=STOCK.=--The Stock, or Stock-Gilliflower (_Mathiola_), was one of

the earliest inmates of English gardens, where it was known as the

Gilliflower, a word corrupted from the French name of the flower,

_Giroflée_.

“The white and purple Gillyflowers, that stay

In blossom--lingering summer half away.”

The principal kinds grown in gardens are the Queen’s Stock-Gilliflower,

of which the Brompton Stock and the White Stock are varieties, and

the annual, or Ten-weeks’ Stock (_M. annua_). The old English name

of Gilliflower was familiarly given to several other plants dear to

early English gardeners: thus we find it applied to the Carnation, the

Pink, the Rocket, the Wall-flower, the Ragged Robin, and some others.

Parkinson (who is the first writer to mention the double Stock) remarks

of the flower: “We call it in English generally Stock-Gilloflower (or

as others do, Stock Gillover), to put a difference between them and the

Gilloflowers and Carnations, which are quite of another kindred.” The

word Gilliflower afterwards became corrupted to July-flower, and was so

written by the poet Drayton.----Baron Cuvier had a great partiality

for the double Stock: it had been the favourite flower of his mother,

and the great naturalist, on that account, always prized the fragrant

plant, and whilst it was in season made it a rule to have a bunch on

his table, that he might inhale its grand perfume.

=STONECROP.=--Like the House-leek, the Stonecrop was supposed to be a

protective against thunder and lightning, and hence was planted on the

roofs of cottages, stables, &c. The old herbalists valued the small

Houseleek, or Stonecrop, as a cure for ague and expeller of poisons.

It was used as an outward application, and, when boiled in beer, was

considered good for pestilential fevers. Among country folks the plant

was known as Wall Pepper (from its pungent flavour), Jack of the

Buttery, Gold Chain, and Prick Madam, the last name being a corruption

of the French _Trique Madame._----Stonecrop is held by astrologers to

be under the dominion of the Moon.

=STORAX.=--The Styrax, or Storax-tree, has been held in great

estimation from the time of Dioscorides and Pliny, both of whom

described it. Although the tree is indigenous to many of the southern

parts of Europe, yet the precious and deliciously fragrant gum

that exudes from it, known as Storax-tears, can only be obtained

in perfection from Asiatic Turkey. Old Gerarde says “of this gum,

there are made sundry excellent perfumes, pomanders, sweet waters,

sweet bags, sweet washing-balls, and divers other sweet chains and

bracelets.”----Storax-tears are still used as incense in the churches

and mosques of Asia Minor.

=STRAW.=--In the _Hávamál_, or the ‘Divine Discourse of Odin,’ who

gave these precepts of wisdom to mankind, it is stated that “Straws

dissolve enchantment.” Hence, probably, was derived the custom of

laying two Straws crosswise in the path where a witch was expected to

pass, under the belief that by stepping over Straws, arranged so as to

form the sign of the Cross, a witch was rendered powerless. In Ireland,

on May-eve (_neen na Beal tina_), the ceremony is practised of making

the cows leap over lighted Straw or faggots.----In Cornwall, lasses

desirous of knowing when they are to be married, are accustomed to

repair either to Madron Well, or to a well at St. Austell: there two

pieces of Straw, about an inch long, are crossed and fastened by a pin.

This Straw cross is then dropped into the water, and the rising bubbles

carefully counted, as they mark the number of years which will pass ere

the arrival of the happy day.----In Devonshire, to charm warts away,

they take a Wheat Straw with as many knots as there are warts on the

hand to be dealt with, name over the Straw the person afflicted, and

then bury it: as it decays, the warts will disappear.----In the county

of Donegal, Ireland, a sufferer from warts procures ten Straws, ties a

knot in each, throws the tenth away, and carefully rubs the warts with

the other nine knotted Straws; this done, he makes a white paper parcel

of the Straws, and throws it upon the high road, sure that the person

who picks up and opens the parcel will become the possessor of the

warts.----An old German cure for sleeplessness was to place beneath the

pillow a “composing wisp,” that is Straw which workwomen put under the

burdens on their backs; but taken from people unknown to them.----If

a hen wants to sit, the German peasants make her nest of Straw out of

the bed of the husband and wife: if cock chickens are wished, from the

man’s side; if hen chickens, from the wife’s side.----A Swedish popular

tale narrates how a king’s son, passing a cottage one day, saw a pretty

girl sitting on the roof spinning. Curious to know why she chose so

unusual a place, he enquired of the girl’s mother, who told him that

she sat there to let the people see how clever she was; adding, “She is

so clever that she can spin gold from clay and long Straw.” The truth

was, the girl, although good-looking, was idle in the extreme, and had

been set to spin on the roof of the cot so that all the world might

judge of her sloth. The king’s son, however, knew naught of this, and

being captivated by the girl’s pretty face, he resolved, if she could

really spin gold from long Straw and clay, to take her to the palace,

and make her his consort. The mother having given her consent, the girl

accompanied the prince to the royal residence, where she was given a

bundle of Straw, and a pailful of clay, in order to prove if she were

so skilful at spinning as her mother had said. The poor girl, knowing

her incompetence, soon began to weep when left by herself in her

chamber; whereupon suddenly a little ugly and deformed old man stood

before her, and demanded to know the cause of her grief. The girl told

him; and forthwith the old man produced a pair of gloves, which he gave

to the girl, saying, “Fair maiden, weep not: here is a pair of gloves;

when thou hast them on, thou wilt be able to spin from long Straw and

clay. To-morrow night I will return, when, if thou hast not found out

my name, thou shalt accompany me home, and be my bride.” The brave girl

shuddered, but agreed to the old man’s condition, and he went his way.

Then she pulled on the gloves, and, without difficulty, soon spun up

all the Straw and clay into the finest gold. There was great joy in

the palace, and the king’s son was delighted that he had obtained so

charming and so skilful a wife; but the young maiden did nothing but

weep at the dread prospect of being claimed by the ugly, undersized

old man. Late in the day, the king’s son returned from the chase, and

seeing his bride so melancholy, began to tell her of an adventure he

had just met with in the forest. Said he: “I suddenly came upon a very

little ugly old man dancing round a Juniper-bush, singing a curious

song, at the end of which he loudly bawled, ‘I am called _Titteli

Ture_.’” Then the pretty maid’s face brightened up, for she knew that

she had learnt the name of her mysterious visitor. So she set to work

to spin more gold from Straw and clay alone in her chamber, and kept

repeating the old man’s name, so that she might not forget it. At

midnight the door of her room noiselessly opened, and the hideous old

man entered with beaming eyes. On beholding him the girl sprang up, and

said: “Titteli Ture, Titteli Ture, here are thy gloves.” When the dwarf

heard his name pronounced, he was overcome with passion, and bursting

through the roof of the apartment, hastened away through the air. The

maiden was espoused by the king’s son the following day, and nothing

more was ever seen of Titteli Ture.

=STRAWBERRY.=--Strawberries were reputed to be the favourite fruit of

the goddess Frigg, who presided over marriages. In German legends,

Strawberries symbolise little children who have died when young.

According to one of these legends, before St. John’s Day mothers

who have lost their little ones take care not to eat Strawberries,

because they think that young children ascend to heaven concealed in

Strawberries. Mothers who eat Strawberries are considered to have

wronged the Virgin Mary, to whom the Strawberry is dedicated, and

who would assuredly refuse an entry into heaven to those children

whose mothers had defrauded her of the fruit specially set apart for

her.----A representation of the leaf of the Strawberry is set in

the gold coronets worn by certain of the English nobility: a duke’s

coronet has eight leaves, an earl’s eight, and that of a marquis four.

Strawberry-leaves and the Flower-de-luce are used in the coronets of

the younger members of the royal family. Don John, son of King John

I. of Portugal, adopted the Strawberry as his device, to show his

devotion to St. John the Baptist, who lived on fruits. It is mentioned

by Hollinshed, and the fact has been dramatised by Shakspeare, that

Glo’ster, when he was contemplating the death of Hastings, asked the

Bishop of Ely for Strawberries.

“My lord of Ely, when I was last in Holborn,

I saw good Strawberries in your garden there.”

Linnæus was cured of frequent attacks of gout by the use of

Strawberries, and the fruit is accounted an excellent remedy in putrid

fevers.----To dream of Strawberries is reputed to be a good omen:

to a youth they are supposed to denote that “his wife will be sweet

tempered, and bear him many children, all boys.”----A legend of the

Fichtelgebirge (a mountain range at the junction of Saxony, Bavaria,

and Bohemia) records that one Midsummer Day a woman went with her child

to look for Strawberries in a wood. She chanced to light upon some

plants, which when plucked in the night, were not to be exhausted; and

after awhile she perceived a cavern which she entered with her child.

Here, to her astonishment, lay heaps of gold scattered about; and three

white maidens gave her permission to take as much of the treasure as

she could collect with one grasp. Her greed, however, induced her

to make three swoops, and then, fearful of the consequences, and

forgetting her child, she rushed out of the hollow, when the entrance

was immediately closed upon her, and a warning voice informed her that

she could not regain her child until the next St. John’s Day. When this

day arrived, the woman repaired to the cave, and found to her joy the

entrance once more open, and her little one awaiting her with a rosy

Apple in its hand. Disregarding the treasures scattered in the cave,

the mother rushed with outstretched arms towards her child, and the

white maidens finding that the mother’s love was stronger than her

greed handed over the little one to her.----There is, in this district,

another legend anent the gathering of Strawberries, which will be found

under the head of CLUB MOSS.

