We 
 may give it, then, its old English name, spoon- 
 wort. The first species is the well-known 
 officinal, or drug-shop cochlearia, famous and 
 deservedly so as the common scurvy-grass, so 
 called from its known good effects as an altera- 
 tive in scorbutic cases. It is met everywhere on 
 muddy sea-shores, on brackish banks, and on 
 rocks near the coast. It also shows that rocks 
 and sea-coasts in some things resemble inland 
 mountains, as we find it, although cautiously dis- 
 liking intervening lowlands, seizing the remote 
 cliffy heights of the interior country. Salt river- 
 walls, even within towns, strands, and beaches 
 where clay meets sand, abound with our plant. 
 Its deep shining green leaves are well known, 
 and in May and June its snow-white petals 
 make, with its intensely green leaf, a strong 
 and showy contrast. Much of the fame of this 
 plant has been derived from its being the most 
 plentiful wholesome vegetable which sailors, after 
 long voyages, meet on sea-coasts. It is very uni- 
 versally distributed, the various species having 
 many good properties in common, and being 
 found over much of the navigable world. Several 
 of our circumnavigators record its value to the 
 scurvy-prostrated sailors.
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 107 
 
 The next species is called Cochlearia Anglica, 
 English scurvy-grass. It is by no means limited 
 to England, as it is found plentifully with us ; 
 in Denmark, also, and elsewhere, it is very gene- 
 ral, but seems to keep more strictly to the saline 
 districts than the former species. Its botanical 
 distinctions will be found in systematic books ; 
 but it is popularly recognised by being not more 
 than half as large a plant as the previous one ; 
 and yet its seed-vessels in June are twice as 
 large. It is thought that this plant derives its 
 specific name from the fact of Caesar's making an 
 acquaintance with it in Britain, getting it after- 
 wards in Germany, and applying it with success 
 to the cure of scurvy, which was very severe in 
 the Roman army there. It was named by Pliny 
 the Herba Britannica. 
 
 The third Irish species is C. Danica, the Danish 
 Scurvy-grass. From the shape of the leaves, it 
 is also called Ivy-leaved Scurvy-grass. It grows 
 where the preceding kinds do, and also clambers 
 up on the roofs of old thatched houses near the 
 sea-side. It is the smallest plant of the genus, 
 and the angularity of its almost triangular fleshy 
 leaves guides those vegetarians to it who, en- 
 closing it between bread and butter, eat it as a 
 salad to purify the blood. It has, like its pre- 
 viously-described relatives, a slightly bitter, cress- 
 like taste, and contains a pungent essential oil, 
 from which its stimulative power is derived. Her- 
 balists who seek to preserve this property in the 
 desiccated plant must fail, as heat or drying dis- 
 sipates its slight acridity, and all effects accord- 
 ingly. The name Danica records the notice taken
 
 108 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 of this plant by northern seamen. Maartens and 
 Egede have especially lauded its curative effects ; 
 and when the old mode of victualling ships with 
 furiously salt meat is remembered, it is easy to 
 believe that a fresh and wholesome, though 
 simple, vegetable, must have been quite a lux- 
 ury to sailors ; the salutary consequences on their 
 health producing a liking for it, as is the case 
 with many condiments where weakened diges- 
 tion sometimes requires them. The imprisonment 
 of long voyages, the want of variety and pleasing 
 occupation, must have made unwholesome food 
 more injurious to health. Scurvy was induced, 
 and languor and depression of spirits made it 
 chronic in many cases. Touching land was, pro- 
 bably, the great prophylactic to the wearied sea- 
 man, and with it the scurvy-grass was a helpful 
 cure. The white blossoms of the Cochlearia 
 Danica appear in April; the leaves are very 
 succulent and fleshy, and the seed-pod is much 
 veined. Dirty habits, gross feeding, vulgarity, 
 and want of refinement, if not always the origin- 
 ators, were the constant companions of cutaneous 
 diseases ; so constantly, indeed, that a rude, vul- 
 gar, indelicate manner, had the name of the di- 
 sease applied to it, as a quickly-apprehended 
 description. Shakspeare uses the word several 
 times in this sense, and mixes the manners and 
 the disease as interchangeables ; for instance, the 
 Welsh parson, in the Merry Wives of Windsor, 
 complains of being made " a flouting-stock," and 
 resolves to be revenged a on this same scall, 
 scurvy, cogging companion, the host of 'The 
 Garter/" And in Troilus and Cressida, Ther-
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 109 
 
 sites the boaster, mixes up dirtiness, meanness, 
 and want of gallantry, or poverty of spirit, with 
 his " scurviness," viz. : 
 
 Hector. What ! art thou Greek art thou for 
 Hector match ? Art thou of blood and honour ? 
 
 Thersites. No, no : I am a rascal ; a scurvy 
 railing knave ; a very filthy, filthy rogue. 
 
 Hector. I do believe thee live. 
 
 And, now, so much for scurvy and its vegetable 
 remedy, scurvy-grass.
 
 110 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 HORSE-RADISH OR LADLE-WORT : ITS USE AS A CONDIMENT. VI- 
 VIPAROUS HOOTS : ITS CURE FOR HOARSENESS : IT EMITS SUGAR 
 AND CONTAINS SULPHUR : USED AS A COSMETIC. THE BEST 
 RECEIPT FOR BEAUTEOUSNESS. PENNY-CRESS. PURPLE SEA- 
 ROCKET. WHIPPING PEDAGOGUES. THE DAME'S VIOLET. ORI- 
 GIN OF THE PURPLE AND WHITE ROCKETS : HOW TO PROPAGATE 
 THEM. VESPER FLOWERS. 
 
 THE last Irish species of the genus Cochlearia 
 is armoracia. The word is said to be con- 
 structed from the Celtic particles " ar," near ; 
 " mor," or " mar," the sea ; and " rich" over 
 against; that is, a plant growing near the sea. 
 Like many other marine plants, it is often found 
 in mountainous places. Its name, Cochlearia, 
 must be accepted largely, as its great leaf grows 
 into a ladle, and instead of being only a " Spoon- 
 wort/' we might fairly call it a " Ladle-wort/' It 
 is, however, popular enough under its well known 
 name, horse-radish, because the heat of the radish 
 is in it, multiplied by the strength of the horse. 
 Though often thrown out in garden rubbish, it is 
 also met with truly wild; and in wet fields, near 
 Mallow, Mr. Drummond discovered it aboriginal. 
 It is also found at Blarney. It is needless to de- 
 scribe this large coarse vegetable; one look at it 
 in a garden will fix it in the memory sufficiently. 
 Those who want its blossom, to place in a her- 
 barium, will find it in flower in May. 
 
 The culinary use of horse-radish root, scraped, is 
 well known as an accompaniment at table to the
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. Ill 
 
 roast-beef of old England. Perhaps, if people eat 
 the fat too greedily, such a spicy stimulant may 
 give tone to digestion, and help to repair the harm 
 done by voracity. Those, however, who regulate 
 their epicurisms, will find the flavours of whole- 
 some and well-dressed meats quite piquant enough 
 to ensure for them the wish, " may good digestion 
 wait on appetite, and health on both." 
 
 Plants which have numerous bulbs, or vivipar- 
 ous roots, producing shoots copiously, very often 
 seed badly ; their energy being thrown upon one 
 mode of reproduction, the other is less required. 
 Horse-radish is an illustration of this law ; its 
 blossoms, as compared with the whole bulk of the 
 plant, are very few; but the creeping roots are 
 numerous, and every bit is instinct with vitality. 
 In parts of France the roots are steeped in water, 
 to wash away some of their acrimony, and they 
 are then boiled, or fried in oil, as a vegetable. 
 The root sometimes emits a sweetish juice, but not 
 in sufficient quantity to be of any value as a sugar. 
 Those who scrape or shred these roots, know well 
 how its pungent vapour catches the nose, and sti- 
 mulates the tear-vessels of the eyes ; but as an old 
 naturalist remarks, "these titillations reach not 
 much higher than the senses." The disciples of 
 Culpepper will find various cures attributed to 
 this plant; a syrup of horse-radish for "the 
 hoarseness," is not absurd ; it may give tone and 
 excitement in cases of laryngeal debility. The 
 anti-scorbutic uses, common to all the cruciferous 
 plants also belong to it ; but old Threlkeld re- 
 marks, that while in sauces, it " whets the appe- 
 tite, it hurts the head," as provocatives to excess
 
 112 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 must do. Einhoff, the chemist, has examined 
 these roots, aud found that their characteristic 
 acrimony is derived from a volatile oil, somewhat 
 in appearance like the oil of cinnamon. Its taste 
 was at first sweetish, but it was afterwards very 
 'acrid, and excited inflammation in those parts of 
 the lips and tongue where it was applied. It is 
 more heavy than water, and, in alcohol, retains' 
 its properties when dissolved into an essence. 
 Like many of its congeners, it affords, by dis- 
 tillation, traces of sulphur, which mineral is in its 
 separate form a well known specific against some 
 of the most annoying forms of cutaneous disease. 
 The essence of horse-radish is, like other species, 
 sometimes effective against tooth-ache. It should 
 be remembered that this acrid root, when taken 
 into an empty stomach, has been found deleteri- 
 ous, and once it proved so to such an extent as 
 to be quickly fatal. 
 
 We thus see that many provocatives and sti- 
 mulants are more or less maglignant ; and as 
 their evil effects require to be mitigated by food, 
 or by other " confounders," it is doubtful whether 
 delicate people should use them at all ; although 
 ostrich stomachs seem to suffer little from taking 
 their indigestibilities acrid and hot. It is said 
 that a spoonful of horse-radish root scrapings, 
 put into a pan of milk, will keep it sweet for 
 several days. This could be easily tried, but the 
 cause of the imputed effect is not obvious. 
 
 Gerarde tells us that "Diners thinke that 
 horse-radish is an enemy to vines, and that the 
 hatred betweene them is so great, that if the roots 
 hereof be planted neere to the vine it bendeth
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 113 
 
 backwards from it as not willing to have fellow- 
 ship with it" Probably this marvellous anti- 
 pathy is explainable by the vigorous demands 
 both plants make on the soil, which causes them 
 to be jealous and exhausting neighbours. 
 
 The cultivation of this plant is described in 
 gardening books. The only matter peculiar about 
 it is, that, as is the case in many of the other 
 cruciferse, a moist soil increases its acridity. This 
 plant has not received any position in poesy, ex 
 cept a satirical one. Mrs. Reddish, of ancient 
 theatrical fame, was clever, but knew how to say 
 a biting thing ; and her manners, even on the 
 stage, were sometimes rude and coarse. One wit 
 of the day, on whom she had exercised some of 
 her acridity, accented her name as " Radish," with 
 , the prefix of "horse" to it. It was made into an 
 epigram afterwards, which said that if she was 
 Mrs. Radish, it must be Mrs. Horse-Radish ; but 
 the metre would not excuse the vulgarity of the 
 jest for insertion here. 
 
 The last use we shall record of this Cochlearia 
 is the old perfumer's prescription ; it was bruised 
 with milk to make a cosmetic. There can be no 
 doubt of the value which is naturally belonging 
 to personal beauty, and, without at all detracting 
 from the truth of the old couplet, 
 
 " "Pis not the pleasing tincture of the skin, 
 But peace of mind and harmony within," 
 
 we are bound to say that it is every one's duty 
 to look as well as possible. Even the jewel 
 of the mind may properly have a befitting case ; 
 and the appearance which gives most pleasure to
 
 114 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 friends is, so far, a gift to all the receivers. A 
 poor woman expressed the idea well, when she 
 said to one whose expression pleased her 
 " Heaven reward you, you have a blessing in 
 your face." Much more time was formerly ex- 
 pended on the outside than the inside human 
 beauties ; and unless that best fairness exists, 
 which can beam brightly through the darkest 
 skin, the most potent cosmetic will vainly be ap- 
 plied to " wash the blackamoor white." This 
 idea is very prettily conveyed in the following 
 lines of an observant poet, C. H. Sherive : 
 
 " Tho' Venus' handmaids three, adorning 
 
 Your lovely form, delight to stay ; 
 Tho' softer than the bloom of morning, 
 On your bright cheeks the blushes play ; 
 
 " Yet pardon, pardon, lovely maid, 
 
 The rash presumption of your poet ; 
 Take one cosmetic to your aid, 
 And tell the world, for all may know it. 
 
 *' 'Tis neither wash, nor patch, nor paint, 
 That will our ready hearts beguile 
 It is, and would become a saint, 
 The sweet cosmetic of a smile. 
 
 " Nor use it only when you dress, 
 
 But on your rnein for ever bear it ; 
 ! 'tis an amulet to bless 
 
 But those who see, and those who wear, it. 
 
 " Nought from your lip a smile should sever, 
 
 For life a tenant let it be ; 
 'Twill brighten all your charms for ever, 
 And bend, ! bend, that smile on me." 
 
 The next native genus of flowers we have is 
 Thlaspi, so called from the Greek word " Thlao," 
 to flatten, which refers to the flatted form so re- 
 markable in the seed-pods. We have but one
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 115 
 
 species viz., the " Arvense," or field-growing 
 Thlaspi. It is a very rare plant, but is worth 
 the discovery, when found not for its small 
 inconspicuous blossoms, which lend their white 
 petals to its inflorescence in May and June, but 
 from the remarkable structure of its large seed- 
 pouch, fringed with broad borders or wings ; and 
 the curious circumstance, that the anthers of the 
 flowers are, like the seed-pocket, heart-shaped. 
 The plant is about a foot high, and somewhat 
 branchy. The common name of it is "penny- 
 cress." The old coinages often had a heart 
 stamped on them, which gave the idea of money 
 to the heart-shaped pod, and the flat seed 
 of this little plant, a tiny silver penny being 
 its metallic prototype. The penny-cress, when 
 bruised or chewed, is slightly acrid, with some- 
 what of the odour and flavour of onion or gar- 
 lic; and having been used in sauces, from its 
 stimulating quality, was called by the general 
 name of mustard. Medicinally the term " Mith- 
 radate" was prefixed to it because Mithradate, 
 King of Pontus, was a famous mediciner, who 
 compounded poison-resisting draughts, and tried 
 them on himself, as he reported, with success ; 
 however, he is shrewdly charged with having 
 applied his powers of herbalism as an anodyne 
 in a domestic way ; and, knowing the plants 
 which prevented all perception of suffering, it is 
 recorded that he gave a very skilful dose to a 
 disagreeable queen of his. Modern drug-doctors, 
 and doctresses, however, poison more slowly than 
 this king-doctor ; the modern practitioners our 
 quacks only undermine the tone of the stomach
 
 116 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 by rubbishy potions, and their mischiefs are, of 
 course, less obstrusive and notorious. Mithradate 
 mustard used to be blended with sugar, and it 
 certainly could not have been with it alone that 
 the King of Pontus poisoned his wife, as it seems 
 a very harmless and inefficient compound, al- 
 though Pliny tells us, that it is " a singular good 
 confection." Its assumed preventative and curing 
 powers are thus noticed in a simile, by Dr. 
 Donne : 
 
 " But you of learning and religion, 
 
 Virtue and such ingredients, have made 
 A Mithradate whose operation 
 
 Keeps off or cures what can be done or said." 
 
 The next native plant we meet with is the 
 Cakile a name appropriated by the Arabic doc- 
 tors to this, or to some allied, vegetable ; and 
 maritima its specific title is derived from its 
 place of growth, the sea-side. The purple Sea- 
 rocket of our coasts, and more especially of our 
 sandy shores, is a bushy succulent plant, with 
 crooked branches showing in June and July its 
 purplish white flowers, which are succeeded by 
 thick, fleshy seed-pouches. It looks somewhat 
 like a candy-tuft, or small variety of stock gilly- 
 flower. Addison says, " Every rock endeth with 
 a constellation, strewing the air with a shower 
 of silver spangles ;" and so it is with our sea- 
 rocket its head or terminal cluster, is a group 
 of " silvery spangles," and, on a bright day, is a 
 gay object on the shores of our waters. This, 
 like many of the cruciferous vegetables, may be 
 eaten mixed with other plants, being as an old 
 writer, Mortimer, calls it, " one of the salad fur-
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 117 
 
 niture ;" but alone it would be unpalatable food, 
 being acrid, and possessing an alkaline taste. It 
 is drastic in its action on the intestines, probably 
 from its mustard-like pungency and saline juices. 
 Pliny's history of its virtue would make it very 
 welcome to truant school-boys, who may have the 
 misfortune to be dragged up, not brought up, by 
 one of the old fashioned flogging pedagogues. 
 Our old Latin naturalist says, "That whoever 
 taketh the seed of rocket before he be whipt 
 shall be hardened that he shall easily endure the 
 pains." Those brutal old torturers, whipping 
 schoolmasters, are now nearly extinct ; and, con- 
 sequently, supposed charms to subdue the suf- 
 fering from their indolent and very ignorant 
 cruelties need not be appealed to any more. It 
 was no wonder, when malignant and unreason- 
 ing inflictions were permitted by parents to be 
 perpetrated on children, that an appeal should 
 be made to vegetable magic, as the parental af- 
 fections did not shield them from such superfluity 
 of wicked barbarity. Locke tells us, that teach- 
 ing " requires more than setting children a task, 
 and whipping them without more ado, if it be 
 not done to our fancy ;" and the ever-observant 
 Shakspeare notices the mean servility which 
 corporeal punishment induces, when Antony de- 
 grades Thyssus by base punishment, in his order 
 to 
 
 " Whip him, fellows, 
 
 'Till, like a boy, you see him cringe his face, 
 And whine aloud for mercy." 
 
 How could self-culture that most energetic 
 power manly industry, or vigorous progress
 
 118 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 flourish, when parents or tutors were tyrants 
 over whipped and terrified slaves ? 
 
 Threlkeld, and other old herbalists, called 
 this plant Eruca marina, the why is rather 
 doubtful ; we will take it to be a form of 
 " eructo" or eructation, that disagreeable slight 
 convulsion of the stomach, which is called " re- 
 peating of food," or tasting it again ; the vege- 
 tables we are treating of, if eaten raw, or only 
 partially dressed, are rather indigestable, and 
 often produce this effect, which is described sim- 
 ply, but well, by Dr. Arbuthnot, viz.: "The 
 signs of the functions of the stomach being de- 
 praved are eructations, either with the taste of 
 the aliment, acid, inodorous, or foetid ;" in fact, 
 a kind of fermentation goes on where digestion 
 ought to be quietly and wholesomely in opera- 
 tion. It would be worth while to transplant a 
 root of sea-rocket into a garden away from the 
 sea-sand, and try whether it would still continue 
 to secrete from the soil enough of salt to retain 
 the remarkably strong saline taste which dis- 
 tinguishes its juices in its native habitat. After 
 blossoming, the flower-heads lose their clustered 
 form, the branchlets of the seed-pouches elongate, 
 and the seed-vessels appear almost in racemes, 
 like the fruit on a currant-tree. As the plant 
 grows from six to twelve inches high, the rambler 
 at the sea-side can readily recognize it. 
 
 The Hesperis matronalis is our next wild 
 native. It is so called from "hesper," the eve- 
 ning, and "matronis," a mother " the Mother of 
 the Evening." For once, the most accurate Lin- 
 naeus is at fault : he calls this flower scentless,
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 119 
 
 because it was by day he observed it ; for in the 
 evening, as its popular name declares, it sheds 
 about it delicious richness. There is a variety, 
 however, which has only a very slight scent at 
 any time, and this was the plant which Linnaeus 
 adopted as the specific type. We have a Hes- 
 perus sung sweetly by Milton, where the Spirit 
 in Comus, as the poet says, " epilogizes," viz. : 
 
 " To the ocean now I fly, 
 And those happy climes that lie, 
 Where day never shuts his eye ; 
 Up in the broad fields of the sky, 
 There I suck the liquid air, 
 All amidst the gardens fair, 
 Of Hesperus and his daughters three, 
 That sing about the golden tree. 
 
 Along the crisped shades and bowers, 
 Revels the spruce and jocund Spring, 
 
 Graces, and rosy-bosom'd Hours, 
 Thither all their beauties bring." 
 
 But this father of the Hesperides is not the 
 hesperus after whom our flower is called. If he 
 ventured on a night excursion at all, it was but 
 to bring in the day, and to call Aurora in her 
 " pinky morning light." Happily, we find a softer 
 parentage, a mild ancestress, in the evening star 
 for our hesperis, and in paradise itself she shines : 
 
 "Now came still evening on, and twilight gray 
 Had in her sober livery all things clad ; 
 Silence accompanied, for beast and bird- 
 They to their grassy couch, these to their nests 
 Were slunk ; all but the wakeful nightingale 
 She all night long her amorous descant sung. 
 Silence was pleased. Now glowed the firmament 
 With living sapphires. Hesperus that led 
 The starry host, rode brightest; till the moon, 
 Rising in clouded majesty, at length, 
 Apparent queen, unveiled her peerless light, 
 And o'er the dark her silver mantle threw."
 
 120 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 It is, then, from this dew-begetting queen and 
 her soft power that our plant is called the Ma- 
 tronal Hesperis. Sweet is it at the hour of even- 
 ing, and yielding then 
 
 " Its stream of balm, most sovereign and dainty dear." 
 
 The common name of this wanderer in hilly pas- 
 tures is " Dame's Violet ;" its pale pinky blossoms 
 having recommended it to the cottage gardens of 
 rural dames, and suggested a rather far-fetched 
 resemblance to the single violet's blossom; or, 
 perhaps, indeed, the perfume was what gave the 
 notion of this relationship. It is found in the 
 rubbish of old gardens by the way-side ; but in its 
 wild single state, can scarcely hope to be per- 
 mitted on a visit into the modern parterre. Our 
 hesper, or vesper-flower, was described by that 
 patriarch of herb-seers, the English botanical 
 antiquary, Gerarde, so long ago as 1597. It is 
 probable that the beautiful columnar flower, the 
 double white rocket, is a sport of our plant, pro- 
 duced by the multiplication of its petals, and by 
 a modification of other organs into petals. It was 
 first noticed in Itaty, and our garden flower is 
 said to be a native of that fine climate. Its name 
 is derived from our Southern neighbours, being 
 the French word rochet, a white gown, hardened 
 by its journey into the English rocket, as our 
 children's frocks formerly were called. The re- 
 semblance of the plant to our Stock-gillyflower is 
 recorded by Miller, who styles it very appropri- 
 ately Queen's Gillyflower. It is a triennial, and 
 can only be made perennial by taking off cut- 
 tings, and striking them carefully; so it is apt to
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 121 
 
 be lost in gardens ; and it is a pity it is not more 
 generally looked after now, for a more beautiful 
 Summer's bed than a couple of dozen of queen's 
 gillyflowers cannot be produced. 
 
 The simple way of multiplying these plants is 
 after their flowering, for you need not lose your 
 blooms to cut the stalks into lengths of about 
 four inches, and stick them into flower-pots of 
 loamy earth, the forcing up a little of the bark 
 tends to cause the roots to protrude soon; press 
 the clay well to them, water, and shade them from 
 the sun and wind, but do not rot or mildew them, 
 and you may secure a family of healthy children 
 in white and blue rockets, to be gay and bright 
 in your sunny flower-knot; they, like all young 
 creatures, however, desire fresh air, they pine and 
 are sickly if confined to cities ; although they may 
 be bloomed in sun-warmed windows, when placed 
 there in a blossoming condition. We could say 
 much more about this queen of cross-bearing 
 flowers, with her snowy or purpure frock, " all 
 flounced and furbelowed;" but, alas, her exuber- 
 ance of beauty and wealth of dress, dooms her to 
 "keep a pale-faced maiden ever;" her external 
 attractions are her all in all, for she exhales no 
 sweetness ; while her more simple rustic relative, 
 the matron-rocket, is parent to a family, and dif- 
 fuses influence round, most pervasive in the quiet 
 homefelt evening hours. Exhaled as a most de- 
 licate odour, when, as quaint old Dr. Donne says, 
 she shall be 
 
 " Exalted more for being good, 
 Than for her interest of motherhood." 
 
 And now, we may make our bovi-repos to our
 
 122 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 vesper flower, using some pleasing lines for our 
 farewell, which run nearly thus, in Withering's 
 Botany : 
 
 " Still may thy shadowy beauty bloom 
 
 When stars give quiet light; 
 Your offering still, a soft perfume; 
 Your shrine, the silent night. 
 
 " Rich and profuse the breath you send 
 Through air, though none are nigh; 
 Oh ! 'tis your incense from the earth, 
 Your tribute sent on high. 
 
 " Emblems are you, night-scenting flowers, 
 
 Of hope to sorrow given; 
 Strongest, through tearful darkling hours, 
 Are breathings into heaven."
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 123 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 HEDGE-MUSTARD OR SCRAMBLING-POCKET. ROCK-GENTLE OR LON- 
 DON ROCKET. FINE-LEAVED HEDGE-MUSTARD. WHITE GUNPOW- 
 DER. THALIA'S CRESS. SPRING FLOWERS AND THE SPRING THAT 
 
 BRINGS THEM. WALL-FLOWER. HEDGE - MUSTARD. TREACLE- 
 MUSTARD. WHAT TREACLE WAS. ONION - MUSTARD. ODOROUS 
 CONDIMENTS. 
 
 THE next genus of cross-bearing flowering 
 plants we have in Ireland, is called Sisymbrium. 
 The application of this generic name is not ob- 
 vious, or it is altogether misplaced ; we find it 
 mentioned by Ovid as part of a nosegay, of sweet 
 scented flowers, recommended to Venus herself, to 
 increase her attractions ; the group is formed of 
 myrtle, roses, and sisymbrium. Let us try what 
 flower could it be ? " Sisybos " means a fringe ; 
 and "brechio" wet, or water, from which comes our 
 English word, "brook." It was probably a water- 
 mint, with its collar or fringe of flowers round 
 the stem, called in botany "a whorl" No doubt 
 such a coarse perfume as spearmint affords, would 
 not now be chosen by a young beauty to delight 
 the sense of smell ; but by the observations we 
 can make, modern waiting-maids are more refin- 
 ed in all their tastes, than were the very god- 
 desses of the ancients. Not one of our sisym- 
 briums goes near the water now, so we must give 
 this name as arbitrary, and not as descriptive ; a 
 rare circumstance, indeed, in the biography of 
 plants. Even on the first portion of the name, 
 "Sisybos" a fringe, I fear we have but little claim,
 
 124 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 nor is it very indicative of corresponding struc- 
 ture. Donne tells us certainly that the roots of 
 some of the species "are fringed." What a fringe 
 on a root can be, which is all a tassel, we must 
 find out by seeking. The field and way-side bo- 
 tanist may, therefore, pull up some of the tribe, 
 to look for the fringe ; but as the names of plants 
 have generally been given from more obvious 
 structures than such a doubtful underground 
 form, if we use this Greek word as an artifi- 
 cial aid to memory, let us apply it to the blos- 
 som-stalk of the first species, which has indeed a 
 a range of closely adhering pods, springing from 
 its column through its whole length, and termi- 
 nating in a small golden tassel of flowers. We 
 have spent some time trying to trace the name 
 of a genus the sixth species of which is one of 
 our commonest annuals, because as we are doomed 
 to meet with it on every heap of coarse rubbish, 
 or piece of waste ground, it is well to know as 
 much as we can about it. It is the Sisymbrium 
 officinale of Linnaeus. Its lyre-shaped lower leaves 
 and halbert-shaped upper leaves, are easily re- 
 cognized; while its straggling, wiry, whip-like 
 branches are well described as " being small, lim- 
 ber, yet very tough, and will twist and writhe, as 
 doth the ozier, growing in untilled places." This 
 pliant plant is often used by boys for a whip ; and 
 as a kind of cat-o'-nine-tails affords them a faci- 
 lity to "make each other smart." Its commonest 
 name now is Hedge-mustard, which is obviously 
 derived from the general acridity of the plant, 
 and more particularly from the bitterish heat of 
 the small seeds. Its saw-formed, or runcinate
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 125 
 
 leaves, when " slashed" and bruised, have what 
 our keen observer Gerarde calls an ungrateful 
 smell. It was considered a tonic for a relaxed 
 throat, and good against hoarseness. Under the 
 characteristic name of Scrambling-pocket, Tlirel- 
 keld, our ancient Irish botanist, lauds its pectoral 
 virtues, when made into a syrup ; and once again 
 to quote Gerarde, he recommends it for sciatica, if 
 it be taken with honey. Galen says, " it is of a 
 fiery temperature, and doth thereby attenuate, 
 melt, and make thin, which is the reason of its 
 reputation in discussing rheum." Withering tells 
 us that birds love the seeds ; cows, horses, and 
 even swine refuse it, but sheep and goats eat 
 it. This member of the very democracy among 
 plants has now had its biography fairly and fully 
 given. 
 
 Our next native species is the Irio, the Iris 
 Sisymbrium. To look at its appearance, we do 
 not discover any of the playful lights or tints 
 which adorn that irradiate goddess; neither do 
 we readily perceive why it should be named after 
 her, or dedicated to her with any marked appro- 
 priateness, for our plant is a very plain-looking 
 weed, with its long pale-green leaves, and group 
 of lengthy pods, enclosing a centre of regular- 
 ly progressing yellow blossoms, which, showing 
 themselves upon otherwise naked wastes, were 
 considered in former times to make such a " gal- 
 lantee show" as to be called " rock gallant," and 
 from its enriching or adorning these rubbishy 
 crags, it was also dignified by the name " rock 
 gentle," it having thus civilized or "gentled" 
 these rude and barren " scalps and rifts of land."
 
 126 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 This plant has, at least, the praise of hardiness 
 
 " She is of nought afraid, 
 Through woods and waters wide. 
 
 Having inquired of various god-fathers why 
 this wild child of our rudest places is called Iris, 
 we must supply an extemporaneous reason. Iris 
 is the grand-daughter of watery Neptune ; he 
 exhales her atoms into clouds; and Milton tells 
 us that , ,, ... , . , , 
 
 " She there, with humid bow, 
 Waters the odorous banks that blow 
 Flowers of more mingled hue 
 Than her purpled scarf can shew; 
 And drenches with Elysian dew; 
 (List, mortals, if your ears be true,) 
 Beds of hyacinths and roses 
 Where young Adonis oft reposes." 
 
 'We find, then, that this April queen, the god- 
 dess of showers, sheds her richness upon our syl- 
 van cress, which, in return, starts up with vigour 
 to meet the warm Spring showers from the mother 
 rainbow. Ovid, too, tells us how this lady's mes- 
 senger, Iris, visits with richness our earth, when 
 she yields her treasures in brightness 
 
 " When showers enlarged come pouring on the ground, 
 Then clad in colours of a various dye, 
 Junonian Iris breeds a new supply ; 
 To feed the clouds, impetuous rain descends, 
 And bearded corn beneath the burden bends." 
 
 The properties of this plant are indicated by its 
 most well known name, " Hedge-mustard," but is 
 distinguished from the previous species by the 
 appropriate prefix "broad-leaved." It is also 
 called London Rocket, from the curious fact, that 
 it sprung up in great quantities on the ground 
 which was laid waste in London by the great fire.
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 127 
 
 This burst of vegetation gave cause at that time 
 for a lively discussion on the often refuted hypo- 
 thesis of spontaneous vegetation; that is, of or- 
 ganic creatures coming into being without a 
 parentage. All testimony, however, is against 
 any such notion ; every vegetable creature, whose 
 continuance is within the reach of observation, is 
 subject to the ancient law of life continuance, viz., 
 it is an herb, or a tree bearing seed after its kind, 
 a fat well expressed long since by Harvey in his 
 notable motto, " Every creature is from an egg." 
 This general statement does not go into the sub- 
 ject of buds or cuttings of plants, but merely 
 deals with the production by seeds, as recorded 
 by Prior, the poet 
 
 " Just gods, all other things their like produce 
 The vine arises from her mother's juice ; 
 When feeble plants or tender flowers decay, 
 They to their seed their images convey." 
 
 The third native species of the genus Sisym- 
 brium, is S. Sophia; so called by the ancients 
 from the profound wisdom which a full knowledge 
 of its medical properties indicated. This " Sophia" 
 of ours has, like the word " sophist," one of its 
 derivatives, declined much in dignity ; for the ho- 
 nours of both are now held to be questionable 
 and deceptive. It is a plant easily found on 
 rubbishy waste ground ; and, as Gerarde says, " in 
 the chinkes of stone walls in the mortar." It 
 is an annual of about two feet high, with erect 
 branches, and finely-cut leaves, so much so as to 
 look somewhat like parsley. From this doubly- 
 pinnatifid form of its foliage, it is called the " fine- 
 leaved hedge-mustard." There is a whimsical
 
 128 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS, 
 
 story also about the seeds of this plant viz., that 
 the force of gunpowder is increased by mixing 
 with it a tenth of the weight of these little round- 
 ish grains. The value of this discovery most pro- 
 bably lay entirely with the rural retailer of am- 
 munition. Several old receipts are to be found 
 for improving gunpowder ; perhaps the large 
 coarse grain in which some of it was made up, 
 might have had a facility of ignition given to it 
 by mechanical dispersion, derived from saw-dust ; 
 but good powder seems best when most free from 
 any admixture of foreign matter; and the little 
 yellow seeds of our plant contain no very readily 
 inflammable material. The last Irish species of 
 this genus is Sisymbrium thalianum; this speci- 
 fic name is a " hard word," which, though used 
 by the botanists, seems to be unexplained by any 
 one ; yet the first observer who baptized the 
 youngling, must have had a meaning for it; and 
 as it is a plant very often met with, we too must 
 associate an idea with the word, if we can. We 
 try " Thalia," but find no characteristic associa- 
 tion with that muse ; for, although she is described 
 with a shepherd's crook, and with her petticoats 
 shorter than those of her eight clever sisters, we 
 cannot claim her patronage for Thalianum, as the 
 stalk of our plant will not do for the crook, nei- 
 ther will the small leaves of this Sisymbrium 
 clearly represent the classical Thalian costume. 
 Is the name derived from " Thalamus," a marriage 
 bed ? Alas ! it would not do ; ours is, indeed, 
 almost a wall-cress ; Virgil tells us of a marble 
 marriage bed, viz., "Marmoreus Thalamus," 'tis 
 true also that our little plant springs from lime
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 129 
 
 mortar when it is a little aged, and also from 
 stone walls, yet this is a far-fetched origin for 
 the name. Our last classical resource then is, 
 " Thallo," one of the Horse, equerry to the car of 
 Flora, who presides over Spring; and as our thale- 
 cress produces her small white flowers in April, 
 we will say she is named from the season of her 
 being " brought out ;" which fact is indicated by 
 the above Greek word. In Holland it was once 
 the pleasing practice to place a white rosette over 
 the door where a birth took place. Madame na- 
 ture stars our gateways, clay-banks, and old walls, 
 with this tufty plant, to announce this season of 
 millions of new births; choosing for her ribbon- 
 like clustre of leaves, our country's colour, green, 
 with slight red veins inserted in them, to produce 
 an agreeable variety. We have little more to say 
 about this plant, except to record the associations 
 of the time of year, which feeling every poet has 
 breathed, and those who have not sang have 
 sweetly felt it. It is hard to select from the 
 many praises of Spring which verse ancient and 
 modern offers to us, we must limit our discursion, 
 and adopting Anacreon's lines, transcribe the sus- 
 ceptibilities of that sweet singer of Grgecia, as trans- 
 lated by our sympathizing poet Thomas Moore: 
 
 " See the young the rosy Spring, 
 Gives to the breeze her spangled wing; 
 While virgin graces, warm with May, 
 Fling roses o'er her dewy way. 
 The murmuring billows of the deep, 
 Have languish'd into silent sleep; 
 And mark ! the flitting sea-birds lave 
 Their plumes in the reflecting wave; 
 While cranes from hoary winter fly, 
 To flutter in a kinder sky.
 
 130 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 Now the genial star of day 
 Dissolves the miu'ky cloud away; 
 Arid cultur'd field, and winding stream 
 Are sweetly tissued by his beam. 
 Now the earth prolific swells 
 With leafy buds and flowery bells; 
 Gemming shoots the olive twine, 
 Clusters green festoon the vine; 
 All along the branches creeping, 
 Through the velvet foliage peeping, 
 Little infant fruits we see, 
 Nursing into luxury." 
 
 The delicious airs in the climate where Ana- 
 creon sung, breathe summer upon young spring 
 so suddenly, that they almost seem to be one 
 season, as the above sweet lines intimate ; but 
 our seasons come to us in a more staid and pro- 
 gressive course ; we have full time to make ac- 
 quaintance with Spring before Summer absorbs 
 her ; indeed, her fickleness at times makes every 
 testimony of her sure arrival valuable. We must 
 now claim a slight poetical record of our own 
 Spring, from the heart and the pen of a lady ; it 
 is, of course, full of expressive description, and 
 susceptible gratitude. Hymn by Mrs. Steele : 
 
 " While beauty clothes the fertile vale, 
 
 And blossoms on the spray, 
 And fragrance breathes in every gale, 
 How sweet the vernal day ! 
 
 " How kind the influence of the skies ! 
 Soft show'rs with blessings fraught, 
 Bud, verdure, beauty, fragrance rise, 
 And fix the roving thought. 
 
 " Oh, let my wondering heart confess, 
 
 With gratitude and love ; 
 The bounteous hand that deigns to bless, 
 The garden, field, and grove."
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 131 
 
 Our younger field-botanists should take care 
 not to confound wall-cress with the Draba verna, 
 which occurs more frequently, and has some- 
 thing of the same general form, while, like the 
 present plant, it springs from walls and dry 
 earth fences. Lastly, I have not discovered why 
 our plant has been called popularly in England, 
 " Turkey -pod/' It is, however, very probable 
 that its cress-like flavour may recommend it as 
 early green food to turkeys, when turned out to 
 range in the rather naked clay-paddocks which 
 are close to farm-yards, and where the thale-cress 
 often grows. 
 
 We next meet with Erysimum: it is a genus of 
 cross-bearing flowered plants, named from " Eruo- 
 cio," meaning in Greek, to cure or renovate ; it 
 indicates to nicety, and is, perhaps, the same joy- 
 ous kind of word with our Irish " hoora ;" surely 
 no wonder, for if it produces by its mustard-like 
 hotness such revivals as are attributed to it, the 
 burning of the old Phoenix to evoke juvenility 
 is nothing compared with pulverizing and prepar- 
 ing these seeds, which magical grinding, is is said, 
 makes old people young. We may then, indeed, 
 make a free transposition of our eruca into eureka, 
 and say, we have found it that is when the ery- 
 simurn is proved to be able for all the potency 
 attributed to it by old authors. 
 
 Our first species of this wonder-working genus 
 is cheiranthoides the wall - flower - like hedge- 
 mustard. Its leaf is nearly smooth like that of a 
 wall-flower : it grows in waste places, dry corners 
 of fields, on clay banks, and in hedges. It is 
 about two feet high, bearing a small terminal
 
 182 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 cluster of bright yellow petals, and also a series 
 of single lateral blossoms, or small branchlets of 
 flowers along the stalk. The little foot-stalks of 
 the pods run nearly horizontally, and the siliques 
 themselves, running upright, give a little of a can- 
 delabrum form to the plant when blooming in 
 July. The yellowish-brown seeds are intensely 
 bitter, and have been given as a vermifuge to 
 children, with probably very good effect, from 
 which property they were called worm-seed. The 
 plant, though containing a cress-like acrid pro- 
 perty, is eatable by cows, swine, sheep, and goats. 
 And now for an extract from the legendary lore 
 connected with our Erysimum. Its old English 
 name is treacle-mustard. I have put my eye on a 
 derivation of treacle; I have found that it means 
 three times renowned, from the Greek words 
 "tri," three, and "kleia," glorious. Think of 
 this treacle eaters. The French and Dutch have 
 a similar word, and the Latins had in use the 
 Greek Theriaca among their medicines ; from the 
 Greeks it was adopted by early western com- 
 pounders, and had a very grand place in their 
 pharmacologias. Therion is a wild animal, which, 
 with a termination meaning " sufficient against," 
 was probably the constructive origin of Theriaca, 
 which compound became a remedy against all 
 injuries of a venomous or poisonous nature ; or 
 it might be derived from " Thero," which means 
 to heal, and is also used to express to warm. 
 Now, the seeds of the treacle-mustard are hot 
 and stimulating. Our modern treacle, then, is a 
 descendant of a very ancient family of syrups. 
 Over sixty ingredients were compounded with
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 133 
 
 honey to produce this famous drug. Modern 
 authors slight its antique fame ; but the in- 
 defatigable Mr. Gray, in his " Supplement to 
 all Pharmacopeias," gives the recipe in detail. 
 This ancient treacle was named Theriaca An- 
 droniacha, because Andromachus, of Crete, Ne- 
 ro's physician, was skilful in manufacturing it. 
 The Emperor Antoninus used it daily to prevent 
 any possible poisoning from being malignant ; 
 so we see that incessant drug-drinking, and the 
 practice of turning the stomach into an apothe- 
 cary's shop, is not quite a modern invention, 
 but that the hippish and valetudinarians had 
 their own grand quackeries before newspapers 
 existed to tell of " another wonderful cure " 
 every post. This compound contradiction of me- 
 dicated rubbish was also known as Venice trea- 
 cle, because the Venetians, when traders with the 
 world, had this article on sale for the conveni- 
 ence of the rich and the glutton, who, from the 
 want of activity, suffered all the diseases of en- 
 nui. The treacle common, " the sperm of sugar," 
 as Lord Bacon calls it, has more meaning in it. 
 We exclude the fifty-nine helps to its usefulness, 
 and along with them our treacle-mustard ; and so 
 passes away one of the glories of the herb-garden, 
 while we keep our dark syrup as a wholesome, 
 but coarse, substitute for sugar. 
 
 Our next Erysimum is the Alliaria,ihe onion- 
 flavoured hedge-mustard ; this is a property which 
 will discover it to any one who can smell. It is 
 also called Jack o' the Hedge, I suppose because 
 the old Law has it that "Jack will never be a 
 gentleman," and that the haut-gout of his garlic-
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 like breath can be perceived, even when he is 
 lurking by a hedge-bank, in the smell-exhaling 
 weather of May and June. The appearance of 
 this plant is easily recognised ; it is about a foot 
 or eighteen inches high, looking somewhat like a 
 wild turnip, but the leaves are quite smooth. It 
 has a stoutish flower-stock, with the seed-pods 
 set on to their foot-stalks, almost at right angles. 
 The blossoms are small and white. The heart- 
 shaped toothed light green leaves turn a pale 
 yellow long before they wither ; and, from their 
 garlic-like taste, used formerly to be eaten as a 
 relish between two slices of bread. This taste, 
 says Mr. Sowerby, seems to be the quintessence 
 of the acrid flavour peculiar to the odoriferous 
 plants heightened into that of garlic ; from their 
 pungency it used to be called " sauce alone ;" it 
 was a ne plus ultra : nothing more acid was re- 
 quired. This sauce alone, however, would, by 
 the more refined palates of our times, be sauce 
 left alone : strongly odorous condiments being 
 now to many persons odious. Other persons, 
 too, who are charitably attentive to their neigh- 
 bours' repugnances, avoid alliaceous vegetables, 
 with a view to spare more delicate olfactories, 
 therein following Bottom's judicious advice, to 
 " eat no onions nor garlick, for we are to utter 
 sweet breath ;" which care would enable the 
 speaker, in Quince's phrase, " to be a very para- 
 mour for a sweet voice." 
 
 It has been noticed in the remarks on another 
 stimulating vegetable, that our fresh, juicy, whole- 
 some meats, do not now require the artificial di- 
 gesters which were necessary in the days when
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 135 
 
 old salted oakum, known as store-food, was in 
 use. Those who want truly to enjoy the plea- 
 sures of food and it is, within proper bounds, one 
 of the most lawful, as it is the most universal, 
 of pleasures should, by simple living, keep the 
 powers of taste susceptible. Gluttony and excess 
 defeat the natural excitement of good appetite, 
 and destroy the zest of hunger, that most inviting 
 sauce for the healthy ; forcing the palled palate 
 to appeal for a feeble sensibility to the incongru- 
 ous sauces and violent spices which are used to 
 awake the dull perceptions of the habitually 
 exhausted gourmand. Without, therefore, de- 
 serting that part of our structure which marks 
 mankind omnivorous, we should remember, in our 
 indulgence of variety, not to satiate or abuse our 
 palatial powers. Milton tells us of the refined 
 luxuries prepared by the mother of mankind, 
 when she appeared as an entertainer of man and 
 angels, viz. : 
 
 " On hospitable thoughts intent, 
 What choice to choose, for delicacy best. 
 What order ! so contrived, as not to mix 
 Tastes, not well joined, inelegant; but bring 
 Taste after taste, upheld with kindliest change." 
 
 In the judgment of our grandest poet, such re- 
 finement in the arrangement of food was worthy 
 the consideration of Eve herself. At a paradisia- 
 cal banquet everything should be fitting the high 
 order of guests who met Adam at table : it was not 
 enough to satisfy the cravings of hunger alone, 
 pleasurable sensations were also to have been 
 secured by the viands produced. To this day po- 
 pular adage tells how "the liquid mouth" pre-
 
 136 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 pares to receive our nourishment; and it is one of 
 our daily enjoyments, that perfect digestion com- 
 mences even at our very lips ; a circumstance 
 which Milton epitomizes perfectly : 
 
 " Taste, concoct, digest, assimilate, 
 And corp'ral to incorporeal turn." 
 
 Intimating that the mind itself receives a 
 character from the elegance and delicacy of our 
 food.
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 137 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 GOLD OF PLEASURE. GOLD AS A CURE FOR MELANCHOLY, AND 
 ROCK-ALYSSUM. WART-CRESS. PROCUMBENT DITTANDER. CO- 
 RONE, THE TALE-BEARER. SHEPHERD'S PURSE, AND LADY'S 
 
 POCKETS. PEPPER-WORT. COARSENESS CONTRASTED WITH 
 
 SWEETNESS OF DISPOSITION. 
 
 PURSUING our tour through the tribes of cross- 
 bearing flowers, we come to the genus Came- 
 lina, so called from the Greek "chaTnai," near the 
 ground, and the Latin word " linum" flax. The 
 name, humble flax, is not descriptive, seeing that 
 it is much more robust than the common flax 
 the plant of which this is said by some authors to 
 be the diminutive. Camelina, on the contrary, 
 grows fully three feet high ; but being, when found 
 among flax, a weed, it reduces the value of the crop, 
 and thus " humbling " the flax, it may be commer- 
 cially designated the chamce-lina. We have but 
 one species of this genus, the Sativa that which 
 is SAT, or cultivated. Camella (which is the Latin 
 for a caudle-cup) would not be a bad help to make 
 us remember the vase-like seed-pods of this plant. 
 Like all vegetables which are long known, and 
 which have been put to general use, this enjoys 
 a world of surnames, each being intended to con- 
 vey some point of character. Myagrum, begins its 
 denominations, "myia," being the Greek for a fly ; 
 "agra," to capture, w r hich alludes to the honey-like 
 smell of the flowers, and their attraction for flies. 
 This name is now appropriated to a genus which
 
 138 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 is a native of France ; but the property recorded, 
 when applied to our native myagrum, indicates its 
 applicability, when in flower, in affording honey 
 for bees. Thomson, our British Virgil, alludes to 
 the bee and her mellifluous labours in the mea- 
 dows and flowery fields pleasingly, when he 
 says 
 
 " Nor is the mead unworthy of thy foot 
 Full of fresh verdure, and unnuniber'd flowers ; 
 The negligence of Nature, wide and wild, 
 Where, undisguis'd by mimic art, she spreads 
 Unbounded beauty to the roving eye. 
 Here their delicious task, the fervent bees, 
 In swarming millions, tend : around, athwart, 
 Thro' the soft air the busy nations fly, 
 Cling to the bud, and, with inserted tube, 
 Suck its pure essence its ethereal soul ; 
 And oft with bolder wing they, soaring, dare 
 The purple heath, or where the wild thyme grows, 
 And load them with the luscious yellow spoil." 
 
 But if our Greek and Latin combination is 
 humble, our English term for this plant is superb. 
 " Gold of Pleasure " is not small change in our 
 botanical treasury. Our quaint and learned Bur- 
 ton, among his remedies against heroical love- 
 melancholy, recommends gold, because of its 
 beauty, as a cure. He says, " Gold, of all others, 
 is a most delicious object a sweet light ; a goodly 
 lustre it hath ;" and in proof of its tonic quali- 
 ties, he quotes St. Austin, and continues by 
 saying, that "the sight of gold refresheth our 
 spirits, and ravisheth our hearts ; it so revives 
 the spirits, and is an excellent receipt against 
 melancholy" 
 
 " For gold in physic is a cordial ; 
 Therefore he lov'd gold in special."
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 139 
 
 Tills quaint wit, however, gives his laud upon 
 gold in a double sense ; and so, probably, must 
 we when dealing with the designation of the 
 vegetable " Gold of Pleasure," for its oily seeds 
 have been made a source of considerable profit, 
 whence may have sprung some of the approba- 
 tion indicated by its very laudatory name. 
 