=SUGAR-CANE.=--In the Sugar plantations of the Indies, several

superstitious ceremonies are preserved. It being customary to reserve

a few plants, it sometimes happens after the fields are planted,

that there remain several superfluous canes. Whenever this happens,

the husbandman repairs to the spot on the 11th of June, and having

sacrificed to the Nagbele, the tutelar deity of the Sugar-cane, he

immediately kindles a fire, and consumes the whole. If a Sugar-cane

should flower again at the end of the season, and produce seeds, it is

looked upon as a funereal flower, and as portending misfortune to the

owner of the estate or his family. If, therefore, a husbandman sees one

of these late-flowering canes, he plucks it up, and buries it without

allowing his master to know anything of the unfortunate occurrence,

willingly taking to himself any ill-luck which may accrue.----The bow

of Kâmadeva, the Indian Cupid, is sometimes represented as being formed

of Sugar-cane, sometimes of flowers, with a string composed of bees.

His five arrows were each tipped with a blossom, presented to Kâmadeva

by Vasanta (Spring).

“He bends the luscious cane, and twists the string

With bees; how sweet! but ah! how keen their sting.

He, with five flow’rets tips thy ruthless darts,

Which through five senses pierce enraptured hearts;

Strong _Champa_, rich in odorous gold;

Warm _Amer_, nursed in heavenly mould;

Dry _Makeser_, in silver smiling;

Hot _Kitticum_ our sense beguiling;

And last, to kindle fierce the scorching flame,

_Love Shaft_, which gods bright _Bela_ name.”--_Sir W. Jones._

=SUNFLOWER.=--The _Helianthus annuus_ derived its name of Sunflower

from its resemblance to the radiant beams of the Sun, and not, as is

popularly supposed and celebrated by poets, from its flowers turning to

face the Sun--a delusion fostered by Darwin, Moore, and Thompson, the

latter of whom tells us that unlike most of the flowery race--

“The lofty follower of the Sun,

Sad when he sets, shuts up her yellow leaves,

Drooping all night, and, when he warm returns,

Points her enamour’d bosom to his ray.”

The Helianthus has also been falsely identified with the Sunflower

of classical story--the flower into which poor Clytie was transformed

when, heart-broken at the desertion of her lover Phœbus, she remained

rooted to the ground, and became, according to Ovid, metamorphosed

into a flower resembling a Violet. “Held firmly by the root, she still

turns to the Sun she loves, and, changed herself, she keeps her love

unchanged.” Now the Helianthus, or modern Sunflower, could not have

been the blossom mentioned by Ovid, inasmuch as it is not a European

plant, was not known in his day, and first came to us from North

America. In its native country of Peru, the Helianthus is said to have

been much reverenced on account of the resemblance borne by its radiant

blossoms to the Sun, which luminary was worshipped by the Peruvians.

In their Temple of the Sun, the officiating priestesses were crowned

with Sunflowers of pure gold, and they wore them in their bosoms, and

carried them in their hands. The early Spanish invaders of Peru found

in these temples of the Sun numerous representations of the Sunflower

in virgin gold, the workmanship of which was so exquisite, that it

far out-valued the precious metal of which they were formed. Gerarde,

writing in 1597, remarks:--“The floure of the Sun is called in Latine

_Flos Solis_; for that some have reported it to turn with the Sunne,

which I could never observe, although I have endeavoured to finde

out the truth of it: but I rather thinke it was so called because it

resembles the radiant beams of the Sunne, whereupon some have called

_Corona Solis_ and _Sol Indianus_, the Indian Sunne-floure: others

_Chrysanthemum Peruvianum_, or the Golden Flower of Peru: in English,

the Floure of the Sun, or the Sun-floure.” (See HELIOTROPE.)

=SYCAMORE.=--Sycamore is properly the name of an Egyptian tree, the

leaves of which resemble those of the Mulberry and the fruit that

of the wild Fig; whence it was named from both _Sukomoros_; _sukon_

signifying a Fig, and _moros_ a Mulberry-tree.----Thevenot gives an

interesting tradition relating to one of these trees. He writes:--“At

Matharee is a large Sycamore, or Pharaoh’s Fig, very old, but which

bears fruit every year. They say, that upon the Virgin passing that

way with her son Jesus, and being pursued by the people, this Fig-tree

opened to receive her, and closed her in, until the people had passed

by, when it re-opened; and that it remained open ever after to the year

1656, when the part of the trunk that had separated itself was broken

away.” The tree is still shown to travellers a few miles north-east

of Cairo.----Another version relates that the Holy Family, at the

conclusion of their flight into Egypt, finally rested in the village

of Matarea, beyond the city of Hermopolis, and took up their residence

in a grove of Sycamores, a circumstance which gave the Sycamore-tree

a certain degree of interest in early Christian times. The Crusaders

imported it into Europe, and Mary Stuart, probably on account of its

sacred associations, brought from France and planted in her garden

the first Sycamores which grew in Scotland.----From the wood of this

Egyptian Fig-tree or Sycamore (_Ficus Sycomorus_), which is very

indestructible, the coffins of the Egyptian mummies were made.----By

a mistake of Ruellius the name Sycamore became transferred to the

Great Maple (_Acer pseudoplatanus_), which is the tree commonly known

in England as the Sycamore or Mock-Plane. This mistake, Dr. Prior

considers, may perhaps have arisen from the Great Maple having been,

on account of the density of its foliage, used in the sacred dramas of

the Middle Ages to represent the Fig-tree into which Zaccheus climbed

on the day of our Saviour’s triumphal entry into Jerusalem--the _Ficus

Sycomorus_ mentioned above.

“Here a sure shade

Of barren Sycamores, which the all-seeing sun

Could not pierce through.”--_Massinger._

In Scotland, the most remarkable Sycamores are those called Dool-trees

or Grief-trees. They were used by the powerful barons in the west of

Scotland for hanging their enemies and refractory vassals on.----The

Great Maple is called in France, as with us, _Sycomore_ or _Faux

Platane_ (Mock-Plane); the Italians call the same tree _Acero Fico_

(Fig-Maple); but in both these countries there grows the _Melia

Azadirachta_, or False Sycamore, which is called the Sacred Tree in

France, and the Tree of Our Father in Italy. In Sicily, it is known

as the Tree of Patience, and is regarded as emblematic of a wife’s

infidelity and a husband’s patience.----To dream of the Sycamore-tree

portends jealousy to the married; but to the virgin it prognosticates a

speedy marriage. (See also MAPLE).

=SYRINGA.=--The Arcadian nymph Syrinx pursued by Pan, who was enamoured

of her, fled to the banks of the river Ladon. Her flight being there

stopped, she implored relief from the water-nymphs, and was changed

into a Reed, just as Pan was on the point of catching her. Ovid thus

describes her transformation:--

“Now while the lustful god, with speedy pace,

Just thought to strain her in a strict embrace,

He filled his arms with Reeds, new rising on the place;

And while he sighs his ill-success to find,

The tender canes were shaken by the wind,

And breathed a mournful air, unheard before;

That much surprising Pan, yet pleased him more.

Admiring this new music, ‘Thou,’ he said,

‘Who can’st not be the partner of my bed,

At least shall be the consort of my mind;

And often, often to my lips be joined.’

He formed the Reeds, proportioned as they are,

Unequal in their length, and waxed with care,

They still retain the name of his ungrateful fair.”--_Dryden._

The _Philadelphus coronarius_ is the shrub into which, according to

Ovid, the nymph Syrinx was metamorphosed. The stems of this shrub are

used in Turkey for making pipe-sticks. Evelyn applied the name Syringa

also to the Lilac, which for the same reason was called “Pipe-tree.”

=TAMARIND.=--The _Tamarindus Indica_ is in Ceylon dedicated to Siva,

as the god of destruction. The natives of India have a prejudice

against sleeping under the Tamarind, and the acid damp from the tree

is known to affect the cloth of tents that are pitched under them for

any length of time. So strong is the prejudice of the natives against

the Tamarind-tree, that it is difficult to prevent them from destroying

it, as they believe it hurtful to vegetation. It is chiefly cultivated

for its seed-pods, which are used medicinally, and for food.----Dreams

connected with Tamarinds are of ill omen, portending trouble, loss, and

disappointment.----The Tamarind is held to be under the dominion of

Venus.

=TAMARISK.=--The _Tamarix orientalis_ is also known as the Tamarisk

of Osiris. The ancient Egyptians believed that at the commencement of

the world Osiris was born from the midst of chaos, from whence also

proceeded his wife Isis, the Queen of Light, and Typhon, the Spirit

of Darkness. Osiris was the ruler of all the earth; but Typhon, being

jealous of him, seized him by strategy, nailed him in a chest, and

cast it into the Nile, that it might float out to sea. Isis in despair

wandered all over the country, searching for the dead body of her

husband, and at length heard that the chest had been cast on shore at

Byblos, and had there lodged in the branches of a Tamarisk-bush, which

quickly shot up and became a large and beautiful tree, growing round

the chest so that it could not be seen. The king of the country, amazed

at the vast size of the Tamarisk-tree, ordered it to be cut down and

hewn into a pillar to support the roof of his palace, the chest being

still concealed in the trunk. Here it was discovered by Isis, who cut

open the pillar, and took the coffin with her to Egypt, where she hid

it in a remote place; but Typhon found it, and divided the corpse of

Osiris into fourteen pieces. After a long and weary search, in which

Isis sailed over the fenny parts of the land in a boat made of Papyrus,

she recovered all the fragments except one, which had been thrown into

the sea.----The _Tamarix Gallica_ is called the Tamarisk of Apollo:

the Apollo of Lesbos is represented with a branch of Tamarisk in his

hand. Nicander called the Tamarisk the Tree of Prophecy. In Persia, the

Magian priests (who claimed supernatural power) arrived at a knowledge

of future events by means of certain manipulations of the mystic

_baresma_, or bundle of thin Tamarisk twigs, the employment of which

was enjoined in the Zendavesta books as essential to every sacrificial

ceremony.----Herodotus informs us that the Tamarisk was employed for

a similar purpose by other nations of antiquity; and Pliny states

that the Egyptian priests were crowned with its foliage.----According

to tradition, it was from Tamarisk-trees that the showers of Manna

descended on the famishing Israelites in the desert.----At the present

day, the Manna of Mount Sinai is produced by a variety of _Tamarix

Gallica_: it consists of pure mucilaginous sugar.----Astrologers state

that the Tamarisk is under the rule of Saturn.

=TANSY.=--The herb Tansy (_Tanacetum_) has derived its name from the

Greek _athanasia_, immortality, it being supposed that this herb was

referred to in a passage in Lucian’s Dialogues of the Gods, where

Jupiter, speaking of Ganymede, says to Mercury, “Take him away, and

when he has drunk of immortality [_athanasia_], bring him back as

cup-bearer to us.” In the Catholic Church the herb is dedicated to

St. Athanasius, and in Lent cakes are flavoured with it. Gerarde says

that the name _athanasia_ was given to the plant because the flowers

do not speedily wither: he also tells us that “in the Spring time are

made with the leaves hereof newly sprung up, and with egs, cakes or

tansies, which be pleasant on taste, and good for the stomacke.”----In

some country places, it is customary to eat Tansy pudding at Easter,

in allusion to the “bitter herbs” at the Passover. In Sussex, a charm

against ague is to wear Tansy leaves in the shoe.----In some parts of

Italy, people present stalks of the Wild Tansy to those whom they mean

to insult.----The Tansy is held to be a herb of Venus.

=TEA.=--A Japanese Buddhist legend attributes the origin of the

Tea-plant (_Thea Sinensis_) to the eyelids of a devotee, which fell

to the ground and took root. The legend relates that about A.D.

519 a Buddhist priest went to China; and, in order to dedicate his

soul entirely to God, he made a vow to pass the day and night in

an uninterrupted and unbroken meditation. After many years of such

continual watching, he was at length so tired, that he fell asleep. On

awaking the following morning, he was so grieved that he had broken his

vow, that he cut off both his eyelids and threw them on the ground.

Returning to the same spot on the following day, he was astonished

to find that each eyelid had become a shrub. This was the Tea-shrub

(until then unknown in China)--the leaves of which exhibit the form

of an eyelid bordered with lashes, and possess the gift of hindering

sleep.--One Ibn Wahab, who travelled in China some time in the ninth

century, makes the first authentic mention of Tea as a favourite

beverage of the Chinese. He describes it as the leaf of a shrub more

bushy than the Pomegranate; and says that an infusion is made by

pouring boiling water upon it.

=TEREBINTH.=--The Terebinth (_Pistacia Terebinthus_) is a tree much

venerated by the Jews. Abraham pitched his tent beneath the shade

of a Terebinth at Mamre, in the valley of Hebron, and an altar was

afterwards erected close by. The spot whereon the tree of Abraham had

flourished was in the time of Eusebius still held in great reverence

and sanctity, and a Christian church was erected there. Josephus, in

his ‘History of the Jews,’ recounts that the Terebinth of Abraham had

flourished ever since the creation of the world; but a second legend

states that it sprang from the staff of one the angels who visited

Abraham. At Sichem is shown the Terebinth of Jacob, near which Joshua

raised an altar. The angel appeared to Gideon to encourage him to

engage in battle near a Terebinth-tree at Ophra, and on this spot,

after the victory, Gideon raised an altar. The Jews, by preference,

bury their dead beneath the shadow of a Terebinth.

=THISTLE.=--The Thistle (_Carduus_), in the first days of man, was

sent by the Almighty as a portion of the curse passed upon him when he

was made a tiller of the soil. God said, “Thorns and Thistles shall

it bring forth to thee (Gen. iv.). One species, the Milk Thistle

(_Carduus Marianus_), is distinguishable by the milky veins of its

leaves, which were supposed to have derived their peculiar colour from

the milk of the Virgin Mary having fallen upon them. This is sometimes

called the Scotch Thistle, but it is not so: it grows on the rocky

cliffs near Dumbarton Castle, where, if tradition be true, it was

originally planted by the unfortunate Mary, Queen of Scots. The Thistle

of Scotland is believed to be the _Onopordum Acanthium_, the Cotton

Thistle, which grows by the highways: this is the national insignia,

and its flower-cup and bristling leaves accord well with the motto,

“_Nemo me impune lacessit_.” Tradition says that the Thistle, with

the motto rendered in homely Scotch, “_Wha daur meddle wi’ me?_” was

adopted as the symbol of Scotland from the following circumstance:--A

party of invading Danes attempted to surprise the Scotch army by night.

Under cover of darkness, they approached the slumbering camp, but one

of them trod upon a prickly Thistle, and his involuntary cry of pain

roused some of the Scots, who flew to arms, and chased the foe from the

field. The _Onicus acaulis_, or stemless Thistle, is by some considered

to be the true Scotch Thistle, as it accords best with the legend of

the defeated Norsemen, and is, besides, the Thistle seen in the gold

bonnet-piece of James V. _Carduus acanthoides_ and _C. nutans_ are by

others supposed to be the

“Proud Thistle, emblem dear to Scotland’s sons,

Begirt with threatening points, strong in defence,

Unwilling to assault.”

The Thistle has given its title to a Scotch order of knighthood,

which is said to have been instituted by Achaius, king of the Scots,

when he obtained a victory over Athelstan. The insignia borne by the

knights of the Order of the Thistle is a gold collar, with Thistles

and a sprig of Rue interlaced. A gold medal is also worn, bearing a

figure of St. Andrew.----Mannhardt states that in Mecklenburg there

is a legend current which relates that in a certain wild and barren

spot, where once a murder had been committed, there grows every day

at noon a strangely-formed Thistle: on the weird plant are to be seen

human arms, hands, and heads, and when twelve heads have appeared, the

ghastly plant mysteriously vanishes. A shepherd, one day, passed the

spot where the mystic Thistle was growing. His staff became tinder, and

his arms were struck with paralysis.----According to Apuleius, the wild

Thistle, carried about the person, possessed the magical property of

averting all ills from the bearer.----In Esthonia, they place Thistles

on the Corn that has first ripened, to drive away any evil spirit that

may come to it.----In divining, by an old English rite, a girl, to find

out which of three or four persons loves her best, takes three or four

heads of Thistles, cuts off their points, gives each Thistle the name

of one of these persons, and lays them under her pillow. That Thistle

which bears the name of the person loving her most will put forth a

fresh sprout.----To dream of being surrounded by Thistles is a lucky

omen, portending that the dreamer will be rejoiced by some pleasing

intelligence in a short time.----Astrologers state that Thistles are

under the rule of Mars.

=THORN.=--According to a German tradition, the Black Thorn springs

from the blood of the corpse of a heathen slain in battle. In Germany,

the Easter fire was anciently called Buckthorn because it was always

kindled with that wood, as it is to this day at Dassel, in Westphalia.

Kuhn thinks the tree itself (_Bocksdorn_) was so called from the

sacrificial buck-goat which was burned upon its wood in heathen

times.----The Celts have always reverenced the Thorn-bush, and its wood

was used by the Greeks for the drilling-stick of their _pyreia_, an

instrument employed for kindling the sacred fire. The Thorn was also

held by the Greeks to be a preservative against witchcraft and sorcery.

Nevertheless, in some parts of England, witches were formerly reputed

to be fond of a Thorn-bush, and both in Brittany and in some parts of

Ireland it is considered unsafe to gather even a leaf from certain old

and solitary Thorns, which grow in sheltered hollows of the moorland,

and are the fairies’ trysting places. To this day, it is thought in

many rural districts to be a death-token, and therefore to take a

branch or blossom into a house is deemed to be unlucky.----Josephus

tells us that the “bush” out of which the Lord appeared to Moses in a

flame of fire was a Thorn. He writes: “A wonderful prodigy happened to

Moses: for a fire fed upon a Thorn-bush; yet did the green leaves and

the flowers continue untouched, and the fire did not at all consume

the fruit branches.”----According to Aryan tradition, the Hawthorn

sprang from the lightning, and as with other trees of like mythical

descent, it was considered a protective against fire, thunderbolts,

and lightning. Sir John Maundevile bears witness to this old belief,

when, speaking of the Albespyne, or Whitethorn, he says:--“For he that

beareth a braunche on hym thereof, no thondre, ne no maner of tempest

may dere [harm] hym; ne in the hows that yt is ynne may non evil ghost

entre.”----The Whitethorn or Hawthorn has long had the reputation of

being a sacred tree, and the plant which had the mournful distinction

of supplying the crown of Thorns worn by our Saviour at His

crucifixion. Many other plants, however, have been credited with this

distinction, including the Buckthorns (_Rhamnus Paliurus_ and _Rhamnus

Spina Christi_), and the _Paliurus aculeatus_, or Christ Thorn.----In

the thirteenth century, there existed among Christians a strong passion

for relics, and when the Emperor Baldwin II. came to beg aid from Louis

IX. (St. Louis of France), he secured his goodwill at once by offering

him the holy Crown of Thorns, which for several centuries had been

preserved at Constantinople, and had been pledged to the Venetians

for a large sum of money. Louis redeemed this precious and venerable

relic, aided Baldwin with men and money, and then triumphantly brought

the crown of Thorns to Paris, carrying it himself from Sens, barefoot

and bareheaded. Having also been so fortunate as to obtain a small

piece of the true Cross, he built in honour of these treasures the

exquisite chapel since called _La Sainte Chapelle_. In pictures of St.