 Our old friend, Gerarde, tells us, that " Dios- 
 corides saith the roughness of the skin is polished 
 and made smooth with the oylie fatnesse of these 
 seeds ; also, that Ruellius teacheth that the juice 
 of the herbe healeth ulcers of the mouth ; that 
 the peasant doth use the oyl in his banquet, and 
 the rich for his lampe." As an agricultural plant 
 it has not been much cultivated in Ireland ; nor, 
 since grain crops have had such a predominant 
 profit, was it much sown in England. We observe, 
 "pure Colza oil imported directly from France " in 
 the advertisements of chandlers ; it is manifest 
 then, that if attended to, a market for the oil ex- 
 ists at present ; and, consequently, this vegetable 
 may, with other new or revived crops, gain agri- 
 cultural notice. Its value is enlarged on in the 
 Flemish husbandry of " The Society for Promot- 
 ing Useful Knowledge," page 51, where, among 
 other recommendations, it is stated that it ripens 
 its seeds in the short time of three months from 
 the time of sowing; on this account it may be 
 sown in Spring, where rape or any other crop has 
 perished during the Winter. 
 
 In taking leave of our gold-flowered vegetable, 
 we may notice, that when it was figured in the 
 English Botany it was called Alyssum sativum, 
 but since the publication of the old edition of
 
 140 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 that work, Alyssum lias been restricted to a 
 genus of which we have not a species in our 
 Irish flora. There is a species, however, known 
 in our flower-gardens which invites a word on its 
 merits ; it is the well-known Alyssum saxatile, 
 or Kock Alyssum, a hardy pretty flower, which 
 grows well on dry fences or stony places, and is 
 an excellent rock-plant. Its learned name is de- 
 rived from a, to deprive, in Greek, and "lyssa," 
 rage ; it took away anger ; and so, indeed, ought 
 all pleasing objects. Its common English name, 
 Mad wort, was of the same import ; it removed 
 anger, which we all know is a temporary in- 
 sanity. Now, any plant which can charm away 
 that demon, we must cherish ; and instead of 
 " stamping it in a mortar, and braying it with 
 sugar," according to the old wife's prescription, 
 let us stamp the fact sweetly on our minds, that 
 anger and passion are poisonous to human nature. 
 Coronopus is the next genus which demands 
 our attention : its name is not Corona opus, the 
 crown of the work. No ; to attain the summit 
 of this plant's history will take much time yet. 
 It is so called from the branchy palmate form of 
 its structure, resembling somewhat a bird's foot, 
 and the leaves being again divided in the manner 
 of toes; its designation in the Greek is "koroiie," 
 a crow, and " pous," a foot, which combination 
 reminds us of our former friends, the Ranuncu- 
 lacce, or English Crow-foots. We must not again 
 directly translate the Greek here, but, to prevent 
 a duplication of names, retain the generic title, 
 in Latin, Ooronopus. Our first native species is 
 Coronopus Ruellii ; for which appellation we
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 141 
 
 have not met any cause assigned. We find, how- 
 ever, that a botanist, whose name was Ruellius, 
 translated Dioscorides into French ; and it is 
 probable that the species was thus designated to 
 his honour. It is a low and very procumbent 
 plant, of a vivid green colour in both stalk and 
 leaf; its inconspicuous white petals are almost 
 lost in the green clustering calyxes which sur- 
 round them. Its seed-vessel is a small kidney- 
 shaped pouch, which is flattened in its form, but 
 crested with elevated sharpish points ; the name 
 of Wart-cress is appropriately given to it from 
 this structure. It is found very commonly by 
 road-sides and in stony waste places ; it seems 
 much attached to limestone, gravel, or chippings 
 as a home ; and from June to September may be 
 smelled before it is seen in recesses among rub- 
 bish. It has a very active flavour of the mus- 
 tard and cress character every part, seed-pods 
 and all, partaking of it. It is called also Swine's- 
 cress, either because of its rank acridity, or be- 
 cause pigs eat it, which, indeed, is not improbable, 
 as these animals seem now and then to indulge 
 in stimulants, and grub and gravel for them at 
 the way-side, but without detracting from their 
 porcine dignity as much as men do from theirs 
 when they wallow in low excitements, and, by 
 such beastliness, place themselves on a level with 
 the meanest of the sty-born swinish multitude. 
 We must now take leave of this crawling offence 
 to our noses ; if we trample it, its garlic haut- 
 gout molests us, especially so in hot dry weather, 
 when its pungent vapour seizes on our eye-lids and 
 makes them smart, in revenge for our slow sight
 
 142 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 not having noticed it hiding in some corner on 
 lime-stone rubble. Shakspeare picked out a hu- 
 man prototype of the Wart-cress in one of Sir 
 John Falstaff's tattered recruits, as follows : 
 
 Sir John. Is thy name Wart ? 
 
 Wart. Yea, Sir. 
 
 Falstaff. Thou art a very ragged wart. His 
 apparel is built upon his back, and the whole 
 frame stands upon pins. 
 
 Shallow. Ha, ha, ha ! You can do it, Sir ; 
 you can do it. I commend you well. 
 
 The other native species of Coronopus is Didy- 
 ma ; from " didumos," twins, because the seed- 
 pouches, though twain, are yet "twin brothers, 
 whose residence and birth scarce is dividant." This 
 is the procumbent Pepper-wort of old gardeners, 
 and is very like the preceding species, except that 
 it is altogether a more humble plant. It is found in 
 plenty on clayey banks and road-sides ; Professor 
 Hincks gathered it in two localities in Cork, viz., 
 about the Lough, at the south of the city, and in 
 the neighbourhood of Clark's Bridge. It flowers 
 in July, but its herbage is its most guiding feature, 
 and its double seed-vessels the most individualiz- 
 ing characteristic. Linnaeus notices its neaT rela- 
 tion in this last part of its structure to Cochlearia ; 
 old authors called this plant Procumbent Dittan- 
 der, which is, probably, a diminutive of the Latin 
 "ditio," power, a term which we are familiar with 
 in the structure of the English word " addition ; " 
 otherwise we may derive Dittander from " dito," 
 to enrich or increase, our adopted word " ditto " 
 being thus used, the vegetable we are speaking 
 of having had, in old cookery, fame as a powerful
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 143 
 
 stimulant, and an " enriching corroborative." It 
 is not easy to find poetic notices of mere meat 
 garnishes ; their story is somewhat culinary, and 
 consequently independent of such imaginative re- 
 commendations ; yet their latinized name Goro- 
 nopus, reminds us of Coronis in Ovid, to whose 
 fate we may dedicate our flower, and some of the 
 poet's verses. This lady was the daughter of 
 Coronseus, King of Phocis, she was beloved of 
 Apollo, but even to a god ladies will sometimes 
 be fickle ; she encouraged a rival, and Apollo's 
 pet raven told him of it.* She lost her life and 
 her love, but the raven, for his tale-bearing, was 
 turned from white to black for ever ; he was 
 warned by the daw to hold his tongue, but he 
 was too vain of being master of a secret to be 
 retentive, and to show how rich he was, he whis- 
 pered his scandal to Apollo. The daw told him 
 her own sad tale, to induce him to keep his 
 " prating tongue " quiet, but in vain ; she urged 
 on him, that Minerva had severely punished her 
 for her tittle-tattle ; and surely real female wis- 
 dom could never endure scandalous detraction or 
 permit a whisperer of secrets in her presence. 
 Just imagine a prating, espying lady, whose name 
 was Corone, and of course a relative of Coronis, 
 having her fairness turned into blackness, because 
 of her invidious whisperings, and of her being 
 obliged to wear the odious nickname of Corvus 
 in addition, so that when she is now seen on her 
 old haunt, the sea-beach, she is known as the 
 
 * Ravens have long screamed in unhonoured obscurity, but 
 Dickens has again given them a place near poetic inspiration. 
 His raven belonged to our modern Apollo.
 
 144 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 " corvus-corone," or carrion-crow. That fair lady 
 who once could whisper other people's love-secrets, 
 is now condemned to caw and creak, marking how 
 odious is the voice which has dealt in scandalous 
 insinuation, or in exaggeration of harmless trifles 
 into injurious offences and jealousies. The daw's 
 warning we quote ; for, says Ovid 
 
 " The daw gave honest counsel, though despis'd, 
 And tedious in her tattle ; thus advis'd, 
 Be thou no tell-tale, for I think my wrong 
 Enough to teach a bird to hold his tongue. 
 But you, perhaps, may think I was remov'd, 
 As never by the heavenly maiden lov'd ; 
 But I was loved, ask Pallas if I lie ; 
 Though Pallas hate me now, she won't deny : 
 For I, whom in a feathered shape you view, 
 Was once a maid I vow my story's true ; 
 A blooming maid, and a king's daughter, too. 
 A crowd of lovers own'd my beaxity's charms 
 My beauty was the cause of all my harms ; 
 Neptune, as on his shores I went to rove, 
 Observed me in his walks, and fell in love ; 
 Swift he pursued, I ran along the strand, 
 Till spent and wearied on the sinking sand, 
 I shrieked aloud, with cries I filled the air, 
 To gods and men, nor god nor man was there. 
 A virgin goddess heard a virgin's prayer, 
 For, as my arms I lifted to the skies, 
 I saw black feathers on their whiteness rise." 
 I strove to fling my garment on the ground 
 My garment turn'd to plumes; and girt me round 
 My hands to beat my naked bosom try, 
 Nor naked bosom now nor hands have I. 
 Lightly I tripped ; nor, weary, as before, 
 Sunk in the sand, but skimmed along the shore, 
 Till rising on my wings I was preferred 
 To be the chaste Minerva's virgin bird ; 
 Preferred in vain ! I now am in disgrace, 
 Nyctimene, the owl, enjoys my place." 
 
 Rambling abroad to observe plants, it may be 
 excusable to notice a bit of bird history ; perhaps,
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 145 
 
 then, the extraneous and discursive interpolation 
 just inserted, and its moral, must be accepted. We 
 see in the story, that the once snowy daw became 
 foul and dingy by indulging in envyings and 
 whisperings, her appetites being prepared for the 
 meanest garbage ; the goddess of wisdom repudi- 
 ated the uncharitableness she betrayed, until 
 seeking, with anxiety, every low and disgusting 
 thing, the carrion bird is now the punished " cor- 
 vus corone;" this name at length brings us back 
 to take leave of the genus Coronopus, which 
 being mostly acrimonious, biting herbs, may well 
 be devoted in deprecation to Discordia, the god- 
 dess of envy and maliciousness, and offered for 
 ever to her as " scandal-wort," chosen to avert 
 the deadly poisons of tale-bearing, and scandal- 
 mongering. 
 
 The next genus of cruciferous plants, Capsella, 
 is very indicatively named, being called so from 
 its seed-pod, which is a little coffer or capsule. It 
 was formerly united with the genus Tklaspi; and 
 as that name has long been associated with it, we 
 must stop to say that it was very appropriate; 
 describing, as it did, the flattened sides of the 
 seed-pods, which idea was early intimated by the 
 Greek word T/dao, to compress. This is one of 
 our commonest weeds, and shows its insignificant 
 white flowers during all the Summer months. It 
 is a thick spreading weed in the furrows of corn- 
 fields, turns waste clay-banks green at their 
 bases, and, indeed, is a most universal rambler in 
 all arable grounds. It is hardly necessary to seek 
 it by means of its leaves. The Capsella Bursa- 
 pastoris the pasturer's purse, or bourse of the
 
 146 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 French cannot be mistaken. The very variable 
 height and robustness of this plant might lead to 
 the idea that a three-inch specimen was a different 
 species from that which is two feet high ; but this 
 difference is merely the result of its being stinted 
 for food when young say during its struggle up 
 through the gravel of a court-yard, as compared 
 with its flourishing facilities among the rich pa- 
 bula3 of a potato trench ; and, by the way, let me 
 remind the reader that the nourishment of the 
 infancy and youth of plants determines for ever 
 their bulk and vigour. In this fact, like to ani- 
 mals, and to man himself, it is very hard to con- 
 quer the diminishing effect of an early starving. 
 The widely-sawed edges of the leaves are remark- 
 able ; but it is still more worthy of observation be- 
 cause less common, that the root, when recently 
 pulled up, has a smoke-like smell a fume de 
 terre like our common fumitory. The Toy-wort, 
 or " false-pocket," has its broad bag-part upper- 
 most, as it were, supported instead of being sus- 
 pended by its string : some pockets are made to 
 retain their contents; but this, on the contrary, 
 is constructed so that when the little yellow disks 
 within are ripe, the purse shall open, and, instead 
 of preserving, scatter its treasures. Thus, enough 
 of the seeds reach the ground in spite of the birds, 
 who are fond of them. 
 
 " Apropos to pockets," what an inviting discus- 
 sion on this subject solicits me out of my road. 
 The battle of the pockets has always figured in 
 the integumental history of the first order of 
 ike mammalia. In our earliest time the song 
 says that
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 147 
 
 "Madam Eve, who was straight as the sticks of sky-rockets, 
 First brought up the fashion of wearing no pockets." 
 
 And we find ever since that time controversies 
 about wearing them, or leaving them off what 
 size they were to be, where they were to be worn, 
 &c. &c. The lady Fashion is fond of extremes; 
 and we find accordingly that the pockets in the 
 time of the Irish patriarchirate that is to say, of 
 the fourteenth century were great open sacks, 
 worn in front, and decked with the gayest co- 
 lours. On old tombs may still be found many a 
 Bhan Tierna bearing such a satchel ; and it is pro- 
 bable that the hitherto unexplained line 
 
 " Pray visit Cork with your pocket before you," 
 
 has an ancient Celtic origin, and records the ar- 
 ticle of costume alluded to. But we must not 
 dwell too lengthily on the history " long pockets ;" 
 they have taken their place importantly in all 
 time. Mr. Shandy discussed them carefully when 
 he was decisive that his son Tristram's breeches 
 should be sustained by hooks and eyes. Even 
 our sentimental bard, Moore, treats of them, and 
 tells us that 
 
 " Ere times and morals both grew bad, 
 
 And yet unfleec'd by funding blockheads, 
 Happy John Bull not only had, 
 
 But danced to money in both pockets ;" 
 
 which proves that they were full free, and the coin 
 could clink in them. We might quote largely on 
 the particulars of pockets and purses, from Dame 
 Fortune's own silken net down to the empty 
 silique which a prudent Pope once gave to a 
 boasting alchemist. We might remember us of 
 the Lord Chancellor's marsupium, notorious for
 
 148 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 its intolerable swallow, by which lands, houses, 
 and gold are ingulphed, but is now somewhat less 
 dangerous to the community since the Incum- 
 bered Estates Commission has laid a hand on that 
 maw. We might; but we must return to our 
 plants, and point to the fact, that they are in this 
 family much under pocket-law, long and short 
 pockets mark the great divisions of the Tetrady- 
 namia, Siliqua, and Siliculosa; the long purse 
 and the little one having been chosen by Linnaeus 
 to distinguish his cross-bearing community of 
 flowers; as it is in the world among men some 
 bear crosses on sceptres, they possess great si- 
 liques; while others carry their crosses on pil- 
 grims' staves, bearing through the world their 
 bag, but often a little one a truly siliculous and 
 very limited purse; and so ends my chapter on 
 pockets. In conclusion, the qualities of our Cap- 
 sellce are those of the milder Tetradynamice, and 
 though it is the true Thlaspi of Dioscorides, it has 
 no pretence to value as a medical herb. 
 
 The genus Lepidium now invites our attention ; 
 so called, some authors say, from " lepis," a scale, 
 the little seed-pouches resembling small fish- 
 scales. Withering says it is so named, because it 
 is of an anti-scorbutic group of plants, useful to 
 remove leprosy and scaly diseases of the skin. The 
 general stimulant character of this large family 
 has been noticed by Professor Tilley, at the Cam- 
 bridge meeting of the British Association in 1845,* 
 which statement being a recent account of their 
 properties, is fitly abstracted here. He says, cru- 
 ciferous plants are taken as condiments, in conse- 
 
 * See Miscellaneous Communications, page 35.
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 149 
 
 quence of a stimulant oil which they contain ; and 
 it is interesting to find that sulphur, combined 
 with other chemical substances which are found 
 in the oil of mustard and in the oil of garlic, is 
 also the organic radical material of oil of assa- 
 foetida, which odorous seasoning is much used in 
 India as a condiment. Sulphur, in all its forms, 
 is a specific against cutaneous diseases; and our 
 Lepidiums, from their chemical composition, may 
 be considered Lepifuges, or dispersers of scaly 
 diseases. A long list of maladies which are pro- 
 duced in our countries by dirtiness, bad air, and 
 unwholesome food, their mischiefs reduce the 
 physical and moral tone of those who suffer from 
 them, and the healthy perception of all the senses 
 is damaged. We know that a scaled skin indi- 
 cates the low perceptivity of a fish or a reptile, 
 and a degradation of moral apprehension has 
 always been associated with this obstruction be- 
 tween the outer world with the inner intelligence 
 of man. Thus, we have Spenser describing a 
 base character as associated with cutaneous filthi- 
 ness : 
 
 " Her crafty head was altogether bald, 
 And, as in hate of honourable eld, 
 'Twas overgrown with scurf and filthy scald." 
 
 Shakspeare uses "scall," or scaled, in the same 
 sense ; and Dryden applies scurfiness as indicative 
 of moral defect, when he says 
 
 " They are happy, when by length of time 
 The scurf is worn away of each committed crime 
 No speck is left." 
 
 It is almost whimsical to remark further, that 
 one of our most recent vulgarisms points out in-
 
 150 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 tricacy and deceitfulness as being similarly de- 
 monstrated : he is an artful, mean rogue, is 
 conveyed by saying, " he is a scaly fellow." 
 
 Our first species of this genus Lepidium is 
 latifolium, the broad-leaved kind. Its common 
 name is Broad-leaved Pepper-wort ; it has the 
 acrid quality proper to the whole group of plants. 
 In wettish shady places near the sea, and in salt 
 marshes, this robust perennial is to be found. 
 Its aspect is somewhat like a middle-sized horse- 
 radish plant ; and its pungent roots have been 
 used as a substitute for that condiment, deriv- 
 ing from thence its name of poor man's pepper. 
 In July the small white flowers appear, but so 
 plentifully on the blossoming thyrsus as to be 
 very conspicuous. An infusion of the leaves is 
 emetic; and from this action was formerly, pro- 
 bably, truly considered to be a means of relief in 
 cholic. 
 
 The second Irish species of Lepidium is ru- 
 derale, because it grows in rude coarse places, 
 most especially on ragged rocks near the sea., the 
 Latin word for rubbishy being rudus, and in such 
 places this scale- wort finds a natural home; it 
 is thus called after its nurture ; rusticity, however, 
 is one thing, and rudeness quite another. Hum- 
 ble station and rustic habits may forbid the in- 
 effable facilities of true kindness as it is polished 
 by good society ; but good nature, in the most 
 rusticated individuals, can be perceived as a refin- 
 ing and cordial sentiment, while assurance, though 
 it be London assurance, can be vulgar with the 
 activities of 
 
 " Uncomely courage, unbeseeming skill."
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 151 
 
 Position alone is no cordon against want of re- 
 finement. The city rich ones at times are worse 
 than rustical, and fall into the intolerable vul- 
 garity of " swilled insolence " on the contrary, 
 observe, 
 
 " But as the sun's refulgent light 
 Heav'n's wide expanse refines, 
 With sovereign lustre through the soul 
 Celestial sweetness shines. 
 
 " This mental beam dilates the heart, 
 
 And sparkles in the face ; 
 It harmonizes every thought, 
 And heightens every grace. 
 
 " One glimpse can sooth the troubl'd breast, 
 
 The heaving sigh restrain ; 
 To sickness' couch it comes with rest, 
 And soothes the sufferer's pain. 
 
 " Beneath its bright auspicious beams 
 
 No boist'rous passions rise ; 
 Moroseness quits the peaceful scene, 
 And baleful discord flies. 
 
 " A thousand nameless beauties spring, 
 
 A thousand virtues glow, 
 
 A smiling train of joys appear, 
 
 And endless blessings flow. 
 
 " As when the blooming Spring returns, 
 
 And cheers the wintry plains, 
 O'er earth, and air, and human hearts, 
 Ethereal sweetness reigns." 
 
 Abridged from Robertson. 
 
 Our " rudesby " of the Bohereens sometimes 
 springs from the mud, and bears with it the vul- 
 garity of its nature unamended. It is a coarsely 
 tasted vegetable, with a foetid fox-like smell when 
 bruised; its flowers are yellowish, white, small, 
 and inconspicuous, appearing in June. The young 
 botanical physiologist will observe in this inflor-
 
 ]52 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 escence one of the instances of seeds being per- 
 fected without the blossom-leaves or petals which 
 are so generally displayed on the festive occasion 
 of the birth in plant progeny. Instead of this 
 coloured drapery, we have sometimes only a 
 white-edged calyx, yet the seed-pods are plenti- 
 fully ranged on the stalks, which is usually from 
 six inches to a foot high. The seed-pouches are 
 double, and are adherent to one another with a 
 conspicuous line of junction. Our plant is also 
 popularly designated from the shape of its leaves, 
 which are more slender than those of the pre- 
 vious species, and is consequently known as the 
 narrow-leaved pepper-wort. This vegetable was 
 formerly added to the list of our peptic-worts 
 the concoctive or digestive salads which were 
 made to garnish the coarse animal food of other 
 times. It is rather probable, however, that no 
 wise or tasteful "kitchener" would, in our day, 
 put the eating of it among his peptic precepts.
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 153 
 
 CHAPTER XL 
 
 MITHRIDATE PEPPER-WORT. THE FINISHING CURE. SMOOTH PEP- 
 PER-WORT. WOAD; HOW A GOOD TEMPER SMOOTHS THE SKIN. 
 
 DYING BLUE. PICTS. -THE RAPE PLANT, RAPE OIL, ETC. 
 
 BIRD SEED. CAGED BIRDS. STERNE AND THE STARLING. 
 
 FREEDOM AN UNCONQUERABLE DESIRE IN OUR NATURES. 
 
 RESUMING our history of the Scale- worts, or Le- 
 pra-fuge cresses, we come to Lepidium campestre, 
 an inhabitant, as its name declares, of the cam- 
 pos, the open field, where it. flourishes in clayey 
 or gravelly patches of ground. This word, cam- 
 pestre, was used among the Persians to describe 
 the "shorts," as tailoring affectations name them, 
 which wrestlers wore when engaged in the strug- 
 gling and straining of public athletic contests. 
 The bi-pouched seed-pods of this plant have some- 
 what the form of that compact garment ; and 
 Linnseus, who was stored with images from the 
 classical dictionary of his memory, had, very pro- 
 bably, the secondary meaning of campestre in his 
 mind, as an additional fitness in the surname he 
 conferred on this Lepidium. This cress is a ro- 
 bust plant, with the stalk -leaves halbert-head 
 shaped, and jagged on the edges. It is a foot 
 or more high, and catches attention by the hoary 
 pubescence on the whole herb. The thlaspi-form- 
 ed seed-vessels lead readily to its generic place; 
 the flowers are in small corymbs, with wliitish 
 petals. It is rather an unfrequent plant hi Ire- 
 land, but is met with sometimes in potato trenches, 
 or corn-field sides. There are some structural
 
 154 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 varieties described by botanists, but these differ- 
 ences must be examined in systematic works. 
 
 This species has various names ; one is the cow- 
 cress probably cows have been seen to crop it, 
 It is also called Mithridate pepper-wort. The story 
 of Mithridates and his medicinings has been told 
 before in the description of the Mithridate mus- 
 tard; nevertheless, a case of modern "domestic" 
 medicine, which is better than Buchan's, may be 
 worth insertion here: A re -married widower 
 once called on an acquaintance of his, and having 
 produced a phial with some brownish-looking sy- 
 rupy fluid in it, said "You, sir, are a chemist. 
 For mercy and goodness sake tell me what is in 
 this bottle." The reputed chemist raid "Really, 
 I do not know. Give me some help. Is it ani- 
 mal, vegetable, or mineral?" Ex-widower replied 
 "I don't know; but it was the cure my first 
 wife took when she was sick ; and as the present 
 mistress is poorly, I was just thinking it might 
 cure her." The chemist replied indignantly 
 "Take care, sir. Do you want to get me into a 
 conspiracy to poison your wife ? Be off with your 
 bottle, this instant." "Dear sir," continued the 
 widower, "what did I say? I am sure it was a 
 very skilful lady who made up the bottle for my 
 first wife. I am sorry you are angry at it, and 
 so must bid you good-bye." 
 
 We see from this modern instance that, per- 
 haps, the King of Pontus long ago, being a learn- 
 ed man who spoke twenty languages, although 
 he poisoned his Queen, may have only been try- 
 ing a cure on her, like the lady-leech of our day, 
 and her agent the ex-widower.
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 155 
 
 The last species of this genus is the Lepidium 
 Smithii, of Hooker, called the "Smooth field pep- 
 per-wort," because its seed-vessels are glabrous, 
 but which slight circumstance is scarcely sufficient 
 cause for involving smoothness in its name, while 
 nearly every other part of the plant is hairy to 
 such an extent, as to be described by Sowerby 
 and others as Tklaspi hirtum, or the hairy Mi- 
 thridate mustard This kind of a lucus, almost 
 non-lucendo, often occurs in description, from 
 naturalists treating some one fact as essential, 
 and passing by unnoticed others which are more 
 popularly within the reach of observation. This 
 Lepidium grows from six to eight inches high, 
 in the borders of fields and of hedges, showing 
 its whitish flowers with brown stamens plenti- 
 fully in June and July. When its stalk and 
 leaves only are attended to, its aspect is not un- 
 like that of a small white rocket, being a some- 
 what suflruticous or shrubby plant. Its downy 
 pubescence, and comparatively conspicuous petals, 
 distinguish it well from the Lepidium campestre. 
 This cress also was one of the spices of our coun- 
 try before we received the more pungent kinds 
 from India ; thence come spices for fiery liquors 
 in our days 
 
 " Cinnamon and ginger, nutmegs and cloves, 
 Wherewith to engender a jolly red nose." 
 
 Burton, who anatomized melancholy, or the 
 "black choler, "pronounces that "spices cause hot 
 and head melancholy," and forbids them to stu- 
 dious persons, particularly to melancholy school- 
 masters, believing such things to be corrosive, 
 being hot and dry "in the first degree." As the
 
 156 WALKS AFTEK WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 old pharmacy says spiceries aught to be moder- 
 ately used, because they often disorder the con- 
 coction, having an effect like the over -roasted 
 meats on Petruchio, who tells us 
 
 " For it engenders choler, planteth anger ; 
 And better 'twere that both of us did fast, 
 Since of ourselves, ourselves are choleric, 
 Than feed it with such over-roasted flesh." 
 
 Indeed, experience has shown to all close ob- 
 servers that simplicity in food is the best, that 
 stimulating the palate perpetually makes it cal- 
 lous, except to drastic excitements ; 
 
 "And that though we with pepper may heighten the savour, 
 We thus ruin our taste for each delicate flavour." 
 
 Isatis, the next genus of "cross-worts," is so 
 called from the Greek word Isazo, to smoothen. 
 Its long leaves are glabrous, that is, very smooth ; 
 and they were believed to induce a similar smooth- 
 ness in the skin by their mere application. The 
 leaf has no malign juices in it ; so that, in the at- 
 tempt to smoothen cuticular rugosities, if it does 
 no good, it will do no harm, except by leading 
 people into the lazy doctrines of remedies, which 
 abstracts them away from the better method of 
 preventing evils, either corporeal or mental, from 
 afflicting them. A well-regulated temper does 
 much to insure for the skin its true velvetty pli- 
 ancy and smoothness; while an irritable disposi- 
 tion or habit turns the cuticle the wrong way, 
 like " Quills upon the fretful procupine." I knew 
 a peevish, ill-conditioned old gentleman, whose 
 "bad humours" took at last the unpleasant form 
 of a tetter on his shoulder. His surgeon was
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 157 
 
 once asked how the patient was ; and, mark, his 
 patient was then moving about pretty stoutly. 
 "Oh," said the doctor, "I shall never be able to 
 cure him. He has such a malignant temper, that 
 this will be a morbid sore, I fear, to him. And 
 so it turned out ; the little boil became a car- 
 buncle, and the irritable man's health was broken 
 up, so that he never recovered. Our old poets, 
 Beaumont and Fletcher, give cheerfulness the pre- 
 eminence due to it as a restorative and tonic, in 
 this song of "merrie thought," from one of their 
 plays, viz. : 
 
 " Tis mirth that fills the veins with blood 
 More than wine, or sleep, or food ; 
 Let each man keep his heart at ease, 
 And he scarcely knows disease. 
 He that would his body keep 
 From distempers, must not weep, 
 For whoever laughs and sings 
 Never he his body brings 
 Into fevers, gouts, or rheums, 
 Or ling'ringly his lungs consumes, 
 Or meets with aches in the bone, 
 Or catarrhs, or griping stone, 
 But, contented, lives for aye ; 
 The more he laughs, the more he may. 
 
 Burns says, figuratively, we ought to "stroke 
 people cannily, and with the hair." It is absurd 
 to apply the smoothest lubricants to the skin, ex- 
 cept the mind be bright and lustrous ; indeed then, 
 and without the leaves of the Isatis, the body 
 will be beauteous and translucent. The specific 
 distinction of our plant is tinctoria the tinctur- 
 ing or staining species. This plant is very unlike 
 the group it belongs to, resembling much more 
 one of our large native Asters than its own con-
 
 158 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 geners. Linnaeus considers it a maritime plant; 
 and so are the half shrubby composite herbs which 
 it resembles. It grows about two feet high, and 
 in July shows its golden yellow thyrsus of blos- 
 soms. The seed-vessels are of a dark brown 
 colour. It is now entirely a cultivated herb, 
 so much so that the specimens found wild may 
 well be charged with having strayed away from 
 the farmer ; and yet, it seems generally admitted 
 to have been the source of the blue dye formerly 
 used by the early Britons They were not trans- 
 planters, so that it can hardly have been a plant 
 introduced by the aboriginal pictorial people, 
 whose love of colouring went beyond their love of 
 covering ; and who, scorning the mineral jewels, 
 studded and streaked their skins with 
 
 "Dints and lines of evening's tinct, 
 The purply streaming amethyst." 
 
 Our dyestuif vegetable stands alone, distin- 
 guished among its numerous family by the re- 
 markable property of yielding a blue pigment. 
 Old Salmon, the herbalist, bequeaths to us a ra- 
 ther extemporaneous method of developing this 
 characteristic : he tells us to take the little tongue- 
 like " pods wherein lye the seeds, and chew them, 
 so as to be broken with moisture, and they will 
 give a blew color." The common economic method 
 of producing this colour is much more comprehen- 
 sive. The leaves are mashed up, and a process 
 carried on which is described in works on dyeing 
 its details, which it would be inconveniently 
 long to transcribe here. The account given of 
 this plant in The Entertaining Knowledge 
 article, " Materials for Dyeing," is good, and may
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 159 
 
 satisfy general inquirers. There is also a copious 
 notice of it in Withering 's Botany, describing its 
 culture, and giving manufacturing particulars. 
 The woad dye, though in itself not beautiful 
 enough for our tastes as a colour, is the best foun- 
 dation of depth in our permanent blues ; and we 
 accordingly notice many of our manufacturers an- 
 nouncing that their blue cloths are "well woaded." 
 The word "woad" is the modern form of the Cel- 
 tic gwed bright, brilliant, or showy ; from which 
 the Latins have their gaudio, to delight ; and from 
 it the English of the Tudor times derived their 
 phrase "gauds" showy decorations, or jewels. 
 Pliny translates this name by glastum the blue 
 dye-stuff; from which Latin word old Gerarde 
 says, and says in error, the Celtic name is "wrung 
 out." Caesar, in his " Fifth Book of the French 
 Wars," saith, " That the Brittons do color them- 
 selves with woad, which giveth a blew color." 
 The ancient Britons painted themselves with a 
 pigment prepared from woad ; and their national 
 name is said to be derived from the Celtic word 
 Bretho, to paint. Many ancient writers give an 
 account of the court costume of the Britons, which 
 would indicate a fine climate in their day equal, 
 indeed, in mildness to Paradise itself; or else it 
 would point to a hardihood of constitution not to 
 be believed on mere traditions. They tell us that 
 the British wives and daughters despised all co- 
 vering of the woof and web. Dr. Garth rhymes 
 about them thus : 
 
 " In times of old, when British nymphs were known 
 To love no foreign fashions like their own ; 
 When dress was monstrous, fig leaves were the mode, 
 And quality put on no paint but woad."
 
 160 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 This story of the learned doctor, and those he 
 copied it from, must, for meteorological reasons, 
 be a slander; it is probable that with them, as 
 with most uncivilized nations, painting was con- 
 sidered among the early British to be a great 
 adornment ; warriors of nearly all savage tribes 
 paint themselves to excess ; and many of the 
 priests, who assumed to encounter more than 
 earthly enemies, took trouble to make themselves 
 savage-seeming and horrid at certain fierce sacri- 
 ficial periods; as the Bacchi had also their Bac- 
 chantes, it is probable that women joined in the 
 wild orgies of the northern parts of Europe, and 
 then, in the words of an old writer, " The glastum, 
 was employed depicturing the bodies of British 
 wives and daughters, who thus, coloured all over, 
 went naked in certain kindes of sacrifices: the 
 frenzied and often intoxicate dancings of many 
 pagan ceremonies leading the wildish people to 
 break from clothings and all other decency." His- 
 torians say that the priests and higher orders of 
 warriors and sacrificers had figures of the hea- 
 venly bodies well painted on the skin with this 
 pigment, and that the Britons emulated the New 
 Zealanders, and other intelligent savages, by the 
 picturations on their bodies. The animals bla- 
 zoned on them seem to have been aboriginal armo- 
 rial bearings ; a degree of dignity and distinction 
 which the Irish Celtic stock, who never painted 
 their naked bodies, are not recorded to have en- 
 joyed at all. Thus, we see that the celebrities of 
 every age have had some way or other of " star- 
 ring" it; the pictorial people pigmented them- 
 selves with rosettes of what they, of course, con-
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 161 
 
 sidered " a lovely azure." At this fascinating 
 contrivance, modern beauties would, no doubt, 
 " look blue ;" the priestesses of the modern bou- 
 doir, more tasteful than those of the ancient wig- 
 wam temple, have shifted the cerulean tint from 
 the skin to the stocking; but the learning which 
 once was among our women a kind of "lionizing," 
 is now, happily, become very general, and blue- 
 tinted hose are no phenomena; so much so that 
 our poet Moore's taste is complied with, as sug- 
 gested when he makes Mr. Hartington comment 
 on Lady Bab's display thus: "Learn as much 
 as you please; I could bear a little peep at the 
 blue-stockings, but save me from the woman who 
 shows them up to the knees ! " 
 
 The Latin name glastum under which Pliny 
 notices the Isatis, is derived from the Celtic 
 glas; the word intimates blue, green, blueish, or 
 hoary green ; the juice of the woad wearing on 
 its surface a greenish hue, as, indeed, does the 
 solution of indigo, with which this plant's colour- 
 ing principle assimilates much in character. This 
 old Celtic word appears in many combinations 
 of our language ; one such is glaze, which is usu- 
 ally attended by a glaucous or sea-green tint ; 
 glass too, itself, was formerly much more green- 
 ish, blueish, or opalescent than now, and from 
 which circumstance its name was accurately de- 
 scriptive. Topographically, the word glas for 
 green is universal in Ireland ; for instance, Baltin- 
 glas, " the Baal-tin field or green ;" Glas-nevin, 
 "Nevin's-green;" Fin-glas, "the Fin's-green," &c. 
 In Scotland, the same name often occurs, as Glas- 
 gow, "the goats' green;" and even in England,
 
 162 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 the unextinguislied and unextinguishable Celt 
 still speaks from the soil, as Glas-tonbury, &c. 
 
 We now enter a genus of vegetables, Brassica, 
 whose application, as good for men and cattle, gives 
 to most of the species vast interest and import- 
 ance. The writers on every portion of its history 
 are so numerous and copious, that our descriptions 
 must be a petty breviate, indeed; and, as this 
 plentiful literary supply is everywhere accessible, 
 we may be permitted to be more sparing in our 
 quotations. The name Brassica is said to be de- 
 rived from the Celtic word " bressic," a cabbage ; 
 and this derivation from our aboriginal tongue 
 would naturally induce belief, that although a 
 cultivated, and, of course, much modified, group of 
 vegetables, we have always had several of them 
 indigenous. Withering is not content to abide 
 by our Celtic root, but must give it an Attic 
 origin, and, consequently, he derives it from the 
 Greek " brazo," to boil ; the operation, no doubt, 
 which is of most importance in making all the 
 Brassica tribe useful, for vegetables have been 
 vilified, and called causers of cholera, merely be- 
 cause they were but parboiled, instead of being 
 cooked. The Brassica tribe of vegetables can- 
 not be wholesome when merely sodden and ren- 
 dered tough by hot water. This may be taken as 
 an axiom at all times, and in all states of health ; 
 but when various modifications of intestinal sus- 
 ceptibility were endemic, as in our cholera visi- 
 tations, food of any kind eaten half raw must 
 have been mischievous; and thus such crude gar- 
 bage brought a bad name on "garden-stuffs" in 
 general
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 163 
 
 Our first species of this genus is the Brassica 
 napus, which specific distinction seems derived 
 from the Saxon word "knob" "knop" or "knap," 
 a lump or broken piece ; the root being somewhat 
 elongated, turnip-formed above the ground, al- 
 though spindled below the earth. It is a culti- 
 vated farm vegetable, but strays into waste places 
 and sides of corn-fields. It grows one or two feet 
 high, and has smooth glaucous leaves; the lower 
 of which are lyre-shaped and toothed, the upper 
 long-heart-shaped and clasping the stem. The 
 calyx is yellowish ; and the small, but yet brighter 
 yellow petals make some show in May and June. 
 The pods are torulose, or like a string of beads, 
 and are therefore remarkable and characteristic. 
 
 Like most cultivated plants which have their 
 leading properties in common, the names of 
 the species and varieties of the Brcissicas have 
 been intermixed and subdivided interminably ; 
 gardeners have their catalogues of titles, agricul- 
 turists have theirs, and botanists secure to them- 
 selves variety in liberal amount. Minuteness is 
 laudable, but those who seek its completeness, 
 must go to Deeandolle and other able classifiers, 
 leaving us to the more superficial and easy work 
 of recording popular generalities. Our present 
 plant, then, we describe as the Raipe of agriculture ; 
 we find this word in the Greek, and in the Latin, 
 on its way down to us, but no exact account has 
 turned up of what it means as applied to our 
 vegetable. Napus, the specific distinction of this 
 plant, is represented by the English word "nape," 
 and is taken directly from the Greek "napo," a 
 hillock ; we find this nomenclature demonstrated
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 by the collar or protuberant neck above the root 
 and beneath the leaves of the Brassica luipus, 
 and this discovers to us the meaning of its old 
 English name " naphew" " naveau" in French, or 
 "navew" in more modern English works, which 
 are the softened or vowel-sounding modifications 
 of the above Latin word "napus" 
 
 The age of green crops in Ireland having been 
 much forwarded by the free admission of foreign 
 grain, we may expect to see a larger extension 
 of Rape culture in our agricultural districts. It 
 is known to do admirably on well-tilled clay soils, 
 and yield a plentiful production in such situations. 
 The examination of its value as a cattle-feeding 
 vegetable belongs to the calculations and eco- 
 nomy of farming ; it is also universally known as 
 an oil-producing plant, rape oil, derived from its 
 seed, being one of our commonest articles of ma- 
 nufacturing use. Every work on husbandry, na- 
 tive and continental, notices the processes for 
 growing Rape and preparing its oil for commer- 
 cial purposes ; one of the most summary and de- 
 scriptive accounts is in " The Entertaining Know- 
 ledge "volume, "On Vegetable Substances;" 
 article, "Fixed Oils." The oil is known in 
 France as Colza oil, where it is largely prepared, 
 as it also is in Belgium and Holland. One thing 
 appears in this account which is not commonly 
 mentioned, viz., the stalks and waste of the 
 Rape, when burned, afford much potash ; a cir- 
 cumstance important to be known, now that the 
 value of alkalies, as restoratives to the land, 
 is generally appreciated. This vegetable was 
 one of the old group of coleworts ; but we shall
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 165 
 
 apply that name only to the cabbage species, as 
 its use here would lead to confusion. One of the 
 popular applications of the seed of the Brassica 
 napus is as food for cage-birds. Rape is one 
 of the bird-seeds well known to every keeper 
 of feathered pets. When considering the ques- 
 tion of those minor morals which have their ef- 
 fects upon our every-day feelings, the propriety 
 of keeping caged birds has frequently been dis- 
 cussed. We all love liberty ; should we, then, 
 forgetting to do unto others as we would be done 
 by, imprison our fellow bipeds, who, wearing 
 feathers, resemble us in our sometimes plumery 
 and gaily coloured finery ? Sentimental Sterne 
 has recommended this consideration to our com- 
 passions very vividly in his Journey. With what 
 feeling he commences his story: "I was in- 
 terrupted with a voice which I took to be a 
 child's, complaining, ' It could not get out/ I 
 looked up and down the passage, and seeing 
 neither man, woman, nor child, I went out with- 
 out further attention. In my return back through 
 the passage I heard the same words repeated 
 twice over, and, looking up, I saw it was a star- 
 ling hung in a little cage. ' I can't get out, I 
 can't get out/ said the starling." Sterne's effort 
 to aid the bird's struggles carries our sympathies 
 with it. He says for us, "I vow I never had my 
 affections more tenderly awakened." He had 
 recently been under-estimating the evil of im- 
 prisonment, even in the Bastile ; but the bird's 
 complaint was true to nature, and put to flight 
 his theoretical sopliisms, which he had imagined 
 in mitigation of the misery of a prison Then fol-
 
 166 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 lows his splendid deprecatory apostrophe : " Dis- 
 guise thyself as thou wilt, still, slavery, thou art 
 a bitter draught." The bird in the cage, he says, 
 pursued him to his room, and he was going to 
 figure to himself the miseries of imprisonment, 
 as applied to millions of his fellow-creatures who 
 endure it ; but he limited his plan he " took a 
 single captive ; and, having shut him up in his 
 dungeon, he looked at him through the twilight 
 of his grated door." Let any one who makes 
 light of the punishment of imprisonment; who 
 thinks it too mild an infliction on an offender, 
 read Sterne's " Captive," see how slightly, intrin- 
 sically, his state differs from that of the captive 
 of to-day, surely then he will know and pitifully 
 feel what misery confinement brings with it. 
 
 But we must return from men to birds : how 
 far is it wrong to keep them caged? The invi- 
 tation to do so is founded on one of our most 
 natural, nay, of our most amiable sentiments, 
 viz., the love of nature's own children, and of 
 holding intimate intercourse with them. It is 
 easy for those who know the pleasures of rural 
 life to understand the feelings which induce the 
 town-prisoned artizan to keep cage-birds. Say 
 we omit the eminent instinct which we all enjoy 
 that of adding to our group of perceptive be- 
 ings who know us, and who love us must we 
 not sympathize with the poor shoemaker, who, if 
 he cannot command rural sights from his garret 
 in a lane, secures to himself rural sounds, at 
 least, sharing his savings with his dingy black- 
 bird, whose coat, it is true, wants some of its 
 native gloss, but who still possesses his rich whistle
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 167 
 
 in perfection, with which he sometimes rolls and 
 carols so loudly as to drown the beating of his 
 master's hammer on his work ? All we ask, then, 
 for the feathered choristers is, that birds shall be 
 selected who have not the instinct of freedom very 
 strong in them ; the sparrow's bold energies sub- 
 mit badly to confinement, and the half-domestic 
 robin with a still worse grace changes his fami- 
 liarity and confiding friendship in the garden for 
 a prison, whence he "can't get out." Under the 
 care of man, the linnet seems satisfied to extend 
 his twitter into a song. The wood-lark, too, for- 
 gets that he is encaged, and cheerfully challenges 
 your attention in unexpected town residences ; 
 but who would be so cruel as to restrain the 
 characteristic instinct of the sky-lark in a cage, 
 and there forbid to him his natural home, with 
 
 " The mountain nymph, sweet Liberty, 
 In unreproved pleasures free, 
 Where the lark begins his flight, 
 And, singing, startles the dull night 
 From his watch-tow'r in the skies, 
 Till the dappled dawn does rise '?" 
 
 The lady of cage songsters, however, is the 
 canary; graceful in form, and of lively and taste- 
 fid coloured plumage, with fully reconciled and 
 cheerful habits, she is well recommended to the 
 lover of drawing-room melodists ; but, with all 
 these facilities for domestication, let us remember 
 that " a small cage" was one of the prisoned star- 
 ling's afflictions. Those ladies then obey humanity 
 as well as good taste who give to these " primrose 
 pets " a good-sized aviary, in which they can use 
 their wings, and show their graceful movements
 
 168 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 with effect ; their health and energy are improv- 
 ed by this exercise, and their melodious powers 
 made more tonic and powerful. The canary, 
 seems naturalized to our restraints ; she re- 
 sembles Montgomery's imprisoned dappled doe, 
 who, 
 
 "All fire and life, 
 Trips along with gallant pace, 
 Her limbs alert, her motion grace ; 
 Soft as the moonlight fairies' bound, 
 Her footsteps scarcely touch the ground. 
 She happier than a queen appears ; 
 Free 
 
 From all the risks of Liberty ; 
 Born in a gaol, a pris'ner bred, 
 No thoughts of freedom plague her head." 
 
 And now, surely, a good deal of chat has been 
 made out of the words, "bird seed ;" but it must 
 be excused Brassica napus was rather a barren 
 subject, if severely restricted from the free discur- 
 siveness of a rural rambler.
 
 WALKS AFTEK WILD FLOWERS. 169 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 TURNIPS : KNOWN TO THE ROMANS. EATEN RAW AS FOOD IN THE 
 TIME OF THE LAST IRISH FAMINE. DEAN SWIFT AND THE STREET 
 CRY OF " TURNIP." SEWERS AND CHANNELS. CABBAGE : AFFEC- 
 TATION ABOUT THE WORD. FIRST SPRINGING FROM DROPS OF 
 
 JOVE'S PERSPIRATION. PERCEPTION IN HEADS OF CABBAGK. 
 
 THE second Irish species of Brassica is the Rapa 
 the translated word has been already applied 
 as the English name of the previous species ; this 
 plant is also entitled to share in the manure-miser's 
 approbium as both the Brassica iiapa, the rape, 
 and the Brassica rapa, the turnip, are gross feed- 
 ers, and great consumers of the pabulum in soils. 
 The fact of these vegetables being very voracious, 
 was well known to early cultivators ; the Roman 
 agriculturist, Columella, calls a bed of the Bras- 
 sicas " rapina ;" but whatever they carry off from 
 the soil, they fully return to the horticulturist or 
 farmer in a highly organized and applicable form. 
 The common turnip is too well known to require 
 description ; it frequently runs wild in the neigh- 
 bourhood of garden and farm, and its glaucous 
 perfoliate stalk, surmounted with golden flowers, 
 is very familiar. The true root is the fibrous cau- 
 dex which proceeds from that succulent globe be- 
 neath the leaves the turned or rounded knop, 
 from which our word " turnip " is constructed. 
 The previous species, Brassica napus, as we have 
 seen, has an elongated knop a nape which Ge- 
 rard e says is like unto a great cucumber. Our 
 present plant, on the contrary, has its vegetable
 
 170 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 ivory turned into a ball, just beneath its rough 
 cluster of herbage a structure recorded in Gay's 
 Sixth Pastoral, when Bowzybeus sings his rural 
 cosmogony thus 
 
 "Of nature's laws his carols first begun, 
 How turnips hide their swelling heads below, 
 And how the closing coleworts upward grow." 
 
 The turnip is an orbicular expansion of the stem, 
 a turned nip. The horticultural and agricultural 
 modes of improving and adapting the vegetable 
 for the various uses to which it is applicable, are 
 to be found in all books of gardening and hus- 
 bandry, making too large a literature for insertion 
 here. The writers for the farmer and gardener 
 having done their parts fully, this appendix takes 
 up a less utilitarian tone, and seeks to amuse, 
 while it is somewhat historical also. 
 
 Our potato famine has, very generally, intro- 
 duced a greater variety of garden stock into cul- 
 ture ; and, even as field produce, turnips are more 
 generally raised than they have been. A rash 
 and chance-medley confidence in our changeable 
 climate, and in the ripening powers of our fre- 
 quent cold and wet summers, has, for a series of 
 deteriorating seasons, exposed our staple crop, 
 which, in its best harvested condition, is a rather 
 tender South American under-ground bud, to all 
 the accidents of ill-usage. The potato, which with 
 us is properly the subject of ten months' culture 
 from the planting to the digging, has been driven 
 by the hurried hazard of about half that period 
 for its maturation. The debility thus introduced 
 and made general, will, perhaps, take some time 
 to be replaced by energy and vigour ; but we saw
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 171 
 
 sad results during the visitation of the potato rot ; 
 hundreds of our people, for want of better food, 
 devoured turnips as a principal part of their sus- 
 tenance, and often raw too, having no means to 
 purchase fire to dress them. In that state they 
 were, no doubt, a mere stay against starvation, 
 being very indigestible, and, as diet, very meagre 
 and watery. I may give one instance, from among 
 many similar cases of destitution, of the way in 
 which the famishing often fed themselves : 
 
 " A woman and her children were seen in a 
 gentleman's field devouring raw turnips ; the 
 owner was a magistrate ; he inquired, ' Are they 
 putting them in a bag?' 'No/ said his informant, 
 ' they are eating them/ ' God help them/ said 
 he, 'I will not notice them ; driven to devour my 
 turnips raw, they are more to be commiserated 
 than blamed/ " Even those who could buy this 
 poor alleviation of hunger consumed them in every 
 way, cooked, if possible, half-cooked from necessity, 
 but, alas ! entirely undressed when famine-hunger 
 was ravenous and indiscriminate. Prudent cooks 
 recommend turnip food to be mashed, and then 
 stewed with milk, adding salt and spices to savour 
 it ; and, certainly, for those who have delicate 
 stomachs, such a dish is both palateable and 
 wholesome. Turnips were a part of the farmer's 
 food in Gay's time. He gives a short national 
 dietary, in his First Pastoral, as follows : - 
 
 " Leek to the Welsh to Dutchmen butter's dear. 
 Of Irish swains potato is the cheer. 
 Oats for their feasts the Scottish shepherds grind. 
 Sweet turnips are the food of Blouzalind : 
 While she loves turnips, butter I despise ; 
 Nor leeks, nor oatmeal, nor potato prize."
 