Louis, he is usually depicted with his special attribute, the Crown

of Thorns, which he reverently holds in one hand.----In Brittany,

there is a superstition current which will explain the cause why the

robin has always been a favourite and protégé of man. It is said that

while our Saviour was bearing His Cross, one of these little birds

took from His Crown one of the Thorns steeped in His blood, which

dyed the robin’s breast; and ever since the redbreasts have been the

friends of man.----St. Catherine of Siena is frequently represented

with the Crown of Thorns, in reference to the legend that, having been

persecuted and vilified by certain nuns, she laid her wrongs, weeping,

at the feet of Christ. He appeared to her, bearing in one hand a

crown of gold and jewels, in the other His Crown of Thorns, and bade

her choose between them. She took from His hand the Crown of Thorns,

and pressed it hastily on her own head, but with such force that the

Thorns penetrated to her brain, and she cried out with the agony.----In

a painting of Murillo, Santa Rosa de Lima is depicted crowned with

Thorns, in allusion to the legend that when compelled by her mother to

wear a crown of Roses, she so adjusted it on her brow that it became

a veritable crown of Thorns.----In representations of St. Francis of

Assisi, the Crown of Thorns is sometimes introduced, the saint having

been considered by his followers as a type of the Redeemer.----In many

parts of England charms or incantations are employed to prevent a Thorn

from festering in the flesh. The following are some of the magic verses

recited:--

“Happy man that Christ was born,

He was crowned with a Thorn.

He was pierced through the skin,

For to let the poison in.

But his five wounds, so they say,

Closed before He passed away.

In with healing, out with Thorn,

Happy man that Christ was born.”

“Unto the Virgin Mary our Saviour was born,

And on His head He wore a crown of Thorn:

If you believe this true and mind it well,

This hurt will never fester nor swell.”

“Our Saviour was of a virgin born,

His head was crowned with a crown of Thorn;

It never canker’d nor fester’d at all,

And I hope in Christ Jesus this never shall.”

“Christ was of a virgin born,

And He was pricked by a Thorn,

And it did never bell [throb] nor swell,

As I trust in Jesus this never will.”

“Christ was crown’d with Thorns,

The Thorns did bleed, but did not rot,

No more shall thy finger.

In the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.”

In Herefordshire, the burning of a Thorn-bush is supposed to act as a

charm against smut or mildew in Wheat. When the crop is just springing

out of the ground, the farmer’s servants rise before daybreak, and cut

a branch of some particular Thorn; they then make a large fire in the

field, in which they burn a portion of it, and hang up the remaining

portion in the homestead.----Tradition affirms that, at Hemer, in

Westphalia, a man was engaged in fencing his field on Good Friday, and

had just poised a bunch of Thorns on his fork, when he was at once

transported to the Moon. Some of the Hemer peasants declare that the

Moon is not only inhabited by this man with his Thorn-bush, but also by

a woman who was churning her butter one Sabbath during Divine Service.

Another legend relates how the Man in the Moon is none other than Cain

with a bundle of Briars.----To dream you are surrounded by Thorns,

signifies that you will be rejoiced by some pleasing intelligence in a

very short time.

=THORN APPLE.=--Gerarde, in his ‘Herbal,’ calls the _Datura Stramonium_

Thorny Apple of Peru: he speaks of it as a plant of a drowsy and

numbing quality, resembling in its effects the Mandrake, and he tells

us that it is thought to be the _Hippomanes_, which Theocritus mentions

as causing horses to go mad. The words of the poet are thus translated

by the old herbalist:--

“Hippomanes ’mongst th’ Arcadian springs, by which ev’n all

The colts and agile mares in mountains mad do fall.”

The juice of Thorn-Apples Gerarde guarantees, when boiled with hog’s

grease and made into a salve, will cure inflammations, burnings and

scaldings, “as well of fire, water, boiling lead, gunpowder, as that

which comes by lightning.” In India, the _Datura_ is sometimes employed

by robbers as a magical means of depriving their victims of all power

of resistance: their mode of operation being to induce them to chew and

swallow a portion of the plant, because those who eat it lose their

proper senses, become silly and given to inordinate laughter, feel a

strong desire to be generous and open-handed, and finally will allow

anyone to pillage them. The Indians apply to the _Datura_ the epithets

of the Drunkard, the Madman, the Deceiver, and the Fool-maker. It is

also called the tuft of Siva (god of destruction). The Rajpoot mothers

are said to besmear their breasts with the juice of the leaves, in

order to destroy their new-born infant children. Acosta states that

the Indian dancing girls drug wine with the seeds of the _Datura

Stramonium_. He adds that whoever is so unfortunate as to partake of

it is for some time perfectly unconscious. He often, however, speaks

with others, and gives answers as if he were in full possession of

his senses, although he has no control over his actions, is perfectly

ignorant of whom he is with, and loses all remembrance of what has

taken places when he awakes.----The Stramonium, or Thorn-Apple, is one

of the plants commonly connected with witchcraft, death, and horror.

Harte, describing the plants growing about the Palace of Death, says:--

“Nor were the Nightshades wanting, nor the power

Of thorn’d Stramonium, nor the sickly flower

Of cloying Mandrakes, the deceitful root

Of the monk’s fraudful cowl, and Plinian fruit” [_Amomum Plinii_].

=THYME.=--Among the Greeks, Thyme denoted the graceful elegance of

the Attic style, because it covered Mount Hymettus, and gave to the

honey made there the aromatic flavour of which the ancients were so

fond. “To smell of Thyme” was, therefore, a commendation bestowed

on those writers who had mastered the Attic style.----With the

Greeks, also, Thyme was an emblem of activity; and as this virtue is

eminently associated with true courage, the ladies of chivalrous times

embroidered on the scarfs which they presented to their knights, the

figure of a bee hovering about a spray of Thyme, in order to inculcate

the union of the amiable with the active.----In olden times, it was

believed that Thyme renewed the spirits of both man and beast; and the

old herbalists recommended it is a powerful aid in melancholic and

splenetic diseases.----Fairies and elves were reputed to be specially

fond of Wild Thyme. Oberon exclaims with delight:--

“I know a bank whereon the Wild Thyme blows,

Where Oxlips and the woody Violet grows,

Quite over-canopied with lush Woodbine.

With sweet Musk-Roses, and with Eglantine.”

The fairy king’s musical hounds would willingly forsake the richest

blossoms of the garden in order to hunt for the golden dew in the

flowery tufts of Thyme. Of witches it is said, that when they

“Won’t do penance for their crime,

They bathed themselves in Oregane and Thyme.”

In the South of France, when a summons to attend a meeting of the

votaries of _Marianne_ is sent, it is accompanied by tufts of Wild

Thyme, or _Ferigoule_, that being the symbol of advanced Republicanism.

=TOADSTOOL.=--The name of Toadstool was originally applied to all

descriptions of unwholesome Fungi, from the popular belief that toads

sit on them. Thus Spenser, in his ‘Shepherd’s Calendar,’ says:--

“The griesly Todestool grown there mought I see,

And loathed paddocks lording on the same.”

Fungi are in some parts of the country called Paddock-stools from

the same notion that toads are fond of sitting on them; and in the

Western counties they bear the name of Pixie-stools. In Sussex, the

Puff-ball (_Lycoperdon_) is called Puck’s-stool; and in other places

these fungi are known among country folks as Puckfists. These names

tend to identify Puck, the mischievous king of the fairies, with the

toad (_pogge_), which is popularly believed to be the impersonation of

the Devil himself: hence Toad-stools, Paddock-stools, Puck’s-stools,

Puckfists, and Pixie-stools have been superstitiously thought to be

the droppings of elves or of Satan, and in some districts are known as

Devil’s droppings.

=TOBACCO.=--With the Aborigines of Southern America, the Tobacco

(_Nicotiana_) was regarded as a sacred plant, and Darwin has described

how, in the pampas of Patagonia, he saw the sacred tree of Wallitchon.

This tree grew on a hill in the midst of a vast plain, and when the

Indians perceived it afar off, they saluted it with loud cries. The

branches were covered with cords, from which were suspended votive

offerings, consisting of cigars, bread, meat, pieces of cloth, &c. In

a fissure of the tree they found spirits and vegetable extracts. When

smoking, they blew the Tobacco smoke towards the branches. All around

lay the bleached bones of horses that they had sacrificed to the sacred

tree.----The Indians believe that this worship ensures good luck to

themselves and their horses. In other parts of America, the Indians

throw Tobacco as an offering to the spirit supposed to inhabit the

waterfalls and whirlpools.----M. Cochet, a French traveller, recounts

that the Indians of Upper Peru, entertain a religious reverence for

Tobacco. They consider it an infallible remedy for the sting of

serpents, and each year a festival-day is consecrated to the plant.