 172 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 Turnips have been baked into pies and sweetened ; 
 roasting was also one of the old modes of dress- 
 ing them for the table. Pope names this simple 
 food of the Roman agriculturists, when he states 
 how circumstances might have sent inordinate 
 epicurim to browse on vegetables, viz : 
 
 " Lucullus, when frugality could charm, 
 Had roasted turnips in the Sabine farm." 
 
 But turnips, when prepared without plenty of 
 water to wash away their brassicacious twang, 
 have an acridity of taste which is too coarse for 
 modern palates ; indeed, our old gardeners com- 
 plain that these nips, when dry-toasted, " did nip 
 their eyes sorely ; although being dried of their 
 wateriness, they were more corroborative for the 
 belly, and less flatulent therein/' Turnips used 
 to be stored in the early winter ; and we are told 
 in an old work, "Peacham on Drawing," that 
 November month should be pourtrayed with 
 bunches of parsnips and turnips in his hand. 
 Sweet Anne Page must have attended the hous- 
 ing of some such winter stores, as we find Master 
 Slenders ill-favoured faults suggesting a simi- 
 larity between his visible mawkishness, and the 
 unfeatured globularity of our vegetable. Anne 
 prays " Good mother, do not marry me to yond' 
 fool. Alas ! I had rather be set quick i 5 the 
 earth, and bowl'd to death with turnips ;" but 
 Anne, by being one of the "best discretions of 
 a woman," escaped this tediousness of a man. 
 Our quaint historian of Irish vegetables, Threl- 
 keld, gives us an extract from Blair's account of 
 the rapid vegetation of turnip seeds, a precocity
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 173 
 
 common to them, and to those of many cruciate 
 plants ; this vivacity gives them an utility in 
 producing readily a small salading where no 
 better vegetables can be had on board ship, for 
 instance. Dr. Blair tells us that turnip-seed, 
 sown in July, appeared above ground in three 
 days ; and in little over a month, one of these 
 turnips weighed two pounds fourteen ounces. 
 These observations were noted so long ago as 
 the year 1702, but the great sized cattle-turnips 
 of our agricultural shows are big enough to 
 supersede the fairy-grown gourd of the an- 
 cient tale, and would almost answer for P onset 
 and his seven brothers to burrow into. Monster 
 vegetables are common now ; and giants from 
 culture do not require the exaggerations of fable 
 to describe them. Blair continues his "turnip 
 tellings" by stating, that he has counted the 
 seeds of this vegetable, and found that there 
 were 1 000 grains in one ounce weight of them. 
 He also calculated that a vegetating seed's pro- 
 gress in accumulation was to gain 671,600 times 
 its original weight of vegetable matter in six 
 weeks' growth, which he divided into the follow- 
 ing periods: it increased 11,193 times its weight 
 in a week; 666 times its weight in every hour, 
 and 11 times its weight in a minute. Surely, 
 after this relation, the Irish description of active 
 vegetation is scarcely hyperbole, when we say, in 
 a lively spring-time, that we can "hear the plants 
 growing." Perhaps we are not to bind our old 
 author severely to his exact figures ; but we 
 know that these seeds grow amazingly quickly, 
 when aided by shade and heat ; that a kitchen
 
 174 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 shelf makes a good hot-bed for them; and a piece 
 of well-wetted flannel, or any such retentive sur- 
 face, supplies the place of a seed-bed. 
 
 Of these slight materials portable gardens may 
 be made of all shapes and forms, resembling in 
 little the clipped topiary works formerly so much 
 the fancy in hedges, when pillars, cones, and co- 
 lumns grew greenly; and paradisiacal figures of 
 Adam and Eve were dressed with the tailor's 
 shears very extemporaneously. 
 
 We have in all old herbalists, of course, a long 
 list of cures turned up by the turnip ; most of 
 these benefits, however, belong to all wholesome 
 vegetables, which are properly cooked ; these 
 utilities appear under the name of making the 
 "stomacke soluble," curing scorbutics, &c. One 
 of the famous old remedies for hoarseness, which 
 is still retained in country places, is covering 
 sliced turnips with sugar, and when the juice dis- 
 solves into a syrup, saving it for the intended 
 " emollient." It is very probable that this far- 
 mer's capilliare may be healing, and, when taken 
 in sips, would soothe down an irritative cough ; 
 this syrup was called Sapa of old, and had its 
 curative merits. As to eating sliced turnips with 
 pepper and vinegar, as a salad, it is a taste which 
 does not obtain use among us now ; nor will mo- 
 dern horticulture permit us to be thrown back 
 upon such raw and coarse resources. Our abori- 
 ginal straggler, the wild turnip, we have brought 
 into the arable field, where, as the Brassica rapa, 
 it is ravenous of the substance in the soil; but 
 when in its turn devoured, it goes far, in another 
 form, to replenish its place of nurture. But say
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 175 
 
 that we have gathered some of our wild plants, 
 and taken them into the vegetable garden, there, 
 known as the Rapum 8ativum,it is "sat" by an- 
 other propagator, the gardener, who guides it fur- 
 ther on its way to the kitchen, where it is finally 
 received by the cook, as one of the most univer- 
 sally applicable of culinary materials. Agricultur- 
 ally, horticulturally, in the officina, or drug-shop, 
 and in the culiTia, the kitchen, we have attended 
 our vegetable all through its course ; but one mat- 
 ter remains yet for us to do, we must say a few 
 words, according to Dean Swift, on the political 
 history of Irish turnips. The groans of the grum- 
 blers, in old times, were as great an annoyance to 
 slowly-moving legislators as they now are ; public 
 speaking was more restricted, the old authori- 
 ties were, of course, more suspicious and prying ; 
 crimes, by implication, were more easily attri- 
 buted, and more difficult of contradiction, they 
 were the more readily believed. Swift records, in 
 his own way, the sensitive feeling of the Govern- 
 ment in 1732, in his "Examination of certain 
 Abuses, Corruptions, and Enormities of the City 
 of Dublin." The Dean says, " I shall mention one 
 of the public cries of Dublin which has reference 
 to politics; but it is, indeed, of all others, the 
 most insolent, as well as treasonable, under our 
 present happy establishment I mean that of 
 turn-ups, not of turnips, according to our best 
 orthography, but absolutely turn-ups. We hope 
 to see the cards shuffled once more, and another 
 king turn-up trump; and when shall we meet 
 over a dish of turn-ups? The same term of art 
 was used in plots against the Government in trea-
 
 176 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 sonable letters, written in ciphers, as you may 
 read in the trials of those times. 
 
 " It is to be observed, that this cry was sung in 
 a very particular manner by fellows in disguise, 
 to give notice where those traitors were to meet 
 in order to concert their villainous designs. 
 
 " I have no more to add upon this article than 
 an humble proposal, that those who cry this root 
 at present in our streets of Dublin may be com- 
 pelled, by the justices of the peace, to pronounce 
 turnip, and not turn-up; for I am afraid we 
 have still too many snakes in our bosom ; and it 
 would be well if their cellars were sometimes 
 searched when the owners least expected it ; for I 
 am not out of fear that latet anguis in herba 
 or, there is treason hid in the turnips." 
 
 Nearly a century and half has elapsed since this 
 quiet drollery was levelled at the tremulousness 
 of a timid authority in the Irish capital ; and to 
 this day, as then, when you visit the Coombe, 
 where the Drapiers 3 Sympathizers flourished and 
 faded, you meet an aged man, leaning on the low 
 back of a donkey's cart, whose eager eye ranges 
 along those lofty half-ruined houses, and, search- 
 ing from the cellars to the garrets for an answer, 
 raises the ancient invitation or warning, to sum- 
 mon from their seclusion, below or above, the 
 still discontented natives of that locality. Swift 
 saw this hawker's antetype, noted his ragged cos- 
 tume as a disguise, and left us his ancient Irish 
 melody secure which is " Turn-up," " Turn-up." 
 
 Our vegetable has been named in plainest 
 verse by one other of our wits. Gay, when 
 speaking,
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 177 
 
 " Of the tide 
 Whose sable streams beneath the city glide," 
 
 introduces decaying vegetables as one of its no- 
 torious constituents ; and describes, in a manner 
 that might edify a Board of Health, how there is 
 
 " Below a black canal of mud, 
 Where common sewers a lulling murmur keep, 
 Whose torrents rush from Holborn's fatal steep ; " 
 
 and, disinterring again that ancient Roman god- 
 dess, who, when raised, was not quite so bright 
 in her colours as the Venus of the Sea, he tells 
 us that for her t , m, , . 
 
 " The heaving tide 
 
 In widen'd circles beats on either side ; 
 The goddess rose amid the inmost round, 
 ^ With wither' d turnip-tops her temples crown'd." 
 
 But when she disappeared from earth she dived, 
 instead of soaring 
 
 " The goddess plunges swift beneath the flood, 
 And dashes all around her showers of mud." 
 
 Now, this association of delicate ideas makes 
 the Holborn story a proiws to the Coombe, or 
 any uncleansed street or way, where the channel- 
 age, rough and rugged, prevents the flow of water 
 from flushing or scouring the underneath sewer- 
 age. The goddess of these foul-poisons which 
 come up through sewer-gratings could not have a 
 more appropriate wreath to laurel her victories 
 over health, decency, and comfort, than the rot- 
 ting herbage of the Brassica tribe : their decay is 
 quick, and their exhalations so nitrogenous and 
 foetid, that their deposits in fermenting masses 
 are nearly as dangerous as those animalized poi- 
 sons which we believe sanitary laws will era- 
 dicate, by compelling extramural burials. It is
 
 178 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 hoped the inhabitants of towns will zealously la- 
 bour to get rid of the malign influences from all 
 decaying substances within their precincts; but 
 every material has some fitting use, and the law- 
 ful worship of the ancient subterranean goddess, 
 may be revived under the beneficence of an effec- 
 tive Sewerage System. Then shall her turnip- 
 top wreath grow green and gay, while what poi- 
 soned the pent-up city, in the country becomes 
 the pabulum of life. 
 
 Our next Brassica is Campestris so called 
 from its growing in the campus or field ; it is 
 also called common wild navew or naphew a 
 word, as we have before ascertained, derived from 
 " Tiapus," a thickened nape or collar, the stem 
 being somewhat fleshy, and, consequently, capable 
 of being dressed like asparagus. We need not 
 delay to give the botanical specific characters of 
 the wild cabbage ; those who find it in corn-fields 
 will be easily led by its general appearance to 
 determine its specialities; a large yellow blos- 
 som, with glaucous green leaves, clasping a stem 
 of about two or three feet high, will bid them 
 look into their flora, and try if they have found 
 the Brassica campestris. Our supply of matter 
 from which to select a short history of cabbages 
 in general is too abundant for our purpose ; we 
 must, therefore, refer our readers to some of these 
 stores of knowledge, in preference to the attempt 
 at abridging them. Phillips's " History of Cul- 
 tivated Vegetables," contains a sufficiently copi- 
 ous account of cabbage. Louden's " Encyclopedia 
 of Gardening" has a more modern consideration 
 of its history ; and, indeed, all gardening and
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 179 
 
 farming works give it the space its importance 
 to man and to his tributary animals has long 
 demanded. One of the best accounts of this 
 vegetable is in the " Library of Entertaining 
 Knowledge," in the volume entitled "Vegetables 
 Used for the Food of Man ;" and I shall give no 
 more acknowledgment than this for what I may 
 select for my abstract. Respecting our present 
 member of the family of the Brassicas, authors 
 write but little : where two travel on horse, one 
 must go in front ; and so it is with these cross- 
 worts the younger brother, the cabbage, car- 
 ries away the public attention and position by 
 his greater usefulness. Brassica campestris has 
 scarcely a thought given it, except by our faith- 
 ful historian, Gerarde, who says, that "Wild 
 colewort hath broad leaves not unlike to the 
 tame colewort, but lesser, as is all the rest of 
 the plant ; is of nature wild, and, therefore, 
 not sought after as a meat ; " but is sown and 
 husbanded, adds Threlkeld, upon ditch banks, 
 for the seeds' sake, by which gain is often gotten. 
 These Brassicas are a very social tribe, and 
 know no exclusiveness in their family arrange- 
 ments. Propinquity provoketh consanguinity 
 among them, says an old author; and their 
 progenies are of all commixture. Salmon, an 
 herbalist of 1710, tells us truly, that for the spe- 
 cification of the cabbages it is vain now to be 
 particular; and either by design or accident, the 
 varieties in this vegetable have been ever since 
 that time accumulating. The busy-bee, much 
 dusted with the pollen, flew from blossom to 
 blossom and made a mixed generation, which
 
 180 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 often baffled the seedsman's hope in a pure race 
 or kind ; while the skilful gardener cultivated 
 by transferring some superior occasional quality 
 resulting from happy combinations, but which 
 did not in that form belong to the Brassica 
 campestris. Chrysippus wrote a whole volume 
 on their virtues, applying them in some shape or 
 form to every inch of the body and every feel- 
 ing of the mind ; so you see that this very ple- 
 beian plant, the very name of which as a dish 
 fastidious persons, with an unexplained affecta- 
 tion, abjure at their dinner tables, has afforded 
 literary matter for copious volumes written by 
 dieticians and sage mediciners from the days 
 of imperial Rome until now. I heard a military 
 officer's lady say that she drove a mimini pimini 
 major's wife to such extremity, by calling 
 cabbage, cabbage, that she, in her elegancy, had 
 to induce her major to play minor, and to ex- 
 change out of the regiment where such an out- 
 rage could be committed with impunity. The 
 consequence of asking people will they take 
 " vegetable/' when, perhaps, the dish is unopened 
 and the contents a secret, is notorious and incon- 
 venient. It is difficult to discover whence this 
 coxcombery has arisen. People of good sense 
 cannot but apply Sir Hugh Evans's repudiation 
 to this practice of mock refinement in language, 
 and think, at all events, if they do not say, 
 " What phrase is this ? why, it is affectation." 
 If, indeed, the word cabbage was subject to any 
 possible equivoque, prudery, which is never truly 
 delicate, might make a show of shunning it ; but 
 there is no such excuse for getting rid of a name,
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 181 
 
 and supplying its place with an anomia. It is 
 dangerous dealing with those superfine people ; 
 yet I will risk it, and give to the nationalism 
 of one of our rural philomath's a revival here. 
 A good " Irishian," as a scholar in " the verna- 
 cular" is styled, is always somewhat of a Latin- 
 ist besides ; and, holding it as undoubted that 
 the more juvenile tongue is no other than the 
 Celtic cloaked in ^Eolic terminations, our ancient 
 philologer never looked into Ainsworth until he 
 had first sacked O'Reilly, having found the hard 
 Celtic word Bresic meaning a tegument, and 
 softened down into Brassica he announced it 
 as the origin of the northern Irishman's (vulgo, 
 the Scotchman's) mode of designating his infe- 
 rior garments, or "breeks." Getting on thus 
 to the specific distinction of our plant, cam- 
 pestre, he finds a second explanation in addi- 
 tion to that of a "flat field," it also means 
 " tegmen," a covering, an apron ; upon this hint 
 our Irishian pronounced he had discovered why 
 early Celtic writers had repudiated the notion 
 that mere fig-leaves supplied materials for the 
 primitive tailoring of Paradise. Thus does our 
 bold Hibernian scholar and antiquary trium- 
 phantly prove, that it was not in a paltry pli- 
 cation of fig-leaves Adam and his Eve enveloped 
 themselves, but they fetched from their vege- 
 table garden the superior substantiality and size 
 of cabbage-leaves, which were laid in folds around 
 them for a cincture. He neatly shows that the 
 kilt was continued from that paradisaical era 
 by the Irish, although now worn chiefly by the 
 Scottish branch of the Celtic people; and also
 
 182 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 thinks that the variety of Brassica called red- 
 cabbage may have been alternated in the petti- 
 coat, with the greener leaves as a tasteful variety, 
 in this ancient vegetable tartan ; which, being 
 cool and comfortable, would be suitable enough in 
 a warm Eastern climate. Many plants have had 
 some time of introduction allotted to them; and 
 we are but too happy at finding the causation of 
 cabbages traceable up to the mythological period 
 by some horticultural Hesiod, a metrical version 
 of whose Brassic-ogony is here produced : 
 
 " It is said our wild-cabbage proh pudor 
 Sprung from blobs of King Jupiter's Sudor. 
 On Olympus, the gods once in quorum 
 Had a case and cross-case laid before 'em; 
 Lawyer Momus brought in all the pleadings, 
 Full of cranky, queer roundabout readings; 
 Till he posed the "grand wig" of the session 
 With his spice of the tricky profession; 
 For law is a mess and a mystery, 
 As appears in all new and old history. 
 Judge Jupiter often sought laurels 
 By mixing in mischief and quarrels; 
 The Dog and the Fox had a fight, 
 And his godship must needs set them right. 
 Videlecit, forth comes the hound, 
 And proves in his nature 'tis found 
 As his privilege, when he is willing, 
 That vermin, the fox, to be killing. 
 The Modereen Rue* next replied, 
 That while yelper's case was not denied, 
 There were instincts long granted by fate 
 On which Pincher's penchant must wait; 
 For Foxes, from nature, elude 
 The Beagles by which they're pursued. 
 Lawyer Momus then followed the fact; 
 Quoted Martin's benevolent Act; 
 And denounced, to an unwilling Court, 
 All hunting and killing for sport. 
 
 " Red-dog," Celtic for fox.
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 183 
 
 Such moralities maddened King Jove, 
 
 God, goddess, and nymph of the grove 
 
 Would hunt, and destroy a quadruped 
 
 For sport; so it needs must be stupid, 
 
 And very bad taste, to decry 
 
 The diversions of people so high ; 
 
 Who, like our own princes, love chasing, 
 
 And patronize gambling and racing. 
 
 But this contest of fate against fate 
 
 Put the Court in a quandary great: 
 
 Both sides seem'd entitled to victory 
 
 From laws which are stark contradictory. 
 
 The resume of Jove's joking jester 
 
 For decision gives puzzle and pester: 
 
 Nature seerus to claim power for Pincher 
 
 Fixed fate is for Reynard a clincher. 
 
 Now his godship, with fume and with fret 
 
 Excuse me burst out in a sweat; 
 
 For working so knotty a thesis 
 
 Induced copious diaphoresis; 
 
 Thus Jupiter- Pluvius became 
 
 The dew-dripping deity's name; 
 
 The affluent sweat on the sand 
 
 Made verdant the barrenest land; 
 
 And a problem to bother a Babbage 
 
 Thus caused the causation of cabbage. 
 
 But how was the legal case ended 1 
 
 Arch Mercury Jove thus befriended; 
 
 Come, governor, be not down-hearted; 
 
 Suppose Dog and Fox have both started, 
 
 That chaser and chased are let run 
 
 As the fates have their fix'd tethers spun; 
 
 There must be some end to their scamper, 
 
 Or the finis your worship might hamper. 
 
 In this peripatetical college, 
 
 Though Minerva should lend you her knowledge, 
 
 Lo, lest you should make any blunder, 
 
 Work a slight metamorphical wonder, 
 
 And turn the two beasts into stone; 
 
 Presto Reynard and Pincher are known 
 
 In Naples as guards to the grot 
 
 Del Cani, where canines are caught 
 
 To be stifled, because they gave pain 
 
 Long ago to King Jupiter's brain, 
 
 Made his seething Medulla exude 
 
 Crass vapours, all acrid and crude;
 
 184 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 Which his virulent fretting exalted 
 Into sweat, very bitter and salted ; 
 And on the sea-beach where it fell 
 Now the wild-cabbage flourishes well; 
 But 'tis acrid and saline as yet, 
 As if watered by Jove's bitter sweat." 
 
 It is to be hoped that, after this beginning of 
 our history of the cabbages, those most jealous of 
 their honour will see that we have not slighted 
 them, even the Lady Valisneria, who, in the work 
 on " Whim- whams," attributes perception to this 
 vivacious vegetable, could not now complain. 
 Her servant was wringing the head off a cabbage, 
 when the sensitive mistress screamed out, " Ah ! 
 you cruel wretch, if it is your nature to appro- 
 priate your fellow-creature for your food, decapi- 
 tate the head of cabbage, and do not torture it 
 by twisting its neck in that cruel manner." But 
 we must postpone the remainder of our lore to 
 another chapter; to prepare for which transition 
 we must conclude with our plant, celebrated as a 
 mere eatable by Robert Burns. He says: 
 
 " For me, I can be well content 
 To eat my bannock on the bent, 
 And kitchen't with fresh air ; 
 Of lang-kail I can mak' a feast, 
 And cheerfully hold up my crest, 
 And laugh at dishes rare." 
 
 Horace added something to his recommenda- 
 tion of cabbage, and deemed it well for a work- 
 man to work out of. He says, in his second "Sa- 
 tire" of the second book 
 
 " I saw the hardy hireling till the ground. 
 * * * * 
 
 His cattle graz'd, and children listening stood, 
 The cheerful swain his pleasing tale pursued; 
 On working-days I had no idle treat, 
 But a smok'd leg of pork and greens to eat."
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLO AVERS. 185 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 SEA-CABBAGE. NUTRITIVE QUALITY OF GARDEN CABBAGE. CAULI- 
 FLOWER, COW-CABBAGE: VEGETABLE ANTIPATHY. KATT, BROSE. 
 
 CALCANNON. FORTUNE-TELLING WITH KAIL-STOCKS. PICKLED 
 CABBAGE. RED CABBAGE, ETC. 
 
 THOUGH the last, by no means the least import- 
 ant of our Brassicas is the Oleracea so called 
 because it is one of the very best vegetables to 
 dress in an "olla," or pot. In its wild state it is 
 the Sea-cabbage of our coasts, which is found now 
 but sparingly. Its greyish-green leaves, bearing 
 a hue common to many plants near the sea, are 
 waved, lobed, and very smooth ; it grows about 
 two feet high, but at first it spreads a good deal 
 on these clayey sands where it has not been ex- 
 tirpated by being used for food ; it makes a nota- 
 ble part of the sea-beach herbage, its broad thick 
 leaves being pictorial and characteristic. We 
 find that, in Raffaelle's two cartoons of the " Mi- 
 raculous Draught of Fishes," and the " Charge to 
 Peter," advantage is taken of the full-sized and 
 acanthus-Like structure of this plant, the fore- 
 grounds of the pictures being enriched with vi- 
 gorous portraitures of the common sea-cabbage. 
 As a vegetable, when our sea-cabbage has been 
 reclaimed and civilized, it puts on a very different 
 aspect, changing its somewhat picturesque form, 
 but improving in its domestic fitnesses, Like its 
 frequent "pot companion/' pork the wild pig 
 also being a striking and somewhat picturesque
 
 186 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 object until man has tamed him, and made him 
 as if he was merely born to be fatted, killed, and 
 eaten. Thus our garden cabbage, instead of 
 making part of a cartoon, or showing its yellow 
 flowers for ornament, becomes a valuable subject 
 for an " interior ;" which, it is to be hoped, may 
 soon be as generally a portion of an Irish picture 
 as it has for a long time been of Dutch and Fle- 
 mish domestic scenes. 
 
 It is quite gratifying to see most of our country 
 cottages now surrounded by a cabbage garden, 
 enabling the owners to hope for the days when 
 Sunday's home quiet will present on the dinner 
 table " a pig's cheek reposing on a bolster of boiled 
 cabbage." As a horticultural point of experience, 
 we are told that cabbage exhausts the ground 
 very rapidly ofproteine the new name by which 
 matters convertible into nourishment are desig- 
 nated. Well, if it separates this pabulum from the 
 soil, it also makes it more accessible and readily 
 attained to by man's mouth and stomach, which 
 is a worthy duty in our vegetable ; but the conse- 
 quence of this accumulative and preparing power 
 over nutritive matter, is the great value of our 
 Brassicas, they gather it and store it for us ; and 
 in a palatable form we have made ready for us a 
 plentiful supply of proteine matter. 
 