On that day they construct, in the most secluded portion of the

forest, a round hut, adorned with flowers and feathers. At the foot of

the central pillar which supports the hut is placed a basket richly

decorated, containing a roll of Tobacco. Into this hut troop in one by

one the Indians of the district, and before the shrine of the sacred

Tobacco perform their customary acts of worship.----In reference to

the use of Tobacco by pagan priests in the delivery of their oracles,

Gerarde tells us that the “priests and enchanters of hot countries do

take the fume thereof until they be drunke, that after they have lien

for dead three or foure houres, they may tell the people what wonders,

visions, or illusions they have seen, and so give them a prophetical

direction or foretelling (if we may trust to the Divell) of the

successe of their businesse.”----In the Ukraine, Tobacco is looked

upon as an ill-omened plant, and the Raskolniks call it the Herb of

the Devil, and make offerings of it to appease “genis, spirits, and

demons of the forest.”----Until the time of Peter the Great, the use of

Tobacco was forbidden in Russia, and those who transgressed the law had

their noses split.

=TREACLE-MUSTARD.=--The names of French Mustard, Treacle-Mustard, and

Treacle Worm-seed were given to the _Erysimum cheiranthoides_, the two

last because, in mediæval times, the seed of this plant formed one of

the seventy-three ingredients of the far-famed “Venice treacle,” a

noted antidote to all poisons, believed to cure “all those that were

bitten or stung of venomous beastes, or had drunk poisons, or were

infected with the pestilence.” The origin of this counter-poison was

the famous _Mithridaticum_, a preparation invented by Mithridates, king

of Pontus. Andromachus added to this comparatively simple compound

other ingredients, and especially vipers; changing, on that account,

the name to _Theriaca_ (from the Greek _therion_, a small animal). Dr.

Prior tells us that this remedy, which was known in England originally

as Triacle, was the source of many popular tales of sorcerers eating

poison, and was retained in the London Pharmacopœia till about a

century ago.

=TREFOIL.=--Among the Romans, the Grass crown made of Trefoil-leaves

was esteemed a mark of very high honour. (See CLOVER and SHAMROCK).

=TROLL-FLOWER.=--The Globe-flower (_Trollius Europæus_) acquired the

sobriquet of Troll-flower in allusion to the Trolls, who were malignant

elves, and because of the plant’s acrid poisonous qualities. (See GLOBE

FLOWER).

TRUE-LOVE.--See Herb Paris.

=TUBEROSE.=--The name Tuberose is simply a corruption of the plant’s

botanical title _Polianthes tuberosa_. The Malayans call this

sweet-scented flower “The Mistress of Night:” when worn in the hair by

a Malayan lady, the blossom is an indication to her lover that his suit

is pleasing to her. The Tuberose is a native of India, whence it was

first brought to Europe towards the close of the sixteenth century. Its

blossoms were at first single, but La Cour, a Dutch florist, obtained

the double-flowering variety from seed. So tenacious was he of the

roots, that even after he had propagated them so freely as to have more

than he could plant, he caused them to be cut to pieces in order that

he might have the pleasure of boasting that he was the only person in

Europe who possessed this flower.

=TULASI.=--The Indian name of the Holy Basil (_Ocimum sanctum_) is

Tulasi, under which appellation this sacred plant is worshipped as a

goddess. (See BASIL).

=TULIP.=--The origin of the brilliant and dazzling Tulip has been

given us by the poet Rapin, who relates that the flower was a modest

Dalmatian nymph, metamorphosed into a Tulip to save her from the

importunities of Vertumnus. The story is thus told by the Jesuit poet:--

“Dalmatia claims the nymph, whom heretofore

A bright Timavian dame to Proteus bore;

To her the changing sire his gift conveys,

In every dress and every form to please:

Disguised Vertumnus, wandering round the world,

On the Dalmatian coast by Fate was hurled,

Where by her mother’s stream the virgin played;

The courting god with all his arts assayed

(But unsuccessful still) the haughty maid.

Yet, as the changing colours pleased her eyes,

He put on every form that might surprise,

Dres’t in all Nature’s sweet varieties:

To suit his mind to her wild humour strove,

No complaisance forgot, no policy of love;

But when he saw his prayers and arts had failed,

Bold with desire his passion he revealed,

Confessed the secret god, and force applied.

To heaven for aid the modest virgin cried:

‘Ye rural powers, preserve a nymph from shame!’

And, worthy of her wish, a flower became.

Her golden caul that shone with sparkling hair,

The lace and ribbons which adorned the fair,

To leaves are changed; her breast a stem is made,

Slender and long, with fragrant greens arrayed;

Six gaudy leaves a painted cup compose,

On which kind nature every dye bestows;

For though the nymph transformed, the love she bore

To colours still delights her as before.”

The Tulip is a favourite flower of the East, and is believed

originally to have come from Persia. The French formerly called the

flower Tulipan, which, as well as the English name, is derived from

_Thoulyban_, the word used in Persia for turban.----The Tulip is

considered to be one of the flowers loved by fairies and elves, who

protect those that cultivate them.----In Turkey, the flower is held in

the highest estimation, and a Feast of Tulips used to be celebrated

annually in the Sultan’s seraglio, when the gardens were brilliantly

illuminated and decorated with Oriental magnificence, and the fête was

attended by the Sultan and his harem.----The garden Tulip is a native

of the Levant: Linnæus says of Cappadocia. It is very common in Syria,

and is supposed by some persons to be the “Lily of the field” alluded

to by Jesus Christ.----In Persia, the Tulip is considered as the emblem

of consuming love. When a young man presents one to his mistress, he

gives her to understand, by the general colour of the flower, that

he is impressed with her beauty, and by the black base of it that

his heart is burnt to a coal.----In India, the Tulip seems to typify

unhappy love. In the ‘Rose of Bakawali,’ a Hindustani story, the

author, while describing the beautiful fairy of the heaven, Bakawali,

says “the Tulip immersed itself in blood because of the jealousy it

entertained of her charming lips!” When bidding adieu to the fairy,

Taj-ul-muluk says: ‘I quit this garden carrying in my heart, like the

Tulip, the wound of unhappy love--I go, my head covered with dust,

my heart bleeding, my breast fevered.’----The Tulip is supposed to

have been brought from Persia to the Levant, and it was introduced

into Western Europe about the middle of the sixteenth century by

Busbeck, ambassador from the Emperor of Germany to the Sublime Porte,

who to his astonishment found Tulips on the road between Adrianople

and Constantinople blooming in the middle of winter. In Europe, they

soon became universal favourites, and were imported into England in

1577.----In Holland, about the middle of the seventeenth century, a

perfect mania for possessing rare sorts seized all classes of persons.

From 1634 to 1637 inclusive all classes in all the great cities of

Holland became infected with the Tulipomania. A single root of a

particular species, called the _Viceroy_, was exchanged, in the true

Dutch taste, for the following articles:--2 lasts of Wheat, 4 of Rye,

4 fat oxen, 3 fat swine, 12 fat sheep, 2 hogsheads of wine, 4 tuns of

beer, 2 tons of butter, 1000 pounds of cheese, a complete bed, a suit

of clothes, and a silver beaker--value of the whole, 2500 florins.

These Tulips afterwards were sold according to the weight of the

roots. Four hundred perits (something less than a grain) of _Admiral

Liefken_, cost 4400 florins; 446 ditto of _Admiral Van der Eyk_, 1620

florins; 106 perits _Schilder_ cost 1615 florins; 200 ditto _Semper

Augustus_, 5500 florins; 410 ditto _Viceroy_, 3000 florins, &c. The

species _Semper Augustus_ has been often sold for 2000 florins; and

it once happened that there were only two roots of it to be had, the

one at Amsterdam, and the other at Haarlem. For a root of this species

one agreed to give 4600 florins, together with a new carriage, two

grey horses, and a complete harness. Another agreed to give for a root

twelve acres of land; for those who had not ready money promised their

moveable and immoveable goods, houses and lands, cattle and clothes.

The trade was followed not only by mercantile people, but also by all

classes of society. At first, everyone won and no one lost. Some of the

poorest people gained, in a few months, houses, coaches and horses, and

figured away like the first characters in the land. In every town some

tavern was selected which served as an exchange, where high and low

traded in flowers, and confirmed their bargains with the most sumptuous

entertainments. They formed laws for themselves, and had their notaries

and clerks. During the time of the Tulipomania, a speculator often

offered and paid large sums for a root which he never received, nor

ever wished to receive. Another sold roots which he never possessed

or delivered. Often did a nobleman purchase of a chimney-sweep Tulips

to the amount of 2000 florins, and sell them at the same time to a

farmer, and neither the nobleman, chimney-sweep, nor farmer had roots

in their possession, or wished to possess them. Before the Tulip season

was over, more roots were sold and purchased, bespoke, and promised

to be delivered, than in all probability were to be found in the

gardens of Holland; and when _Semper Augustus_ was not to be had, which

happened twice, no species perhaps was oftener purchased and sold. In

the space of three years, as Munting tells us, more than ten millions

were expended in this trade, in only one town of Holland. The evil rose

to such a pitch, that the States of Holland were under the necessity of

interfering; the buyers took the alarm; the bubble, like the South Sea

scheme, suddenly burst; and as, in the outset, all were winners, in the

winding up, very few escaped without loss.