 The Edinburgh Review of January, 1850, gives 
 a comparative catalogue of the applicable contents 
 of nutritive substances ; and we are rather sur- 
 prised to find it stated there that cabbage con- 
 tains 40 per cent, of muscle-making matter, while 
 wheat produces only 12 per cent, of it. But it 
 must be remembered that wheat in grain, and
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 187 
 
 cabbage in the green, are not spoken of here ; it 
 is the dried substance of each which is compared ; 
 and what a world of water should be dried out of 
 cabbage before it would be in its perfect dessica- 
 tion similar to wheaten flour. The science of food 
 has occupied great attention lately. During a 
 former scarcity, Count Rumford opened up the 
 subject, and the distress of the period secured 
 some notice to his inquiries ; but recent famines, 
 and changes in the rent-value of land, have again 
 made the economics of food a popular subject of 
 examination. Scientific writers on agriculture 
 have given this topic a wide scope. The business of 
 farming is to cause vegetables to assimilate mine- 
 rals into a form nutritive to cattle, who, in their 
 turn, are intended to carry on this process, and 
 present these substances more highly organized, as 
 flesh, fitted to be the highest kind of food for man. 
 This whole subject, then, becomes, to a crowded 
 and high-living population like that of the British 
 dominions, a question of life or death. We have, 
 consequently, multiplied analyses of the nutri- 
 mentive contents of various articles of diet, and 
 they are full of present interest to all inquirers. 
 We cannot do more here than state that they are 
 very accessible ; one notice from them only shall 
 here be quoted. Periera says that the cabbage 
 tribe lose 90 per cent, of water by being dried; 
 and in that form, as he repeats from Bousingalt, 
 83 parts of the meal of cabbage are equal in nou- 
 rishment to 100 parts of wheat. But these mere 
 chemical conclusions as to nutritious equivalents, 
 must be taken with caution ; there are important 
 circumstances which regulate the assimilation of
 
 188 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 food not within the grasp of laboratory exposi- 
 tions. Proximately, the rudiments of nutriment 
 may be thence propounded; but, afterwards, we 
 must go to common experience to ascertain the 
 adaptability of any food, however plentiful, to the 
 organ which is to appropriate it. The quaint but 
 learned Abernethy conveyed the idea that life and 
 living beings have their peculiar powers, which 
 are beyond mechanical or chemical laws, when he 
 said that the stomach was not a stew-pan nor a 
 still, but a stomach. Indeed, the herbivorists have 
 always omitted from their statements many im- 
 portant facts, oversights of enthusiasm which 
 much interfere with the conclusiveness of their 
 arguments, and leave untouched that principle of 
 popular dietetics which asserts that a mixed food 
 is the best general support for all our energies. It 
 is undeniable, except by mere fire-side philoso- 
 phers, that hard-working people are never in 
 full power physically, in peace politically, or, I 
 may say, in progress morally, without a sufficiency 
 of mixed food to aid in producing a sound body 
 and a sound mind. We want, then, for our feed- 
 ers mixed food ; and I can give a semi-Celtic 
 aphorism, proving how desirable it is that Paddy 
 should command milk and fish with his " potatoes 
 galore," plenty of turf to boil them with ; and, to 
 crown all, on Sundays and on holidays 
 
 "Pork and cabaistha 
 Which, make a full man of a growing paistha." 
 
 This food is, of course, recommended not for a 
 baby, but for " a growing paistha" (a youth) ; and 
 there can be no doubt that nutritive support given
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 189 
 
 freely to the young of all animals, human be- 
 ings included, materially influences their size and 
 weight, when they arrive at adult growth. 
 
 Quetelet, the very eminent statist and physiolo- 
 gist, proves, in his " Essay on Man/' that the Irish 
 are the tallest and weightiest people in Europe. 
 I hope that we, as a nation, shall for a while 
 escape his scrutinizing statara, until the reduc- 
 ing effect of scarcity and famine has passed away, 
 or has been repaired among us ; otherwise we 
 must experimentally lose that high physical char- 
 acter which the unprejudiced Flemish philoso- 
 pher has established for us. Quetelet has clearly 
 proved, by his statistical calculations, the truths 
 which popular opinion always asserted on this 
 subject, viz., that strength and weight are the 
 results and exponents of the quantity and quality 
 of food which we use and properly digest ; so that 
 the scale of the prices of nourishment, and the 
 scale of the dynamometer, have many indications 
 in common. Our Irish mothers who, indeed, are 
 good physiologists instinctively nurse their in- 
 fants famously ; and except when the supply was 
 cut off by the direst famine which ever afflicted a 
 people at all advanced in the art of producing a 
 store of food to any reasonable extent, the nursing 
 of the young the early nourishing was always 
 fully and freely supplied. Whatever hardships 
 adult life might inflict on the Irish peasant, his 
 formative period was not stinted ; and his model, 
 if we may so speak, was sustained in complete 
 dimensions. A true parentage was his at that 
 season when his future was determined ; like an 
 infant Hercules, he enjoyed the fulness of tonic
 
 190 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 nursing, which throve well with him ; and though 
 not entirely goddess-born, he possessed in baby- 
 hood extraordinary vigour and power, because he 
 fed, both morally and physically, while milk was 
 proper for him, on the plenteous stream and full 
 flow of human kindness ; also the growing pais- 
 then was secure of his more than a child's share of 
 the pork and cabaistha, which succulent supply 
 confirmed in the gossoon what mother's milk had 
 so well begun in the infant. 
 
 We now return to the catalogue of names which 
 our plant has borne. All kinds of cabbages were 
 formerly called Coleworts ; they were so desig- 
 nated from the Latin "caulis," a stalk, as the 
 young stalks, when boiled, were very palatable. 
 These branches were in one variety headed with 
 white masses of delicate food; and it was then 
 well-known as the cauliflower or stalk' s-flower 
 the boytryoidal cabbage of structural describers. 
 Homely gardeners are wont to say that there is 
 "no flower like the cauliflower;" but for us this 
 restriction would be a gratifying of gout at too 
 severe a sacrifice of taste. We may indulge both 
 in their proper places. The varieties of kale are 
 endless. The Gardener 's Chronicle of 1850, gives, 
 at page 276, one of the most recent of these de- 
 scriptive catalogues. One only from among them 
 has been deemed ornamental, so as to be intro- 
 duced into the shrubbery it is the variegated 
 plumage kale, and is sometimes introduced as a 
 garnish, or decoration round fruits at table. 
 
 Cow-cabbage was recently made a subject of 
 great notoriety. It is a variety which grew to a 
 great height in the Channel Islands, in many in-
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 191 
 
 stances over twelve feet. It was puffed exceed- 
 ingly under the title of Csesarean cabbage, and 
 the seeds were sold at from a penny to a shilling 
 each ; but out of their limited insular home they 
 offered no agricultural advantage at all. 
 
 The antique curiosities of cabbage history are 
 loose and diffuse, like a badly-headed Battersea. 
 Lord Bacon is great in extending small causes into 
 great effects ; he says that raw coleworts prevent 
 intoxication. Alas ! for him who has no better 
 means of prevention than this quackish specific. 
 But our learned philosopher gives a reason for his 
 remedy. There is, he says, a natural enmity be- 
 tween the vine and the cabbage ; so much so, that 
 the vine will wind away when growing near to 
 it ; and if it cannot remove itself it will die. Pro- 
 bably the deficient deduction from facts on which 
 the great master of deductive philosophy based 
 his belief may be, that the vine and the cabbage 
 being both rank feeders and great consumers of 
 vegetable nourishment, they cannot flourish very 
 closely together without exhausting the soil It 
 seems, however, that a fabulous exaggeration dis- 
 figures whatever fact is in the observation. The 
 seeds and the juice of cabbage are also given as 
 a means to enable men to commit excesses in 
 vicious drinks with impunity; temporary, how- 
 ever, must be the advantage to be gained by him 
 who deliberately plans a sensual debauch, protect- 
 ed only by cabbage as his conservation or cure. To 
 such a man, confirmed beastly habits of drunken- 
 ness will become unconquerable and destructive. 
 Derivations of the words Gale, Kale, or Cole, are 
 founded on the Saxon term "kele," 'a pot; our herb
 
 192 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 being long the most eminent of pot-occupying ve- 
 getables. We have still to use the word "keeler," 
 a vessel or tub; and in the finale song of "Love's 
 Labor Lost," we have it cheerily introduced 
 viz.: 
 
 "Tu-whit, tu-who, a merry note, 
 While greasy Joan doth keel the pot ; " 
 
 meaning, we are told, either "to skim a pot," 
 which may, indeed, have pork and cabbage in it 
 boiling, or otherwise to scour its bottom well out 
 previously to cooking these enticing viands ; and 
 thence our umbrageous plant may have been call- 
 ed keel-wort or kale-wort. 
 
 The winter stock of this vegetable used to be 
 put in the ground by September. At that sea- 
 son, Tusser tells us, in his "Hundred Points of 
 Good Husbandry," " Set privet or prim, set bore- 
 cole like him" that is, at the same time. 
 
 But let us now try and progress in our ety- 
 mology query, the derivation of the name cab- 
 bage? Johnson's Dictionary gives no help, Celtic 
 or Saxon ; it merely tells us it is cabus, in 
 French; and the French Dictionare says that, 
 combined with chou, cabus means hard. Now, 
 this is a very hard etymology; but, to assist us on, 
 we find cabas to be la belle langue for a frail of 
 figs. Well a drum -headed cabbage is something 
 like the shape of that globe, flattened at the 
 poles; but it is rather a constrained origin for 
 our name. Then the Latin gives us no aid at 
 all; but, come, what joy and dignity it is to find 
 the root of our shunned and repudiated word in 
 undoubted Attic Greek; take courage, then, "here 
 you are." Kobe, food. Do you espy cabbage now?
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 193 
 
 And then follow the words "kapto," to eat ; and 
 "kabos," a corn-vessel or measure a kind of cor- 
 nucopia,, which might indicate that true Irish 
 union, so well sketched in the song of William 
 Maginn, viz.: 
 
 "Pigs galore, magra asthore, 
 And cabbages, and ladies." 
 
 Various curious powers have been attributed to 
 the different varieties of Brassica oleracea; but 
 some of them are still awaiting that rather re- 
 quisite aid to belief viz., the proof. My Lord 
 Bacon tells us thus another of his tales : "A cion 
 of an apple, grafTd upon a colewort stalk, sendeth 
 out a great apple, without a core." His lordship 
 then gives many reasons why this legend should 
 be true ; and it was thought, even by this great 
 master of objective proofs, that assumptions were 
 at times to be favourably received. A sappy scion 
 put into a moist envelope, such as a cabbage 
 stump, might swell its buds, and make a rucfi- 
 mental effort at growing; but that is all the 
 vegetation which can proceed; the buds will soon 
 wither, and the scion must die. 
 
 The stalky kinds of cabbage are among the 
 most hardy, and were thereby most recommended 
 for general culture in the trying Northern climate 
 of Scotland. The kale, with its custoc or pith 
 scooped out, was bore-kale. And Robert Burns 
 tells us that it was not rich, succulent, and liigh- 
 lymanured cabbage which the Scottish peasant 
 enjoyed, but a poor, ill-favoured, ragged plant, 
 which, when boiled, was so thin and transparent 
 as to be called muslin-kale. Scotland's immortal 
 poet of domestic life, when he apostrophizes his
 
 194 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS, 
 
 kilted muses, his inspiresses, and guardian angels, 
 thus describes the quality of kale, his nation's 
 accepted vegetable, viz.: 
 
 "While ye are pleased to keep my hale, 
 I '11 sit down to my scanty meal, 
 Be "t water-brose or muslin-kail, 
 
 Wi' cheerfu' face, 
 As lang 's the muses dinna fail 
 
 To say the grace." 
 
 Cayl is the ancient Saxon word from which the 
 Latin caulis is formed, and which is also made 
 into the modern English word cole. Johnson 
 omits cole, and likewise kale, which was the Scot- 
 tish form of the word ; probably because he hated 
 and despised the North Britons with a most ener- 
 getic and unsparing detestation. 
 
 We everywhere find universal proof of the 
 nourishing qualities of this vegetable; and the 
 old herbalists give dozens of powers to it, all of 
 an opprobatory kind, though in monstrous hard 
 words, no doubt. Salmon is especially copious in 
 his characteristics of cabbage, and closes a long 
 palinode of its praises by saying that it is emol- 
 lient, pectoral the lie plus ultra for nurses ; be- 
 ing, as he tells us, in his Greekish phrase, galacto- 
 genetic, or milk begetting. These long-enjoyed 
 popularities have secured for our plant a home- 
 stead near mankind for ages ; and we find that 
 kail-yards were the care of the judicious Scotch 
 people lang syne, though our Irish peasantry are 
 only now beginning to cultivate cabbage gene- 
 rally. Burns notices this green crop in winter as 
 affording the stinted hare, when other food had 
 failed, a green nibble in snowy weather, viz. :
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 195 
 
 "The sun had closed the winter's day, 
 The curlers quat their roaring play, 
 And hungry niaukin's ta'en her way 
 
 To kail-yards green; 
 While faithless snaws ilk step betray 
 
 Where she has been." 
 
 In England, too, this culinary treasure occupies 
 a portion of ground in the form of a cabbage-gar- 
 den ; and from the burly plant whose compacted 
 head is cut and divided for the convenience of 
 boiling, to that whose looser texture has its 
 cookery done by separating the greener leaves, 
 the cabbage holds still a well-deserved culinary 
 pre-eminence. English Dryden says, of a house- 
 wife's care, that 
 
 "She took the coleworts which her husband got 
 From his own ground a small, well-watered spot; 
 She stripp'd the stalks of all their leaves ; the best 
 She cull'd, and then with handy care she dress'd." 
 
 But our Irish cooks have added potatoes, but- 
 ter, and sometimes fish, to the boiled greens; 
 and certainly, if this be well prepared, it is a 
 dish the country need not be ashamed of. Some 
 kind of Olla podrida in verse was once likened 
 to this compound, and a criticism on it gives us a 
 rhyme for our native mince-pie, viz. : 
 
 " He mixed them all in his poetic platter, 
 And thus he made calcannon of the matter." 
 
 Calcannon why is this dish so named ? Alas ! 
 I have failed to find out as yet. The first particle, 
 the substantive part, is kail, obviously enough ; 
 what means the cannon ? The Dutch have kan- 
 nen for "kenning," knowing ; but in this matter 
 I am not kenning, cunning, nor knowing.
 
 196 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 Stay, a kind friend lias supplied my want, and 
 has suggested for my incapacity the Celtic Cain- 
 non or head, the thick poll of a leek with its 
 but or head, which mashed, would be right sa- 
 voury with the cabbage, potatoes, and fish, and 
 would give to the tongue for taste and for utter- 
 ance, a perceptible and meaning " Cail-cainnon." 
 
 The pharmaceutical importance claimed for 
 cabbage, in its various forms and productions, 
 must now be glanced at. What they were for- 
 merly specifics for seem to be beyond enumera- 
 tion. Salmon tells us that the old Romans ex- 
 pelled physicians out of their territories for six 
 hundred years, and yet did maintain their health, 
 by using and applying cabbages and coleworts 
 as their only remedy in every disease ; neverthe- 
 less, this biographer of his pet plant divides its 
 preparations into six copious heads. We cannot 
 here follow out at length his boytryoidal bras- 
 sicacious dilations, but must give a breviate, and 
 record that the juice was of course good against 
 all venoms albeit every vegetable juice had this 
 virtue with old pharmaciens. The receipts for 
 their uses, too, are legion. We select one sample 
 of medicinal conjuration, viz. : Take an old cock 
 fowl, beat him to pieces, and then boil him in a 
 decoction of coleworts. This broth was good for 
 about twenty griefs of the body : the syrup re- 
 laxed wheezings, and cured sore eyes ; the electu- 
 ary relieved those who were short-winded and 
 pursy ; the leaves were used as a mild drawing 
 plaister for pustules and wheals of the skin, and 
 against leprosy indeed, before pharmacy had 
 produced a more convenient protection for fretful
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 197 
 
 sores, smooth, cool cabbage-leaves must have had 
 real utility ; and it was in modern times much 
 used as the anodyne and protecting covering of 
 that distressing ulceration, a scald head. 
 
 When our theatrical audiences took more of 
 the public etiquette in hands than devolves on 
 them in these days of police facility, a burly- 
 looking squire placed himself between a lady and 
 the stage, with his hat on, throwing the fair visit- 
 ant into eclipse. The gallant gallery-company 
 would not endure this discourtesy, but roared 
 out, " Sit down hat off." The rudesby was, 
 however, a defiant stoic ; he resisted the storm of 
 disapprobation, firmed his hat on his head, and 
 stood square and immovable, to the lady's obscu- 
 ration. What was to be done now ? A lull took 
 place preparatory to some energetic assault on 
 this rebel against the gods, when, in the silence, 
 a voice was heard to say, in objugation " Arrah ! 
 boys, lave him to stand up awhile ; he is a poor 
 tailor resting his legs ; and as for his hat, if you 
 knew the unwholesome cabin he works in at 
 home, you would pity his scurvy skull ; you know 
 he can't lave the cabbage-leaves fall off from his 
 poll/' This successful jeer was too much for the 
 uncivil oppositionist ; he dropped conquered on 
 his seat, and proved to the audience that he could 
 venture to take off his hat. 
 
 As Jbo cabbage-juice being, as is often reiterated, 
 a cure for drunkenness, probably it was a safe 
 emetic, and that with it the wallowing beastliness 
 of former times was encountered. Modern sen- 
 suality, however, does not go quite so deliber- 
 ately, and of malice prepense, to plot a debauch,
 
 198 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 making drunkenness of easy repetition and man- 
 ageable. Kale had also, it would seem, a place 
 in classical history ; it was known in the age of 
 the demigods ; and, like most productions which 
 had eminent qualities of any kind, either for 
 good or evil, was made a subject of vow, abjura- 
 tion, or objugation by the Greeks. There was 
 some such character early attached to it, for the 
 lonians used to swear " by the sacred cabbage." 
 I have heard a person in this country, too, swear 
 " by the holy cabbage." At the time I thought 
 it was profane nonsense or idleness query, could 
 it have been an oath remaining traditional among 
 our numerous Asiatic customs and Eastern prac- 
 tices ? This topic invites us into the region of 
 romance and fortune-telling ; and our very hap- 
 piest help we will get from " Rab the Ranter." 
 He tells us that 
 
 " Some merry, friendly, contra folks 
 
 Together did convene 
 To burn their nits, and pou their stocks, 
 And haud their Halloween 
 Fu' blythe that night. 
 
 " Then first and foremost thro' the kail 
 Their stocks maun a' be sought ance, 
 They steek their een, an' graip, an' wale 
 
 For muckle anes and straught anes. 
 Poor Hav'rel Will fell aft the drift, 
 An' wandered thro' the bowkail, 
 And pull'd, for want o' better shift, 
 A runt was like a sow-tail, 
 Sae bow'd that night. 
 
 " Then straught or crooked, earth'd or clean, 
 
 They scream and laugh 't each other; 
 The very wee things todlin' run 
 Wi' stocks out o'er their shouther.
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 199 
 
 And gif the pith is sweet or sour, 
 
 Wi' cutty knives they taste 'em ; 
 Then cozily aboon the door 
 
 Wi' cannie care they place 'em 
 To lie that night," 
 
 This general description is explicit enough. 
 The particulars in the amatory fortune-seeking 
 are, that all parties who go to pull up the kail 
 runt or stalk are blindfolded, and as each in- 
 quirer pulls up the first stock he or she lays hand 
 on, it is prophetic, if it be straight or crooked, of 
 what shape a future wife or husband shall be. 
 If earth sticks to the root, that is tocher the 
 fortune ; and the mildness or acridity of the cus- 
 toc, or pith, points to the temper of the lover 
 who is to be. We have an old fable of the Irish 
 application of this kail-craft. Three young girls 
 went out into a cabbage-garden to draw a love- 
 lot of this kind, but with their eyes open; the 
 youngest took the very first plant that came to 
 her hand, but alas ! it snapped off close to the 
 ground, she had seized it so impetuously. Her 
 story was told. The second sister went to work 
 more cautiously, got farther into the field where 
 the ground was softer, and then pulled up her pat- 
 tern of a man He was not perfectly straight, 
 neither did much yellow clay stick to him ; but 
 he was passable every way ; and the girl, though 
 not delighted, was more than contented with her 
 prospects of the future. The eldest girl jeered at 
 her sister's ill-luck, and went peering on for better 
 probabilities ; she rejected one stalk because its 
 head was too green ; and another, because it was 
 like mildew, all grey; she thought some sweet-
 
 200 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 heart-symptoms too tall, and others too short, and 
 thus she loitered on through all the soft cabbage- 
 ground, criticising, denouncing, rejecting, and, be- 
 cause none were better than " well enough," 
 
 " She, like fastidious Judy Baxter, 
 Refused the men before they axed her," 
 
 declaring that she would seek higher ground be- 
 fore she drew her luck. Well, she did so ; on 
 the upper land the planting was thinner, the suc- 
 culents were more exposed to the wind, and, of 
 course, more stocky. Her prudent, satisfied sister 
 now warned her that an old saying suggests how 
 
 " Haughty maidens are undone 
 By getting from the ways of grace 
 Into the very brightest sun." 
 
 But all in vain ; the proud, ambitious girl 
 would persist in trying her luck among sundrawn 
 stocks though they were yellow-looking and queer 
 enough. But twelve o'clock was coming it was 
 too late to try back ; she was close to the upland 
 ditch, and she drew alas ! a club-footed cabbage. 
 What could she do now ? She could not unfix 
 her fate ; and fortune turned up for her a crooked- 
 backed, hurled-footed, withered old miser, the 
 very moral of the cabbage, in whose curled stump 
 the yellow clay stuck fast ; harsh and biting 
 enough he was too in his heart's core that is if 
 he had any heart at all. 
 
 The minutiae of botany has been somewhat 
 eschewed in this popular history ; cultivated vege- 
 tables have stories about them which put scien- 
 tific particulars somewhat in abeyance. There-
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 201 
 
 fore, it is almost enough to repeat that our ori- 
 ginal plant, the sea -cabbage or sea-colewort, is 
 found on our sandy and rocky beaches, sparingly. 
 Jts leaves are of the well-known grey-green called 
 glaucous ; and from it come the several varieties 
 of cabbages alluded to already. Cole-flores was 
 an ancient and not inelegant way of naming the 
 cauliflower. Pickled cabbage was reckoned a 
 remedy against the spleen, and it would not be 
 right to suppress so easy a method of gaining 
 cheerfulness ; perhaps an acid stimulant in mode- 
 ration, may be useful to promote digestion in 
 queasy stomachs. Red-cabbage juice used to be 
 mixed with acid wines, and, when the colour was 
 thereby changed from purple to pink, the old 
 physiologists used to say it was the enmity of the 
 fluids against each other, which, on their admix- 
 ture, provoked this redness of anger to appear. 
 Galen named wild cole-worts Amethusos, pro- 
 bably from their purplish-green hue being some- 
 what of an amethyst tint. Among the old gem 
 and lapidarian medicine-men, the amethyst was 
 held to prevent the ill consequence of various 
 poisonings, and was specific against excess of 
 wine, among the number; the jewel darkly wine- 
 tinged, was pronounced antipathic against vinous 
 ill effects. The purplish cabbage was in com- 
 plexion also Amethustos, which fact finished its 
 fine character as a cure ; and draws our history 
 of cabbage to an end, having placed it grandly 
 among Greek Galenicals.
 
 202 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 CHARLOCK. WILD TURNIP, OR PRASHAUGH BUIDHE. WHITE MUS- 
 TARD. GOOD FOOD CAUSES MUCH DISUSE OF CONDIMENTS AND 
 
 SAUCES. MUSTARD-SEED OF THE SCRIPTURES. MEDICAL USES 
 
 OP MUSTARD : MADE FORMERLY WITH WINE, AND WAS THE 
 MUSTEM ARDENS BURNING WINE. 
 