=TUTSAN.=--The _Hypericum Androsæmum_ was in former days called Tutsan,

or Tutsayne, a word derived from the French name, _Toute-saine_, which

was applied to the plant, according to Lobel, “because, like the

Panacea, it cures all sickness and diseases.” The St. John’s Wort (_H.

perforatum_) was also called Tutsan.

=TURNIP.=--The Turnip (_Brassica Rapa_) was considered by Columella

and Pliny as next to corn in value and utility. Pliny mentions some

of the Turnips of his times as weighing forty pounds each.----In

Westphalia, when a young peasant goes wooing, if Turnips be set before

him, they signify that he is totally unacceptable to the girl he would

court.----To dream of Turnips denotes fruitless toil.

=UNSHOE-THE-HORSE.=--The _Hippocrepis comosa_, from its

horseshoe-shaped legumes, is supposed, upon the doctrine of signatures,

to have the magical power of causing horses to cast their shoes. This

Vetch is the _Sferracavallo_ of the Italians, who ascribe to it the

same magical property. Grimm, however, considers that the Springwort

(_Euphorbia Lathyris_) is, from its powerful action on metals, the

Italian _Sferracavallo_. The French give a similar extraordinary

property to the Rest-Harrow (_Ononis arvensis_); and it is also

allotted to the Moonwort (_Botrychium Lunaria_):--

“Whose virtue’s such,

It in the pasture, only with a touch,

Unshoes the new-shod steed.”--_Withers._

=UPAS.=--The deadly Upas of Java has the terrible reputation of being

a tree which poisons by means of its noxious exhalations. Two totally

distinct trees have been called the Upas,--one, the Antjar (_Autiaris

toxicaria_), is a tree attaining a height of one hundred feet; the

other, the Chetik, is a large creeping shrub peculiar to Java. Neither

of them, however, answers to the description of the poisonous Upas,

which rises in the “Valley of Death,” and which was seen and reported

on by Foersch, a Dutch physician, who travelled in Java at the end

of the last century. Foersch wrote that this deadly Upas grew in the

midst of a frightful desert. No bird could rest in its branches, no

plant could subsist, no animal live in its neighbourhood: it blighted

everything near with its malaria, and caused the birds of the air

that flew over it to drop lifelessly down. Leagues away, its noxious

emanations, borne by the winds, proved fatal. When a Javanese was

condemned to death, as a last chance, his pardon was offered to him if

he would consent to go into the Valley of Death, and gather, by means

of a long Bamboo-rod, some drops of the poison of the Upas. Hundreds of

unhappy creatures are said to have submitted to this trial, and to have

miserably perished.

=VALERIAN.=--The ancient name of this plant, according to Dioscorides,

was _Phu_, and in botanical phraseology Garden Valerian is still

_Valeriana Phu_. The Latins called the plant _Valeriana_, some say from

its medicinal value, others from one Valerius, who is reputed first to

have used the herb in medicine; but the derivation is really uncertain.

The old English name of the plant was Setewale, Setwal, or Set-wall.

Chaucer writes:--

“Ther springen herbes grete and smale,

The Licoris and the Setewale.”

And, speaking of the Clerk of Oxenforde, he says:--

“And he himself was swete as is the rote

Of Licoris, or any Setewale.”

Gerarde tells us that the plant was known in his day by the name of

Valerian, Capon’s Tail, and Setwall, but that the last name really

belonged to the _Zedoaria_, which is not Valerian. The old herbalist

also records that the medicinal virtues of Valerian were, among the

poorer classes in the North, held in such veneration, “that no broths,

pottage, or physical meats are worth anything if Setwall were not at an

end: whereupon some woman poet or other hath made these verses:--

‘They that will have their heale

Must put Setwall in their keale.’”

Cats are so fond of the perfume of Valerian, that they are said to

dig up the roots, rolling on them with ecstatic delight, and gnawing

them to pieces. The action of the Valerian-root (which the herbalists

found out was very like a cat’s eye) on the nervous system of some cats

undoubtedly produces in time a kind of pleasant intoxication. Rats are

also attracted by the odour of this plant.----Astrologers say that

Valerian is under the rule of Mercury.

VENUS’ PLANTS.--See Lady’s Plants.

VERONICA.--See Speedwell.

=VERVAIN.=--The Vervain, or Verbena, has from time immemorial been

the symbol of enchantment, and the most ancient nations employed

this plant in their divinations, sacrificial and other rites, and in

incantations. It bore the names of the Tears of Isis, Tears of Juno,

Mercury’s Blood, Persephonion, Demetria, and Cerealis. The Magi of

the ancient Elamites or Persians made great use of the Vervain in the

worship of the Sun, always carrying branches of it in their hands when

they approached the altar. The magicians also employed the mystic herb

in their pretended divinations, and affirmed that, by smearing the body

over with the juice of this plant, the person would obtain whatever

he set his heart upon, and be able to reconcile the most inveterate

enemies, make friends with whom he pleased, and gain the affections,

and cure the disease of whom he listed. When they cut Vervain, it was

always at a time when both sun and moon were invisible, and they poured

honey and honeycomb on the earth, as an atonement for robbing it of so

precious a herb.----The Greeks called it the Sacred Herb, and it was

with this plant only that they cleansed the festival-table of Jupiter

before any great solemnity took place; and hence, according to Pliny,

the name of Verbena is derived. It was, also, one of the plants which

was dedicated to Venus. Venus Victrix wore a crown of Myrtle interwoven

with Vervain.----With the Romans, the Vervain was a plant of good omen,

and considered strictly sacred:--

“Bring your garlands, and with reverence place

The Vervain on the altar.”

They employed it in their religious rites, swept their temples and

cleansed their altars with it, and sprinkled holy water with its

branches. They also purified their houses with it, to keep off

evil spirits; and in order to make themselves invulnerable, they

carried about their persons a blade of Grass and some Vervain. Their

ambassadors, or heralds-at-arms, wore crowns of Vervain when they went

to offer terms of reconciliation, or to give defiance to their enemies,

a custom thus noticed by Drayton:--

“A wreath of Vervain heralds wear,

Amongst our garlands named;

Being sent that dreadful news to bear,

Offensive war proclaimed.”

Virgil mentions Vervain as one of the charms used by an enchantress:--

“Bring running water, bind those altars round

With fillets, and with Vervain strew the ground.”

The Druids, both in Gaul and in Britain, regarded the Vervain with the

same veneration as the Hindus do the _Kusa_ or _Tulasi_, and, like

the Magi of the East, they offered sacrifices to the earth before

they cut this plant. This ceremony took place in Spring, at about

the rising of the Great Dog Star, but so that neither sun nor moon

would be at that time above the earth to see the sacred herb cut. It

was to be dug up with an iron instrument, and to be waved aloft in

the air, the left hand only being used. It was also ordained by the

Druidical priests, for those who collected it, “that before they take

up the herb, they bestow upon the ground where it groweth honey with

the combs, in token of satisfaction and amends for the wrong and

violence done in depriving her of so holy a herb. The leaves, stalks,

and flowers were dried separately in the shade, and were used for

the bites of serpents infused in wine.” Another account states that

the Druidesses held Vervain in as great veneration as the Druids did

the Mistletoe. They were never permitted to touch it. It was to be

gathered at midnight, at the full of the moon, in this manner:--A long

string with a loop in it was thrown over the Vervain-plant, and the

other end fastened to the left great toe of a young virgin, who was

then to drag at it till she had uprooted it. The eldest Druidess then

received it in a cloth, and carried it home, to use it for medicinal

purposes and offerings to their gods. In the Druidic procession, to

the gathering of the Mistletoe, the white-clad herald carried a branch

of Vervain in his hand, encircled by two serpents. The priests, when

performing their daily functions of feeding the never-dying fires in

the Druidic temples, prayed for the space of an hour, holding branches

of Vervain in their hands. Pliny tells us that the Druids made use of

it in casting lots, as well as in drawing omens and in other pretended

magical arts; he also says that if the hall or dining chamber be

sprinkled with the water wherein Vervain lay steeped, all that sat at

the table should be “very pleasant and make merry more jocundly.”

“Lift up your boughs of Vervain blue,

Dipt in cold September dew;

And dash the moisture, chaste and clear,

O’er the ground and through the air.”--_Mason._

In mediæval days, the sacred character of Vervain was still maintained,

and the plant was greatly prized, and used in compounding charms and

love-philtres. Known in our country as Holy Herb and Simpler’s Joy, it

was credited with great medicinal virtues.

“Black melancholy rusts, that fed despair

Through wounds’ long rage, with sprinkled Vervain cleared.”--_Davenant._

Its juice was given as a cure for the plague, and the plant was

prescribed as a remedy in some thirty different maladies, and was

suspended round the neck as an amulet. Gerarde, however, tells us

that “the devil did reveal it as a secret and divine medicine;” and

R. Turner writes (1687):--“It is said to be used by witches to do

mischief, and so may all other herbs if by wicked astrologers used to

accomplish their wretched ends.” But notwithstanding that it was used

by witches and wizards in their incantations and spells, and was in

fact called the Enchanter’s Plant, Vervain was considered to possess

the power of combating witches: thus Aubrey says:--

“Vervain and Dill

Hinder witches from their will.”

and Michael Drayton writes:--

“Here holy Vervayne, and here Dill,

’Gainst witchcraft much avayling.”

and again--

“The Nightshade strews to work him ill,

Therewith the Vervain and the Dill

That hindreth witches of their will.”