 PROGRESSING through the cross -flowered vege- 
 tables, we come to Sinapis the Latin form of 
 the Greek word sinapi, which is said by authors 
 to be a term built upon the old Celtic word knap 
 or knob, because all this tribe are, under certain 
 circumstances, more or less turnip-like. Our first 
 species, the Sinapis arvensis, is a wildling of 
 great energy, and, as its surname imports, a suc- 
 cessful intruder into arable fields. Lord Bacon 
 tells us " that the ground putting forth a certaine 
 herbe, discovereth well what nature is the soil ; 
 Sinapi sheweth a good strong lay for wheat ; 
 Burnet sheweth good meadow, and the like." 
 This is the well-known Prashaugh Buidhe of all 
 Celtic authors, of our Irish farmers, and of our 
 rural population. Our learned Irish authority, 
 Caleb Threlkeld, says, " Some have made a great 
 splutter about the word Brassica, which is no 
 doubt the Celtic Praissagh put in a Latin ter- 
 mination, as all antiquarians will allow/' Its 
 adjective marks its well-known colour, buidhe, 
 pronounced with the "d" mute. It is almost 
 needless to say that its yellow blossom is well 
 known in corn-fields through May and June. No
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 203 
 
 doubt, a gorgeous show it makes in the green 
 grass corn ; but " all is not gold that glitters." 
 It is a mark of most slovenly agriculture, ex- 
 hausting the soil, disputing the room with the 
 cereal crops, crowding them injuriously; shutting 
 out the sunshine and the showers from the earth ; 
 playing the freebooter in idleness and in rapine. 
 The praissagh, like other bad growths, ought to 
 be eradicated in time as soon as it appears among 
 the corn. Shakspeare tells us the proper season 
 to eradicate it, when he says, happily 
 
 " Now 'tis the Spring, and weeds are shallow rooted ; 
 Suffer them now, and they '11 overgrow the garden ; 
 And choke the herbs for want of husbandry." 
 
 Pulling this pirate out when it is high among 
 the corn is difficult ; the trampling down of the 
 blade is mischief; the drawing up corn stalks 
 with the weed, and the opening the ground in 
 the often arid months of May and June, are all 
 difficulties ; but " if the weed ripen its seed," not 
 only does the corn crop take more picking and 
 screening, but the seed of the praissagh impreg- 
 nates the ground with a perpetual progeny. If 
 it sows itself in the shallow ridges, it is up the 
 next season, and takes possession energetically ; 
 if it be ploughed into the soil more deeply, it is 
 only reposing there, and though buried, not dead, 
 for its oily rotundity resists decay its life is very 
 firm in it ; and woe betide the future farmer who, 
 in his diligence, trenches deeply to put in unclean 
 ground a corn crop ; for in his industry he gilds 
 his field, without doing much more than pro- 
 ducing an unprofitable golden glory, which tri- 
 umphs over the remunerative green. It has been
 
 204 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 known thus to cover a newly broken-up field 
 which had not produced a single plant of the 
 kind for over thirty years. English agricultur- 
 ists have long called this plant charlock, for which 
 name I have not found any origin as yet it is 
 the wild mustard of our popular language, and 
 can be identified in any botanical book. Its eco- 
 nomical uses are few, the other species of the 
 genus having its properties in a more profitable 
 amount. The young plant has been boiled, and 
 in Spring is about as nourishing as turnip-tops. 
 Indeed, as the word prashauh means porridge or 
 pottage, the culinary use of our plant is well 
 denoted by its Celtic appellation, and from it is 
 manifestly educed brashauh, the brose " the kale 
 brose of Scotland " a truly ancient Celtic brew. 
 Cattle and sheep eat it, but horses refuse it ; the 
 seeds, too, have been given to birds instead of 
 rape-seed, but, being more acrid, are found to dis- 
 agree with them. 
 
 Our next native Sinapis is the alba, or white 
 mustard ; it is a common wild plant, but is some- 
 times seen in gardens at its full height of about 
 a foot and a-half, with its leaves cut and toothed 
 in a very various and bizarre manner, and show- 
 ing a large yellow blossom, with its long-beaked 
 seed-pod, which remarkable development distin- 
 guishes it readily from its near relatives. 
 
 Tusser tells us how to store mustard-seed, viz: 
 
 " Maids, mustard-seed gather, ere being too ripe, 
 And weather it well, ere ye give it the stripe ;* 
 
 * Either to strip it, as Tusser's commentator says ; or, more 
 probably, the stripe of the thrashing.
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 205 
 
 Then dress it, and lay it aloft up and sweet, 
 Lest foistiuess make it for table unmeet." 
 
 But it is not the uncrushed seed which was 
 eaten, the flour of mustard was called " the seed " 
 by old authors ; Bottom, the Weaver, uses the name 
 thus in his apostrophe to the fairy who was in 
 attendance on his asinine arcadianism : " Good 
 Master Mustard-seed, I know your patience well : 
 that same cowardly, giant-like Ox-beef, hath de- 
 voured many a gentleman of your house : I pro- 
 mise you your kindred hath made my eyes water 
 ere now : I desire of you more acquaintance, good 
 Master Mustard-seed." But of mustard-seed in 
 grain, we have to note its remarkably quick vege- 
 tation. It will begin to shoot in a few hours ; 
 and the very delicate green colour of its leaves 
 has recommended it for ornamental work in the 
 domestic gardening of parlour windows, &c. Hol- 
 low vessels of wood may be constructed of various 
 pleasing forms, such as cones, crosses, Catherine- 
 wheels, cylinders, &c. These skeletons are to be 
 perforated with small holes, and then covered 
 with brown frieze or flannel ; at the base may 
 be a mouth for receiving supplies of water, which 
 can be closed in by a cork. On the flannel enve- 
 lope, strew a dense quantity of mustard-seed, and 
 the wetness and roughness of the cloth will cause 
 it to adhere ; place the figure in a warm place, 
 and in a surprisingly short time the whole form 
 will come out of a lively green, these vivid seed- 
 leaves looking veiy vigorous, succulent, and vel- 
 vetty. 
 
 Sometimes, in very small town parterres, this 
 kind of toy-gardening has been exhibited, show-
 
 206 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 ing freaks in words or letters on the plats in 
 front of semi-rural residences ; at in-shore little 
 " rockeries," sea-shells have been made into urns, 
 exhibiting tiny verdant patches of vegetated 
 mustard-seed the result of a very protean fancy, 
 no doubt, but still far better for the imaginer 
 than a state of indifference to gardening and its 
 interests would be. This plant-alphabeting is a 
 popular phytography in its own way, and gives 
 its pleasure, too, by exhibiting ingenuity, patience, 
 and even taste. 
 
 But there is an economical application of the 
 ready life-spring of our mustard-seed. It is sown 
 in boxes on board ship, to afford a salad where 
 fresh vegetable food is a great luxury. It vege- 
 tates readily in perfect shade, as do most seeds, 
 but it grows and gets its green colour with less 
 light than many other plants; consequently, it 
 does well with the feeble illumination between- 
 decks, appropriating the heat of such a situation, 
 and scarcely showing any want of energy from 
 its limited supply of fresh air; thus we see that 
 Bottom knew the virtue of " Good Master Mus- 
 tard-seed," when he praised his patience. 
 
 The seeds of the white mustard are of a pale 
 yellow colour, and the green of the herbage is of 
 a lighter hue than that of the next species the 
 black mustard ; so that these plants are distin- 
 guished, not by positive whiteness and blackness, 
 but by relative lightness and darkness of tint in 
 certain notable parts, which were easily brought 
 into comparison. 
 
 We cannot perfect the history of mustard-seed 
 without alluding to the use made of the word in
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 207 
 
 sacred history. The Gospel according to Saint 
 Matthew, chap. xiii., verses 31, 32, records this 
 passage from a parable of our Saviour " The 
 kingdom of heaven is like unto a grain of mus- 
 tard-seed which a man took and sowed in his 
 field, which is, indeed, the least of all seeds ; but 
 when it is grown it is the greatest among herbs, 
 and becometh a tree, so that the birds of the air 
 come and lodge in the branches thereof." Now, 
 we cannot attribute to our native mustard plant 
 the distinction of having been selected for this 
 illustration. It is true that our mustard is a na- 
 tive of the Holy Land; and also, that in such a 
 climate it grows much larger, and is more robust 
 than with us; still, allowing all this, and also for 
 the full style of hyperbole used in the East, the 
 similitudes would be overstrained and discrepant. 
 Commentators, then, and even those who are not 
 fastidious, and who do not, therefore, want to tie 
 down the images of a figurative passage to a 
 mathematically strict similarity, have examined 
 what plant the Great Teacher meant by his word 
 Sinapi. The discrepancies against our mustard 
 are, its seed is not very small, and it rarely grows 
 from a mere herb into anything deserving the 
 name of a tree ; but learned travellers have shown 
 that there are large woody shrubs which have 
 aromatic and pungent properties growing in Ju- 
 dea, and which were formerly, as now, called 
 Sinapi. 
 
 Dr. Beard, in his "Dictionary of the Bible," 
 mentions one great shrub, in particular, which 
 possibly might be referred to by our Lord; but 
 older scholars and botanists have described ano-
 
 208 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 ther native of Judea, which agrees in all the re- 
 quisites of the parable; this plant is the Phy- 
 tolacca dodecandra, which grows abundantly 
 in Palestine. Inquirers will find this subject 
 handled at length in the different natural his- 
 tories of the Bible; and, as some may be inter- 
 ested in the aspect and appearance of the Scrip- 
 tural mustard, the Phytolaccas are to be found 
 figured in "Curtis's Botanical Magazine." It 
 would be out of place to do more than report the 
 result of this inquiry here ; but it is, perhaps, not 
 too much of a trespass on patience to abstract the 
 summary of the conclusions come to, as they are 
 noted in " Calmet's Dictionary of the Bible," viz. : 
 The Phytolacca is the tree mentioned in the 
 Gospels because it is one of the largest trees in- 
 digenous in the country where the observations 
 were made; because it has the smallest seed of 
 any tree in that country ; and because it is used 
 for many of the purposes to which our mustard is 
 applied. And, also, what is very interesting in a 
 physiological point of view is, that having the 
 same uses, it is said to have the same chemical 
 constituents as its western namesake, the com- 
 mon mustard, although of quite another botani- 
 cal family. 
 
 Lastly, mustard-seed has had a multifarious 
 medical fame. Its last pride as a panacea was as 
 a specific against rheumatism ; whole ounces of 
 mustard-seed were swallowed by people who 
 were, as the old pun says, in the "room-attics," 
 and incapable of stirring from their positions. 
 Some were, by its heat, reported as melted out of 
 their rigidities by virtue of this mustum ardens,
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 209 
 
 but some, of course, remained still refractory and 
 infusible. It is doubtful how far a parcel of un- 
 bruised granules taken into the stomach might 
 be injurious to the digestion of valetudinarians ; 
 but good faith in a remedy, which leads queasy 
 people to swallow it, may do much to make it go 
 down with good hope and grievous grimaces. 
 
 Our derivation of the popular name is " spicy," 
 and we must enlarge a little on it. Mustum 
 ardens is " burning hot vinegar." There was al- 
 ways in the world's surgical practice some method 
 of counter-irritation ; St. John Long's proceedings 
 were not an original idolatry, but an aggravated 
 revival of ancient practices, for we find that there 
 was an old cure made with boiling vinegar, or 
 wine for both were called must and adding to 
 these the powder of Sinapis made the mustum 
 ardens. It was applied as a cataplasm when boil- 
 ing hot, and it was often a cure, no doubt ; but at 
 times its only effect was to " scaud poor wretches." 
 This eschariotic was in a milder form diverted 
 from the outside to the inside of the body, and 
 was taken by flapdragon-drinkers, and other fire- 
 eaters, as a dram ; of course, the vinegar decreased, 
 and the wine and ardent spirits increased, in this 
 mustem ardens. At length, however, it settled 
 down into our table mustard, and was eaten, as 
 Tusser tells us, with everything: 
 
 "Brawn pudding and souse, 
 
 And good mustard with all." 
 
 To this day some housekeepers make their mus- 
 tard with vinegar; and the common dressing for 
 cold and watery salads the salso-acid of old
 
 210 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 cookery is mustard, salt, and vinegar. One 
 more derivation of mustard may be remembered 
 here. In a satirical catalogue of Treatises in an 
 Ecclesiastical Library, we find one called, after 
 the fashion of many quaint authors, The Mustard- 
 pot of Penance. It might seem that the tongue- 
 torture of this hot compound was here alluded 
 to ; but one of the happy note-and-gloss-makers of 
 the time tells us, that the allusion is to multum 
 tar dare much of slowness ; accented, in the 
 French manner mouletarde or moutarde, which 
 is mustard. Our commentator goes on to tell, in 
 illustration, that a certain French preacher laid a 
 wager that he would commence a sermon with 
 the word 'moutarde, and that it should be an ac- 
 ceptable one. He took up his oration with mou- 
 tarde, moutarde, moutarde, and then followed 
 with "le pecheur a faire penitenee" "much 
 tardy is the sinner to repent ;" and, getting great 
 applause for his punning preamble, he won his 
 wager. The allusion to this story in the satire on 
 the collection of religious books is, that the teach- 
 ing from them was also moutarde, mouletarde 
 much tardy, slow, and inefficacious. This, how- 
 ever, was an inflated hyperbole ; consequently, the 
 contrast between anything inactive or dull and 
 our acute, biting, energetic condiment, must have 
 been a part of the joke; for to say that sleepiness 
 or indifference could be expressed by the word 
 mustard, was, indeed, a startling proposition one 
 which must have aroused, by its oddity, even 
 very inattentive hearers. And so we postpone 
 the remainder of this spicy subject for another 
 chapter.
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 211 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 BLACK MUSTARD. GROSS ADULTERATION OF MUSTARD : IT WAS A 
 GENERAL FARM-HOUSE MANUFACTURE FORMERLY. COMPOSI- 
 TION. LONG CONTINUANCE OF OILY SEEDS IN GROUND WHEN 
 DEEPLY BURIED. MUSTARD AND HONEY AS A SAUCE. 
 
 THE last of our native mustard plants is the Si- 
 napis nigra. Its leaf is darker than that of the 
 previous species ; and the hull of the seed is of a 
 blackish-brown colour, which distinguishes it from 
 the yellowish seed of the white mustard. For- 
 merly, in this country, the people ground up the 
 black mustard-seed in a quern ; and, as they left 
 the hull with the powder, it was of a mixed yel- 
 low and black colour, and was cried in country 
 fairs and markets with almost the French pronun- 
 ciation, " Fine fleure a mustarde." In tliis pure 
 state it was extremely hot and pungent, with a 
 little coarseness of taste, which was not objection- 
 able to consumers who liked their spices strong 
 and hot. In that unrefined, and also unadulter- 
 ated, state, it deserved the character of being a 
 type of the hot Irishman who used 
 
 " Sauce, like himself, offensive to his foes- - 
 The roguish mustard, dangerous to the nose." 
 
 The cheap rate at which mustard flour is now- 
 sold in the shops has driven this trade as a rustic 
 manufacture out of the market, although with 
 some apparent loss to the purchasers, for it is much 
 weakened in its spicy powers by the more refined
 
 212 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 form in which it is presented for sale. There 
 is a cautious care among drug compounders 
 in our days; they do not like giving their cus- 
 tomers spices in their too pungent purity ; conse- 
 quently, it is with mustard as with many other 
 things a fact that much of the grain which goes to 
 the mill comes from thence with its natural fire 
 mitigated. Indeed, it is said that flour of mustard 
 is often made up of cayenne pepper pods, blended 
 with farinaceous substances, coloured to please by 
 chalk and turmeric, but totally innocent of having 
 brought within the reach of the bruiser, for its 
 happy composition, the life of a single sinapaceous 
 seed. However, as few people adopt Grumio's 
 bill of fare, and " take the mustard without the 
 beef/' the mustard grinders who enter into his 
 idea, and think, "the mustard is too hot a little/' 
 cannot do much harm ; besides we can do what 
 Katherine could not, that is, " have the beef, and 
 let the mustard rest." 
 
 Grinding mustard was a farm-house labour of 
 very early date. We meet with an allusion to 
 this custom in an old satire on miracle-craft, 
 which tells us what that ingenii can hinder or 
 perpetrate, viz.: 
 
 " Theyre wells I can up dry, 
 Cause trees and herbes to dye, 
 And slay all poultery, 
 
 Whenas men do me move. 
 I can make stools to daunce, 
 And earthen pots to praunce, 
 And none shall them enhance, 
 
 When I do caste my glove. 
 
 " I have charmes for the plough, 
 And also for the cow, 
 She shall give milke enow
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 213 
 
 So long as I am pleased 
 Apace the inyll shall goe, 
 So shall the cradle, too, 
 And the mustarde-querne, alsoe, 
 
 No man therwith diseased." 
 
 Plants that have a full domestic history be- 
 come less the subjects of scientific distinctions 
 than others, consequently the botanical descrip- 
 tion of Sinapis nigra the common mustard is 
 of secondary interest ; and it so commonly strays 
 out of cultivation into wild places that, when met 
 in lanes and on hedge- banks, we scarcely acknow- 
 ledge its claim to be examined by book at all ; 
 but we ask the next farmer, is this the mustard ? 
 Suffice it to say, that its family likeness to the 
 esculent cross-flowering plants is notable; its 
 rough green turnip-like leaf, its yellow head of 
 blossoms, and longish pods, are somewhat closely 
 pressed to a stalk which is of two or three feet 
 high, according to the richness of the soil on 
 which it grows. The root is an annual, and is 
 small, differing from those of the knobbed plants 
 of the same order. Our plant is more often 
 found in a true state of wildness near the sea on 
 banks, than in the interior of the country. Dr. 
 Goodenough remarks, that this species may be 
 at once recognised by the leaves on the smaller 
 branches being pendulous. We find, in Wither- 
 ing's "Botany," another meaning for Slnapis, 
 which is certainly too applicable to be omitted 
 viz., " sino," in Greek, painfully to affect ; 
 and "opas," the eyes, in obvious allusion to the 
 painful stimulation of the eyes, and all their 
 neighbourhood, produced by the taste of the Si- 
 napi; and which property gained for them, from
 
 214 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 the Roman agriculturist Columella, the happy epi- 
 thet of the tear-producing mustard, " Fletum fae- 
 tura Sinapi." Plautus has also left its fame for 
 a poignancy recorded in his cognomen, Scelerata 
 Sinapi "the wicked mustard." Thus we see 
 ours is a condiment of ancient as well as of modern 
 dignity ; its warmth, its acuteness, its activity are 
 on record extensively. Gay makes it an illus- 
 tration of love itself, in his " Song of Similies," 
 where he says, " My passion is as mustard strong ;" 
 and we know, from Touchstones communication 
 to Rosalind, that mustard was sometimes, in 
 Shakspeare's period, not as good as the taste for 
 Jiaut gout required ; for " there was a certain 
 knight who swore by his honour they were good 
 pancakes, and the mustard was naught." Now, 
 Touchstone avouches that it was " the pancakes 
 was naught, and the mustard was good." So we 
 see, also, that mustard was a sauce for pancakes 
 on Shakspeare's Shrove Tuesday ; and if they 
 were not made then what cooks call light, it is 
 probable they would not be digestible without 
 some stimulator of the kind. 
 
 Smith, in " English Botany," tells us that mus- 
 tard is one of the most useful and wholesome of 
 stimulating condiments. Its composition is stated 
 to be chiefly a starch ; a bland fixed oil, like that 
 procured from many of the seeds of cruciferous 
 plants, and which has been expressed as an article 
 of commerce ; an ammoniacal salt, or some nitro- 
 genous substance, indicating a natural adapta- 
 bility to the digestive organs of assimilation in 
 animals ; and an acrid volatile oil, in which lies 
 its more potential and significant properties. Its
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 215 
 
 power of retaining the vegetative life is similar 
 to that of the other members of its family ; it 
 becomes hereditary for ages in fields where it 
 once was cultivated ; the surface-sown seeds being 
 ever ready to appear, and those which get deeper 
 remaining safely guarded in their oily coating, 
 and waiting for even ages of time to be turned up 
 to light, air, and moisture, and then to burst into 
 life and vigour. The mustard of table use is re- 
 commended to be made with milk. Dr. Cullen, 
 who devoted his eminent talents to the improve- 
 ment of cookery by science, says that though, 
 with milk, it makes a rich and unctuous bland 
 sauce, it does not keep well ; we can imagine 
 that it was this method which was employed to 
 subdue its fire when our friend Jack Falstaff re- 
 sembled the languid levities of Poins to such a 
 stagnant starchiness. Old Jack says : " He a 
 good wit ! hang him, baboon ! his wit is as thick 
 as Tewksbury mustard : there is no more con- 
 ceit in him than is in a mallet." This use of the 
 word throws us back upon our own origin of the 
 name again the first syllable being " must," or 
 vinegar ; for Cullen tells us that, compounded in 
 this way, the powder excels in pungency ; and 
 still older authors assert " that the vitam ardens, 
 the ' living fire/ is better evoked by the solicitude 
 of the alegar, for which it hath a willing affec- 
 tion." Our faithful friend Gerarde, in his letter 
 " Of Mustarde's Virtues," says, " that the seed, 
 pounded with vinegar, is good to be eaten with 
 any grosse meates, either fish or flesh." And 
 surely the old observer is right ; those who will 
 eat "grosse meates" do require "that sawce
 
 216 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 which helpeth digestion, warmeth the stomacke, 
 and prouvoketh appetite." 
 
 We could give a volume of medicinal and 
 surgical applications of our plant. Among the 
 modern ones are retained usefully weak mus- 
 tard-water, as a tonic emetic ; the sinapism, or 
 wet blister, so called from the Latin name of the 
 plant ; and the dry powder, which is used as a 
 rubifacient, to redden the face of the skin when 
 it requires stimulation. Mustard was used in 
 lethargy or coma, in rheumatism or sciatica, in 
 toothache, in bruises, and in baldness. It was 
 given as a sternuatory ; such snuff may well be 
 supposed to take a person violently by the nasal 
 handle, and for a time certainly cause him to 
 exhibit " a jolly red nose." Mustard mixed with 
 honey was a conserve put on coldish fruits ; and 
 perhaps for some stomachs it would not be an 
 injudicious kind of sweet fruit-curry. But we have 
 been long enough about our "pot moutarde," and 
 must conclude with one legend more about its 
 name. 
 
 Withering tells us that, in 1382, Philip the 
 Bold, Duke of Burgundy, granted to the town of 
 Dijon armorial ensigns, " Moult me t'arde" " I 
 am much ardent" which was sculptured over 
 the principal gateway. By an accident one letter, 
 " t" and the word " me," were broken out ; it 
 then remained " moultarde" The merchant 
 dealers in Sinapi wanting to place the town's 
 arms on the pots of their condiment, copied the 
 words as they saw them, and the spicy compound 
 remains "moultarde" in France to this day. We 
 are not bound to certify this baptism on oath ;
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 217 
 
 but some people hardly know that our com- 
 monest vegetables have their own legendary lore, 
 which is to be found by pleasant searching ; if it 
 be not solemn wisdom, those who like such story- 
 telling science imagine it excellent in its own 
 way, and, with Sir Andrew Aguecheek, are much 
 won by it ; for to some tastes it is at least " the 
 best of fooling," and if not highly dignified, it is 
 instructively amusing.
 
 218 WALKS AFTEK WILD FLOWEES. 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 SEA-KALE. CRAMBO. COOKING-RECEIPT. RADISHES : THE JOINTED 
 CHARLOCK, THE SEA-RADISH, BOILED RADISHES : THE PEEL USED 
 FORMERLY INSTEAD OF LITMUS. LAST OF THE CROSS-WORTS. 
 
 THE AWL-WORT : A RARE LAKE-PLANT. SWIFT'S RHYME FOR 
 
 AWL. THE END OF THIS GROUP OF PLANTS. 
 
 THE palateable and wholesome vegetable, Sea- 
 kale, the Brassica marina of Gerarde, is now 
 so well known in our kitchen -gardens that a 
 description of it would be superfluous ; and, as a 
 wild plant, acquaintance with its domesticated 
 appearance is also a sufficient introduction ; for, 
 although culture improves its size and succulency, 
 it does not a]ter, but rather enhances, its natural 
 characteristics. Good training and good nourish- 
 ment are, of consequence, well bestowed in this 
 case, the healthy aspect of a sea-coast origin re- 
 maining perfect amidst the pamperings of a garden 
 life, exhibiting there an invincible rural vivacious- 
 ness and unbroken constitutional force, becoming 
 a scene, which happily combines all that confirms 
 to it the pristine vigour of a more simple exist- 
 ence, and shows the value of cultivation in peren- 
 nial beauty, energy, and usefulness. The whole 
 plant is, as we know, smooth, and the numerous 
 leaves are spread widely on the ground where 
 they grow wild ; they are waved and indented 
 gracefully ; of a sea-green colour, covered with a 
 fine meal ; sometimes they occur of a pea-green 
 tint, without the delicate powdery shading. They
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 219 
 
 are also sometimes tinted purple. The blossoms 
 are usually large and white ; they have been met 
 with, at times, of a yellowish hue. The seed-pod 
 is egg-shaped, but becomes nearly round when 
 ripe, and is one of many little leathery boxes 
 constructed to keep the seeds safely. When, on 
 our sea-coast rambles in the Spring, we some- 
 times meet the sea-kale forcing its stout leaves up 
 through sea-sand, where it is mixed with shingle 
 or gravel, this rather arid home keeps it stunt- 
 ed, and it looks a very different plant as to size 
 from the garden vegetable ; which is, indeed, more 
 apt to draw attention after the cutting season is 
 past, when the crop has been manured highly, 
 and thus caused to flourish luxuriantly, to enable 
 the roots to gather stores of vigour and life for 
 the ensuing Spring's vegetation. When in June 
 and July it blooms its honey -smelling white 
 flowers, it is, for a vegetable, rather a showy 
 garden plant ; even ornamental when the stable 
 Utter used in forcing is buried, and the blanch- 
 ing-pots or other unsightly contrivances put 
 out of the way, until another Spring calls again 
 for their aid. The inhabitants of the coast 
 used always to cut the Spring shoots under the 
 ground, as is done with asparagus ; but gardeners 
 did not know of this practice until about forty 
 years since. They attempted introducing it as a 
 vegetable when it had grown into a colewort-like 
 size, these large green leaves were then coarse 
 eating, with a strong brassicacious flavour ; and, 
 in consequence, the French cooks denounced Chow 
 mari Angleterre as detestable. Good market- 
 gardening now gives us this excellent vegetable
 
 220 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 at a moderate price. It is of universal use at the 
 table either boiled in whole stalks like celery, 
 put into soups, or presented in any way sufficient- 
 ly cooked, and is welcome either to the healthy 
 or delicate appetite. The late growths of cabbages 
 or sea-kale, when eaten as boiled vegetables, have 
 been found to disagree with some stomachs, giv- 
 ing a giddiness in the head an effect which never 
 results from the use of the early blanched stalk 
 or asparagus sea-kale. 
 