On the Eve of St. John (June 23rd), Vervain was for a long time

associated with the observances of Midsummer Eve. Thus we read in ‘Ye

Popish Kingdome:’--

“Then doth ye joyfull feast of John ye Baptist take his turne

When bonfires great with loftie flame in every towne doe burne,

And young men round about with maides doe dance in every streete,

With garlands wrought of Mother-wort, or else with Vervain sweete.”

J. White, Minister of God’s Word, writes in 1624:--“Many also use to

weare Vervein against blasts; and when they gather it for this purpose

firste they crosse the herb with their hand, and then they blesse it

thus:--

‘Hallowed be thou, Vervein,

As thou growest on the ground,

For on the Mount of Calvary

There thou wast first found

Thou healedst our Saviour Jesus Christ,

And staunchedst his bleeding wound,

In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost,

I take thee from the ground.’”

In many rural districts, Vervain is still regarded as a plant

possessing magical virtues as a love philtre. It has the reputation of

securing affection from those who take it to those who administer it.

The gun-flint boiled in Vervain and Rue ensures the shot taking effect.

The root of Vervain tied with a white satin ribbon round the neck

acts as a charm against ague. Vervain and baked toads, worn in silken

bags around the neck, are a cure for the evil.----In the northern

provinces of France, the peasants still continue to gather Vervain

under the different phases of the moon, using certain mysterious

ejaculations known only to themselves whilst in the act of collecting

the mystic herb, by whose assistance they hope to effect cures, and

charm both the flocks and the rustic beauties of the village.----The

Germans present a hat of Vervain to the newly-married bride, as though

placing her under the protection of Venus Victrix, the patroness of

the plant.----Gerarde tells us that in his time it was called “Holie

Herbe, Juno’s Teares, Mercurie’s Moist Bloude, and Pigeon’s Grasse, or

Columbine, because Pigeons are delighted to be amongst it, as also to

eate thereof.”----Astrologers place Vervain under the dominion of Venus.

=VINE.=--The Vine was held by the ancients sacred to Bacchus, and the

old historians all connect the jovial god with the “life-giving tree”:

he is crowned with Vine-leaves, and he holds in his hand a bunch of

Grapes, whilst his merry followers are decked with garlands of the

trailing Vine, and love to quaff with their master the divine juice of

its luscious violet and golden fruit, styled by Anacreon “the liquor

of Bacchus.” The old heathen writers all paid honour to the Vine, and

attributed to the earliest deified sovereigns of each country the gift

of this ambrosial tree. Thus Saturn is said to have bestowed it upon

Crete; Janus bore it with him to Latium; Osiris similarly benefitted

Egypt; and Spain obtained it through Geryon, her most ancient monarch.

Old traditions all point to Greece as the native place of the Vine,

and there it is still to be found growing wild.----There are many

allusions to the Vine in the Scriptures. Noah, we find, planted a

Vineyard (Gen. ix., 20); enormous bunches of Grapes were brought by

the Israelitish spies out of Palestine; Solomon had a Vineyard at

Baalhamon. “He let out the Vineyard unto keepers; every one for the

fruit thereof was to bring one thousand pieces of silver” (Cant, viii.,

11). The Bible contains many illustrations borrowed from the husbandry

of the Vineyard, showing that Vine culture was sedulously pursued, and

formed a fruitful source of wealth. In Leviticus xxv., 4, 5, we find

a command that every seventh year the Vines were to be left untouched

by the pruning knife, and the Grapes were not to be gathered.----Of

the ancient pagan writers who have alluded to the Vine in their works,

Cato has left abundant information as to the Roman Vine-craft, and

Columella, Varro, Palladius, Pliny, and Tacitus have all given details

of the Vine culture of the ancients. More than sixty varieties of the

Vine appear to have been known to the Greeks and Romans, one of which,

called by Columella and Pliny the Amethystine, has certainly been

lost, for they record that the wine from its Grapes never occasioned

drunkenness.----The Elm was preferred to any other tree by the ancients

as a prop for Vines, and this connexion has led to numerous fanciful

notices by the poets of all ages. Statius calls it the “Nuptial Elm;”

Ovid speaks of “the lofty Elm, with creeping Vines o’erspread;” Tasso

says:--

“As the high Elm, whom his dear Vine hath twined

Fast in her hundred arms, and holds embraced,

Bears down to earth his spouse and darling kind,

If storm or cruel steel the tree down cast,

And her full grapes to nought doth bruise and grind,

Spoils his own leaves, faints, withers, dies at last,

And seems to mourn and die, not for his own

But for her loss, with him that lies o’erthrown.”--_Fairfax._

Beaumont tells us that--

“The amorous Vine,

Did with the fair and straight-limbed Elm entwine.”

Cowley speaks of the “beauteous marriageable Vine,” and Browne writes

of “the amorous Vine that in the Elm still weaves.” Horace, however,

connects the Vine with the Poplar, instead of the Elm. Milton,

describing the pursuits of our first parents in Eden, says:--

“They led the Vine

To wed her Elm; she, spoused about him twines

Her marriageable arms, and with her brings

Her dower, the adopted clusters, to adorn

His barren leaves.”

In the _Mythologie des Plantes_, we find it stated that the Persians

trace the use of wine in Persia to the reign of the blessed Jemshîd.

A woman who wished to poison herself drank some wine, thinking that

it was poison; but she only fell into a profound sleep, and thus the

Persians learnt in Jemshîd’s reign the use of the juice of the Grape.

Olearius, in 1637, heard in Persia the following legend:--To console

the poor and unhappy, God sent on earth the angels Aroth and Maroth,

with the injunctions not to kill anyone, not to do any injustice, and

not to drink any wine. A beautiful woman, who had quarrelled with

her husband, appealed for justice to the two angels, and asked them

to partake of some wine. The angels not only consented, but, after

having indulged rather freely, began to ask other favours of the lovely

woman. After a little hesitation, she agreed to comply, provided that

the angels should first show her the way to ascend to heaven, and to

descend again to the earth. The angels assented; but when the woman,

who was as virtuous as she was beautiful, reached heaven, she would

not descend again to earth, and there she remains, changed into the

most brilliant star in the skies.----With the Mandans, a tribe of

American Indians, the Vine is connected with the tradition concerning

their origin. They believe that the whole nation resided in one large

village, underground, near a subterraneous lake. A Grape Vine extended

its roots down to their habitation, and gave them a view of the light.

Some of the most adventurous climbed up the Vine, and were delighted

with the sight of the earth, which they found covered with buffaloes,

and rich with all kinds of fruit. Returning with the Grapes they had

gathered, their countrymen were so pleased with the taste of them, that

the whole nation resolved to leave their dull residence for the charms

of the upper region. Men, women, and children, therefore forthwith

proceeded to ascend by means of the Vine, but when about half the

nation had reached the surface of the earth, a very stout woman, who

was laboriously clambering up the Vine, broke it with her weight, and

debarred herself and the rest of the nation from seeing the light of

the sun. Those who had reached the earth’s surface made themselves

a village, and formed the tribe of the Mandans, who, when they die,

expect to return to the original settlement of their forefathers; the

good reaching the ancient village by means of the subterranean lake,

which the burden of the sins of the wicked will not enable them to

cross.----Wild Vines differ in many respects from the cultivated Vine;

several distinct species are found in Java, India, and America; one

first found on the banks of the Catawba, from which the famous Catawba

wine is made, is now extensively cultivated on the Ohio, or La Belle

Rivière; its product has been lauded by Longfellow, who sings--

“There grows no Vine

By the haunted Rhine,

By Danube or Guadalquiver,

Nor an island or cape

That bears such a Grape

As grown by the Beautiful River.”

The wood of the _Vitis sylvestris_ was used by the Greeks in the

instrument they employed for producing fire. The Aryan method of

kindling sacred fire by wood friction was practised both by Greeks

and Romans down to a late period. The Greeks called their kindling

instrument _pyreia_, and the drilling stick which worked in it

_trupanon_; and according to Theophrastus and Pliny, the lower part

of the _pyreia_ was formed of the wood of the wild Vine, Ivy, or

Athragene.----To dream of Vines denotes health, prosperity, abundance,

and fertility, “for which,” says a dream oracle, “we have the example

of Astyages, King of the Medes, who dreamed that his daughter brought

forth a Vine, which was a prognostic of the grandeur, riches,

and felicity of the great Cyrus, who was born of her after this

dream.”----Culpeper states that the Vine is “a gallant tree of the Sun,

very sympathetical with the body of man; and that is the reason spirits

of wine is the greatest cordial among all vegetables.”

=VIOLET.=--According to Rapin, the Violet was once a fair nymph, who

was changed by Diana into this flower to avoid the importunities of

Apollo. The poet thus describes the metamorphosis:--

“Next from the Vi’let choice perfumes exhale;

She now disguised in a blue dusky veil

Springs through the humble grass an humble flow’r,

Her stature little and her raiment poor.

If truth in ancient poems is convey’d,

This modest flower was once a charming maid,

Her name Ianthis, of Diana’s train,

The brightest nymph that ever graced a plain;

Whom (while Pherean herds the virgin fed)

Apollo saw, and courted to his bed;

But, lov’d in vain, the frighted virgin fled

To woods herself and her complaints she bore

And sought protection from Diana’s pow’r,

Who thus advis’d: ‘From mountains, sister, fly;

Phœbus loves mountains and an open sky.’