 The botanical name of our plant is Crambe 
 maritima, the generic name being derived from 
 the Greek word "krambos," arid, dry the leaves, 
 as we noted before, habitually forcing up through 
 dry, gravelly sand, with the specific term ma- 
 ritima from the Latin word for the sea. We 
 know nothing legendary about this esculent, but 
 in looking after Crambe we find " crambo." Dean 
 Swift seemed to think that the rhymings and 
 jinglings which bore that name in his time sprung 
 from as arid a human soil as the gravel which 
 produces our Crambe ; and in his wrath he de- 
 nounced them thus : 
 
 " So Msevius, when lie drain'd his skull, 
 His similies in order set, 
 And every crambo he could get." 
 
 Yet the Dean was himself inveterate, along with 
 Sheridan and Delany, at capping rhymes. Cram- 
 bo with us might be a fair intellectual trifle, as 
 an evening dessert after Crambe at dinner. This 
 petite wit is known to consist of one person 
 writing a line, and another putting a rhyming 
 line to it, he being told the last word. This is
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 221 
 
 very allowable amusemement, and would some- 
 times be an agreeable exercise of ingenuity. In- 
 deed, the Dean himself produced certain cries for 
 vegetable-women, which were droll and popular ; 
 and, if his Deanship had known our Crambe, I 
 dare say he would have afforded us some crambo 
 directions, such as this : 
 
 " Listen, cook, to a patter, 
 With sea-kale the matter : 
 Boil well, place in platter, 
 Then a little salt scatter, 
 Powder pepper on that, or 
 Sauce with nice butter-batter 
 And though like a starv'd rat, or 
 A rake chew, don't chatter, 
 But your appetite flatter, 
 And you 11 surely grow fatter." 
 
 Arid so much for sea-kale on the coast and after 
 cookery. 
 
 Our next genus of cross-worts is Raphanus, 
 a name contrived out of the Greek words " ra," 
 quickly, and " phianomai," to appear from the 
 active vegetative power the seeds possess, in com- 
 mon with their near neighbours, those of the 
 mustards. The first species we meet is the Ra- 
 pkanistrum, the most perfect Raphanus, called 
 so to give it eminence. The leaves are a good 
 instance of the lyrate form ; they are rough, and, 
 when picked young, make a good addition to a 
 salad, as they are crisp, and very slightly warmed 
 with the radish flavour, more marked in the root 
 and seeds. The petals are yellow, netted thickly 
 with more or less deep veins of purplish red. 
 The whole flower looks somewhat like that of 
 the single pale harlequin wall -flower. It bios-
 
 222 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 soms in July; and the plant's height is about a 
 foot. It is rather rare in the South of Ireland, 
 but is a troublesome agricultural weed in many 
 parts of England, where it is known as the joint 
 ed Charlock, the seeds being celled off in well 
 marked chambers, which joints readily break 
 away from the rest of the pod. 
 
 The ancient physicians called radish-seed ba- 
 ccmon; we cannot discover why. Bakchia is 
 frenzy, madness ; and Linnseus says that these 
 seeds produce convulsions when ground up in 
 flour and eaten in bread. This is, however, dis- 
 proved in its extreme statement ; but those acrid 
 vegetables, when eaten in quantity, have had at- 
 tributed to them very generally the production 
 of headaches and vertigo. How often violent 
 stimulants are repudiated, whether as acrid ve- 
 getables, or in the more decidedly mischief- 
 marked bakchia madness -making, stimulants. 
 We find Theophrastus Dioscorides and Galen 
 largely writing up radish-seeds for medical uses ; 
 their name is by some early writers changed 
 to kakanon, probably from "kaio," to burn, in 
 allusion to their hotness, or from " kakaneo," to 
 excite, the commonest medical application of 
 them. Our common name, wild radish, we can- 
 not here derive from the Saxon word "rod," 
 red, because the root of the native is not red. 
 The Raphanus sativus, the red or garden radish, 
 though known to Gerarde, is a Chinese plant ; 
 and the English word by which our plant was 
 called was in use before he adopted it. 
 
 The Roman physicians directed that radishes 
 should be eaten raw, with bread and salt, in the
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 223 
 
 morning, before any other food ; and a more an- 
 cient rhymer on Domestic Economy than even 
 Tusser, Barnaby Googe, recommended our vege- 
 table, as a whetter to appetite and a tonic cure, 
 viz. : 
 
 " Some radishe rootes this day doe take before all other meate, 
 Against the quartan ague, and such other sicknesse greate, 
 Straighte after this into the fieldes they walk to take a view." 
 
 So we see that after this somewhat crude food 
 exercise was very necessary. We find this vege- 
 table so popular in early days as to have been a 
 supper's addition ; and, no doubt, a light supper 
 is most wholesome, when required at all. 
 
 We close our account of this species with the 
 evening use of the radish : 
 
 " The customary rites 
 
 Of the last meal commence : a Roman meal 
 Such as the mistress of the world once found 
 Delicious, when her patriots of high note, 
 Perhaps by moonlight, at their humble doors, 
 And under an old oak's domestic shade, 
 Enjoy'd, spare feaat, a radish and an egg." 
 
 Thompson's Poem of " Liberty." 
 
 Our second native species of this genus is Ra- 
 phanus maritimus, the Sea-radish. It is a very 
 robust, tall plant, and grows rather sparingly on 
 our shores ; from three to four feet high, and 
 bearing its showy deep yellow blossoms in June 
 or July. It is a biennial plant, which may 
 fairly confer the name radix or radish on the 
 genus, because its root is very thick, succulent, 
 and fleshy; the Greek word "raphanos," a root, 
 being almost the Latin raphanus, which word 
 botanists retain. The early gardeners carried 
 out the root -producing eminence of radishes
 
 224 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 to the extraordinary sizes produced in carrots, 
 parsnips, mangel wurzel, and turnips, in our 
 days. It is not certain that, in all cases, it 
 was our sea-radish which underwent this ab- 
 normous radication; but Pliny tells us that in 
 Germany they have them with roots of a great 
 size this would make it probable that they 
 were native plants exceedingly developed by 
 much nurture, and a rapidly urged vegetation. 
 This writer states that he has seen a radish 
 weighing forty pounds ; and Matthiole magni- 
 fies this wonder to a radish which weighed one 
 hundred pounds. If these marvels be true, mo- 
 dern mangel-growers are hid away under the 
 ancient monstrosity; but even taking those 
 stories with great deductions, and swallowing 
 such radishes cautiously, cum, grano salis, for 
 fear we should not "stomach" them, it is doubt- 
 ful, in an economical account, w T hether the con- 
 sumption of manure, labour, and care, produces 
 a due return of profit to the agricultural artist 
 for such he is who developes those vegeta- 
 ble enormities. For much further matter of en- 
 tertaining knowledge about radishes, I must re- 
 fer the inquirer to "Phillips's History of Culti- 
 vated Vegetables." He tells us that a Greek 
 author wrote a whole book about them ; and so, 
 it seems, could a modern compiler, if it were 
 the taste of the times to exhaust a subject. It 
 is worth quoting, however, that when imitations 
 of fruits and flowers, made of metal, ivory, &c., 
 were devoted as offerings to the gods, the pro- 
 totypes of turnips were made of lead, those of 
 beet in silver, but those of radishes in gold. Ra-
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 225 
 
 beet in silver, but those of radishes in gold. Ra- 
 dishes have been used as a boiled vegetable and 
 French peasants used them roasted ; they also, in 
 their raw state, possessed multitudes of cures for 
 diseases, from hydrophobia and poisoning down 
 to a rough skin, and which indeed belong, in some 
 degree, as the ancients have said, to nearly every 
 plant that grows. There are no less than six- 
 teen varieties of cultivated radishes, but there 
 is one, the black Spanish radish, which used to 
 be known more than it is now ; it might be pro- 
 fitable for the market-gardeners to revive it, as 
 it is hardy, and, continuing uninjured by slight 
 frosts, makes a desirable salad vegetable through 
 most part of our winters. Reverence the radish, 
 for you see it is said to be of universal value. The 
 chemist formerly made use of the scraped rind 
 for a blue colour, to change it into red by adding 
 acids ; the more convenient litmus has super- 
 seded this use. Sugar and radish-juice made a 
 wheezing windpipe mellifluent; the juice resisted 
 hypocondriacism, and was a great beautifier of 
 the skin two results which are, indeed, very 
 much associated, as a troubled mind darkens the 
 countenance, and engenders premature wriDkles. 
 It was also used as an early kind of Macassar 
 oil ; for Gerarde reports that " the root, stamped 
 with honey, and the powder of sheep's heart 
 dried, cause th hair to grow in short space." Sir 
 John Falsta/ must have heard of one of those 
 gross radishes to which we have had reference, 
 when he makes a bundle of them his own diminu- 
 tive, and says, respecting those who robbed him of 
 the booty he had stolen, " If I fought not with fifty
 
 226 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 of them, I am a bunch of radish : if there were 
 not two or three and fifty upon poor old Jack, 
 then am I no two-legged creature." 
 
 We now come to the last of the native Cruci- 
 ferce, the Subularia called so from " subula" an 
 awl, and "re," a thing or object. The lower 
 leaves are curve-pointed like a cobbler's awl ; and 
 the plant is, consequently, an awl-like thing. The 
 genus has but one species, the Aquatica, and that 
 is found on shallow margins of lakes at great ele- 
 vations. Mr. Edward Murphy, Professor of Agri- 
 culture in the Queen's College, Cork, is one of the 
 few discoverers of this rarity. The old botanists 
 never saw it, as it reposes under water in its 
 plashy bed ; and even now it would be a matter 
 of pleasant exertion on mountaineering excur- 
 sions to hunt it out in its alpine lake residence. 
 Those, however, who have botanized for them- 
 selves some of the previous cross-bearing plants, 
 will be so quick at distinguishing their character- 
 istics, that even through the water this little cru- 
 cifer would be readily recognised. In July, its 
 short stalk and little white tetraform blossoms 
 may be seen, springing from a neat small knot of 
 green recurved awl-shaped leaves ; if drawn up, 
 its roots will be found long and numerous, adapted 
 for holding a place in the muddy bottom whence 
 it springs. The world is limited, as far as we are 
 at present aware, to one genus, and this one spe- 
 cies the awl-wort ; we are honoured in the British 
 Isles by providing the home of the little paddling 
 pet of the mountain ponds. We do not find 
 much to remark of this plant ; it has not won a 
 reputation in medicine-mongering or witchcraft.
 
 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 227 
 
 Like the citizen in Julius Ccesar, it might say, if 
 it could speak " Truly, sir, all that I live by is 
 with the awl : I meddle with no tradesman's mat- 
 ters, nor women's matters, but with awL" It has, 
 in fact, only its name and its form, without a 
 history of any economical kind whatever. We 
 do, it is true, know of a certain water-cobler, but 
 he could not get at our awl-wort, for he lives in 
 the sea, and the mountain ponds or elevated lakes 
 are inaccessible to him ; with this difficulty before 
 us, we cannot draw our plant into a legend with 
 any facility, so we must record its residence in 
 our poet Moore's lines, which will give it some 
 touch of immortality : 
 
 " On Lough Neagh's banks as the fisherman strays, 
 
 At the cold clear eve's declining, 
 He sees the round towers of other days 
 In the waves beneath him shining." 
 
 Close by stones and broken rubble, where the 
 poet may imagine ancient fallen towers lie half 
 imbedded in the lake, the Subularia appears ; it 
 is the Irish rush-cress an admirably adapted 
 name, constructed from its rush-like leaves and 
 its cress-like blossom. This interesting little na- 
 tive ought to be in every aquatic garden. If 
 planted in a pot of gravel with a little clay, and 
 sunk in a quiet stream, it will grow readily ; and 
 then may be noticed by the curious, with facility, 
 the unique fact of a flower in full bloom under 
 the water. It is very probable, however, that the 
 distribution of the pollen on the stigmas takes 
 place before the petals open, and that in this way 
 impregnation is secured ; although the most usual 
 fertilization of seeds takes place after the flower
 
 228 WALKS AFTER WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 expands in the air. We have not a poet who has 
 noticed this water-nymph of the mountains, nor 
 has any part of her name been versified upon 
 directly, except we introduce Swift, using up a 
 part of the name of our little cress chopped into 
 an intellectual salad, as thus 
 
 " A long ear'd beast, and a cobbler's tool, 
 And a boy that's only fit for school, 
 In summer is very pleasant and cool." 
 
 "Which riddle, read broad, is ass-awl-lad "a 
 salad." 
 
 We have now gone steadily through the Irish 
 cross-bearing plants, the Tetradyiwmice of Lin- 
 nseus. As the history of these plants has shown, 
 they all make up a very natural family, or, in 
 other words, have a very like general nature, 
 though individual differences clearly distinguish 
 them. With this summary, then, I bring their 
 collected and abridged history to a close, know- 
 ing that, if it was given at rull length, I should 
 be in danger of excruciating my readers on a too 
 long drawn out expansion of the Cruciates.
 
 INDEX 
 
 OP REFERENCE TO THE SYSTEMATIC AND FAMILIAR NAMES AND 
 8YNONYMES OF THE PLANTS DESCRIBED. 
 
 Alyssum sativum 
 Amphibious Cress . 
 Anemone nemorosa . 
 
 PAOB 
 
 . 139 
 90 
 . 14 
 15 
 . 19 
 41 
 . 97 
 98 
 . 226 
 . 222 
 93 
 . 95 
 43 
 . ib. 
 98 
 . 94 
 15 
 . 51 
 163 
 . 169 
 178 
 . 185 
 218 
 . 28 
 29 
 . 116 
 36 
 . 137 
 
 Capsella Bursa-pastoris 
 Cardamiiie amara 
 
 PAGE 
 
 145 
 . 98 
 99 
 . 102 
 190 
 . 73 
 25 
 . 204 
 82 
 . 73 
 101 
 . 219 
 6 
 . 106 
 107 
 
 . n>. 
 
 110 
 . 201 
 165 
 . 190 
 43 
 . 30 
 140 
 . 142 
 74 
 . 190 
 220 
 . 91 
 
 
 Apiiun Sardonicum . 
 Aquilegia vulgaris . 
 Arabis ciliata 
 
 Cauliflower . 
 Celandine . 
 Celery-leaved Crowfoot . 
 Charlock . 
 Cheiranthus cheiri . 
 Chelidonium majus . 
 Chemise de Notre Dame . 
 Chou mari D'Angleterre 
 Clematis vitalba 
 Cochlearia officinalis . 
 
 Awl-wort . 
 Baconon 
 Barbarea vulgaris . 
 
 Barberry 
 Berberis vulgaris 
 Bitter Lady's-Smock 
 Bitter Winter-Cress . 
 Blue Mountain-Anemone 
 Brandy-Bottles . 
 Brassica napus 
 
 
 
 Cole-flores . 
 Cole-seed .... 
 Coleworts . 
 Columbine 
 Jorn Crowfoot . 
 Uoronopus ruellii . 
 
 
 
 
 Bulbous Crowfoot 
 Butter-Cup 
 Cakile maritima . 
 Caltha palustris 
 Civmeliua sativa . 
 
 2orydalis claviculata 
 2ow-Cabbage . . 
 Crambe maritima . . 
 Creeping-Cress .
 
 230 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Creeping-Crowfoot . 
 Cuckoo-buds 
 
 Cuckoo-flower . . 
 Dame's violet . . 
 Draba verna ... 
 Draba Incana . . 
 Dyer's Woad . 
 Early Winter-Cress 
 Erophila . 
 Euruca marina . 
 Erysimum cheiranthoides 
 alliaria 
 
 PAGE 
 
 28 
 
 . ib. 
 
 101 
 . 120 
 
 104 
 . 105 
 
 159 
 . 95 
 
 105 
 . 118 
 
 131 
 . 133 
 
 146 
 . 11 
 23 
 
 False-Pocket . 
 Feathered Columbine . 
 Figwort Crowfoot . 
 Fine-leaved Hedge-mustard 127 
 Flix-weed ... ib. 
 French Poppy . .' ,57 
 Fringed Rock-Cress . - 87 
 Fumaria capreolata . . 78 
 
 officinalis . . 76 
 
 parviflora . . 77 
 
 Fumitory, Common . 76 
 Garden Cabbage . .186 
 
 Gillyflower . . .80 
 Gilofre .... ib. 
 Glastum . . . .161 
 Glaucium Luteum . . 68 
 Globe-Flower ... 34 
 Gold-of-Pleasure. . . 138 
 Goldilocks ... 24 
 Gowans . . . .85 
 Great Sea-Stock . .80 
 Great Spear- Wort .. . ffl 
 Green Hellebore . . 41 
 Hairy Pale Crowfoot . . 29 
 Hairy Lady's-Smock . 102 
 Hairy-tower Mustard . .98 
 Hedge Mustard, Broad-leaved 126 
 Hedge Mustard, Common . 124 
 Helleborus viridis . . 37 
 Hellebore .... 38 
 Hesperis matronalis . 118 
 Horse-Radish . . .110 
 Hybrid Poppy. . . 53 
 
 Ivy-leaved Ranunculus 
 
 Iris Hedge-Musturd 
 
 Isatis Tinctoria . . 
 
 Jack-o'-the-Hedge . 
 
 Jointed-Charlock 
 
 Kakanon . 
 
 Kale .... 
 
 King-Cups . . 
 
 Laughing Parsley 
 
 Lepidium Latifolium 
 
 Ruderale 
 
 Campestre . 
 
 Smithii , 
 
 PAOK 
 21 
 
 125 
 156 
 133 
 
 222 
 222 
 191 
 27 
 19 
 150 
 ib. 
 153 
 155 
 
 Lesser Spearwort . .22 
 Lionan a-bhan ... 21 
 Little-flowered Crowfoot . 31 
 London-Rocket . . 126 
 Long-headed Prickly Poppy 54 
 Love-in-idleness. . .100 
 Marsh-Cress ... 89 
 Matthiola Sinuata . .80 
 Marsh-Marigold . . 35 
 Meadow-Rue Alpine . .10 
 
 Lesser . . 11 
 
 Greater . . ib. 
 
 Yellow . ib. 
 
 Meconopsis Cambriaca . 66 
 Melampodius ... 38 
 Mithridate Mustard . .115 
 
 Pepper- wort . 154 
 
 Mongrel Poppy . . .53 
 Mustard-Tree of Scripture 208 
 Mustard of Commerce . 211 
 Narrow-leaved Pepper-wort 152 
 Naphew . . . .178 
 Nasturtium officinale . 86 
 sylvestre . .90 
 
 terrestre . 91 
 
 amphibium . 92 
 
 Navew . . . .164 
 Nuphar lutea . . .50 
 Nymphsea alba . . 47 
 Our Lady's Smock . . 99 
 Papaver argemone . . 54 
 dubium . 55
 
 INDEX. 
 
 231 
 
 Papaver hybridum 
 
 rhceas. 
 
 somniferum . 
 Pasque- Flower, or Paschal 
 
 Flower 
 Penny-Cress 
 
 Pepper-wort, Broad-leaved 
 Phytolacca dodecandra 
 Pile-wort Crowfoot . 
 Prashaugh Buidhe 
 Procumbent Pepper-wort . 
 
 Dittander 
 Purple Sea-Rocket . 
 Queen's Gillyflower . 
 Ramping Fumitory . 
 Ranunculus aquatilis . 
 hederaceous . 
 
 lingua 
 
 flammula 
 
 ficaria 
 
 - auncomus 
 
 sceleratus 
 
 acris 
 
 repens . 
 
 bulbosus . 
 
 hirsutus 
 
 arvensis . 
 parviflores 
 
 Rape Seed 
 Raphanus raphanistrum . 
 sativus 
 
 maritimus 
 
 Rapum sativum . 
 
 Red-Poppy 
 
 Rock-Gentle 
 
 Round rough-headed Poppy 
 
 Sauce-alone 
 
 Scelerate sinapi 
 
 Scrambling-pocket 
 
 Scurvy-grass, Common . 
 
 - English . 
 Danish . 
 Sea-Cabbage 
 Sea-Radish 
 Senebiera, see Coronopus . 
 
 PAQE 
 
 PAOB 
 
 53 
 
 Shepherd's purse . 
 
 145 
 
 56 
 
 Sinapis arvensis . 
 
 202 
 
 KQ 
 
 
 f)f\A 
 
 4>y 
 
 
 Z\)* 
 
 211 
 
 nigra . . . 
 
 18 
 
 Sisymbriam officinale 
 
 123 
 
 115 
 
 MA 
 
 19*i 
 
 150 
 
 
 iLD 
 
 127 
 
 
 208 
 
 4llnli n m.* 
 
 
 23 
 
 Small-flowered Fumitory. 
 
 77 
 
 202 
 
 Smooth-headed Poppy 
 
 55 
 
 142 
 
 Smooth Field-Pepper-wort 
 
 155 
 
 ib. 
 
 Subularia aquatics 
 
 226 
 
 116 
 
 Sweet Wood Crowfoot . 
 
 25 
 
 120 
 
 Swine's Cress 
 
 141 
 
 75 
 
 Thale Cress . 
 
 129 
 
 19 
 
 Thalictrum alpinum . 
 
 10 
 
 21 
 
 Tniiiiifi 
 
 11 
 
 ib. 
 
 
 11 
 
 22 
 
 
 11 
 
 23 
 
 Thlaspi arvense . 
 
 115 
 
 24 
 
 Vlil*f 11TYI 
 
 155 
 
 25 
 
 Tongue-leaved Crowfoot 
 
 21 
 
 26 
 
 Toy-Wort 
 
 146 
 
 28 
 
 Traveller's-joy 
 
 7 
 
 ib. 
 
 Treacle-Mustard 
 
 132 
 
 29 
 
 Trollius europaeus 
 
 33 
 
 30 
 
 Turkey-Pod . 
 
 131 
 
 31 
 
 Turnip .... 
 
 170 
 
 163 
 
 Turritis alpina 
 
 97 
 
 221 
 
 Twisted - podded Whitlow- 
 
 
 222 
 
 grass .... 
 
 105 
 
 223 
 
 Upright Meadow Crowfoot 
 
 26 
 
 175 
 
 Viorna .... 
 
 6 
 
 56 
 
 Virgin's Bower 
 
 ib. 
 
 125 
 
 Veratrum .... 
 
 38 
 
 53 
 
 Wall-Flower . 
 
 83 
 
 134 
 
 Wart-Cress, Common . 
 
 141 
 
 914 
 
 T p -upr 
 
 t'6. 
 
 AX4 
 
 125 
 
 Water-Crowfoot . 
 
 19 
 
 106 
 
 Water Ladies . 
 
 21 
 
 107 
 
 Water Cresses . . . 
 
 87 
 
 ib. 
 
 Water Radish . 
 
 92 
 
 185 
 
 Welsh Poppy 
 
 66 
 
 224 
 
 White Water-Lilly . 
 
 47 
 
 140 
 
 White Poppy . 
 
 59
 
 232 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 White Climbing-Corydalis 
 
 White Rocket . 
 
 White Mustard 
 
 White Violet 
 
 Whitlow-grass 
 
 Wild Field-Cabbage . 
 
 PAGE 
 
 74 
 120 
 204 
 
 82 
 104 
 178 
 
 Wild Radish . . 
 Wood Anemone . 
 Worm-Seed 
 Yellow Water-Lilly 
 Yellow Horned Poppy 
 Yellow Rocket 
 
 PAGE 
 
 221 
 
 14 
 
 132 
 
 50 
 
 68 
 
 91 
 
 THE END. 
 
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