To vales and shady springs she bashful ran,

In thickets hid her charms, but all in vain:

For he her virtue and her flight admir’d,

The more she blush’d, the more the god was fired.

And now his love and wit new frauds prepare,

The goddess cried, ‘Since beauty’s such a snare,

Ah, rather perish that destructive grace.’

Then stain’d with dusky blue the virgin’s face:

Discolour’d thus an humbler state she prov’d,

Less fair, but by the goddess more belov’d;

Changed to a Violet with this praise she meets,

Chaste she retires to keep her former sweets.

The lowest places with this flower abound,

The valuable gift of untill’d ground;

Nor yet disgraced, though amongst Briars brought forth,

So rich her odour is, so true her worth.”

_Ion_, the Greek name for the Violet, is reputed to have been bestowed

on it because, when Jupiter had metamorphosed Io into a white heifer,

he caused sweet Violets to spring from the earth, in order to present

her with herbage worthy of her.

“We are Violets blue,

For our sweetness found,

Careless in the morning shades,

Looking on the ground;

Love’s dropp’d eyelids and a kiss,

Such our breath and blueness is.

Io, the mild shape,

Hidden by Jove’s fears,

Found us first i’ the sward, when she

For hunger stooped in tears;

Wheresoe’er her lips she sets

Said Jove, be breaths called Violets.”

In one of the poems of his ‘Hesperides,’ however, Herrick gives a

different version of the origin of Violets. According to the wayward

fancy of this old poet, Violets are the descendants of some unfortunate

girls, who, having defeated Venus in a dispute she had with Cupid on

the delicate point as to whether she or they surpassed in sweetness,

were beaten blue by the goddess in her jealous rage.----Some

etymologists trace the Greek names _Ion_ to _Ia_, the daughter of

Midas, who was betrothed to Atys, and transformed by Diana into a

Violet in order conceal her from Phœbus.----Another derivation of

the name is found in the story that some nymphs of Ionia, who lived

on the banks of the river Cytherus, first presented these flowers to

Ion, who had led an Ionian colony into Attica.----The Greek grammarian

Lycophron, who lived in the time of Ptolemy Philadelphus (about 280

years B.C.), was fond of making anagrams, and from the name of the

Queen Arsinoe extracted “Violet of Juno.” Shakspeare, calls these

favourite flowers

“Violets dim,

But sweeter than the lids of Juno’s eyes,

Or Cytherea’s breath.”--_Winter’s Tale._

In all eastern countries, the Violet is a favourite flower, and a

sherbet flavoured with its blossoms is a common drink at Persian

and Arabian banquets. So delicious is this beverage, that Tavernier

specially remembers that it is drunk by the Grand Seignior himself.

There is a legend, that Mahomet once remarked: “The excellence of the

extract of Violets above all other extracts is as the excellence of

me above all the rest of the creation: it is cold in Summer, and it

is hot in Winter.” Another Oriental saying is, “The excellence of the

Violet is as the excellence of El Islam above all other religions.”--At

the floral games, instituted at Toulouse by Clemence Isaure in the

early part of the fourteenth century, in the time of the Troubadours,

the prize awarded to the author of the best poetical composition

consisted of a golden Violet. The fair founder of these games is

stated, whilst undergoing a weary imprisonment, to have sent her chosen

flower, the Violet, to her knight, that he might wear the emblem of

her constancy; and the flower thus became, with the Troubadours, a

symbol of this virtue. These floral games are still celebrated every

year.----Along with other flowers, the Violet was assigned by the

ancients to Venus.----It is said that Proserpine was gathering Violets

as well as Narcissus when she was seized by Pluto.----The Athenians

more especially affected the Violet; everywhere throughout the city

of Athens they set up tablets engraven with the name, and preferred

for themselves above all other names, that of “Athenian crowned with

Violets.” The Romans, also, were extremely partial to the Violet, and

cultivated it largely in their gardens. A favourite beverage of theirs

was a wine made from the flower.----The Violet was, in olden days,

regarded in England as an emblem of constancy, as we find by an old

sonnet:--

“Violet is for faithfulnesse,

Which in me shall abide;

Hoping likewise that from your heart

You will not let it slide.”

The Violet is considered to be a funeral flower, and we find that in

mediæval times it was among the flowers used in the old ceremony called

“Creeping to the Crosse,” when on Good Friday priests clad in crimson,

and “singing dolefully,” carried the image of the Cross, accompanied by

another image representing a person just dead--

“With tapers all the people come,

And at the barriers stay,

Where down upon their knees they fall,

And night and day they pray;

And Violets and ev’ry kind

Of flowers about the grave

They strawe, and bring in all

The presents that they have.”

It was formerly commonly believed in England that when Violets and

Roses flourished in Autumn, there would be some epidemic in the ensuing

year. In Worcestershire, the safety of the farmer’s young broods of

chickens and ducks is thought to be sadly endangered by anyone taking

less than a handful of Violets or Primroses into his house.----Pliny

had so high an opinion of the medicinal virtues of the Violet, as

to assert that a garland of Violets worn about the head prevented

headache or dizziness. In the time of Charles II., a conserve, called

Violet-sugar or Violet-plate, was recommended by physicians to

consumptive patients.----The Violet has always been in high favour with

the French, and is now the recognised badge of the Imperial party.

The flower became identified with the Bonapartists during Napoleon

the First’s exile at Elba. When about to depart for that island, he

comforted his adherents by promising to return with the Violets:--

“Farewell to thee, France! but when liberty rallies

Once more in thy regions, remember me then;

The Violet grows in the depths of thy valleys,

Though withered, thy tears will unfold it again.”--_Byron._

His followers, perhaps remembering that “Violet is for faithfulness,”

henceforth adopted the flower as their badge, and during his exile were

accustomed to toast his health under the name of Caporal Violette, or

“the flower that returns with the Spring.” So well understood did the

political significance of the flower become, that when Mddle. Mars

appeared on the stage wearing Violets on her dress, she was loudly

hissed by the body-guard of King Louis. It is said that the Empress

Eugénie, when wooed by Napoleon III., signified her willingness to

share with him the throne of France by appearing one evening wearing

Violets in her dress and hair, and carrying Violets in her hands.

Afterwards, when living at Chiselhurst, Violet bouquets were sent in

profusion to the Imperial exiles, and, mingled with immortelles, were

piled upon the tomb of Napoleon III.----The famous actress, Clairon,

was so fond of the Violet, that one of her worshippers took pains to

cultivate it for her sake, and for thirty-seven years never failed to

send her a bouquet of Violets every morning during their season of

bloom; an offering so greatly appreciated by its recipient, that she

used to strip off the petals every evening, make an infusion of them,

and drink it like tea.----To dream of admiring the Violet in a garden

is deemed a prognostic of advancement in life.----By astrologers the

Violet is held to be under the dominion of Venus.

=VIPER’S BUGLOSS.=--The _Echium vulgare_, or Viper’s Bugloss, is one

of the handsomest of English wild flowers. Its seed resembling the

head of the viper, it was supposed on the doctrine of signatures to

cure the bite of that reptile: whilst its spotted stem indicated to

the old herbalists and simplers that the plant was specially created

to counteract the poison of speckled vipers and snakes. Dioscorides

affirmed that anyone who had taken the herb before being bitten would

not be hurt by the poison of any serpent. The French call it _la

Vipérine_, and the Italians _Viperina_.----In England it is also known

as Snake’s Bugloss and Cat’s Tail.----According to astrologers, the

Viper’s Bugloss is a herb of the Sun.

=VIPER’S GRASS.=--_Scorzonera edulis_ has obtained its Latin name

from the Italian _Scorzone_, a venomous serpent whose bite the grass

is supposed to heal, and whose form its twisted roots are thought

to resemble. According to Monardus, a Spanish physician, quoted by

Parkinson, the English name of Viper’s Grass was given to it because “a

Moor, a bond-slave, did help those that were bitten of that venomous

beast, the viper, which they of Catalonia called _Escuerso_, with the

juice of this herbe, which both took away the poison, and healed the

bitten place very quickly, when Treakle and other things would do no

good.”

VIRGIN MARY’S PLANTS.--See Lady’s Plants.

VIRGIN’S BOWER.--See Clematis.

WAKE ROBIN.--See Arum.

=WALLFLOWER.=--The Wallflower (_Cheiranthus Cheiri_) belongs to the

family of Stocks, and was, in fact, introduced from Spain under the

name of Wall Stock-Gillofer, which afterwards became Wall Gilliflower,

and finally Wallflower. In Turner’s ‘Herbal,’ it is called Wall-Gelover

and Hartis Ease.----Tradition gives a poetical origin to this flower.

It tells that, in bygone days, a castle stood near the river Tweed,

in which a fair maiden was kept a prisoner, having plighted her troth

and given her heart’s affection to the young heir of a hostile clan;

but blood having been shed between the chiefs on either side, the

deadly hatred cherished in those lawless days forbade all thoughts of

the union. The gallant tried various stratagems to get possession of

his betrothed, all of which failed, until at last he gained admission

to the castle disguised in the garb of a wandering troubadour, and as

such he sang before his lady-love, and finally arranged, with the aid

of a serving-woman, that the maiden should effect her escape, while he

should await her arrival with a noble courser and armed men. Herrick

tells us the conclusion of the story in the following lines:--

“Up she got upon a wall,

Attempted down to slide withal.

But the silken twist untied,

So she fell and, bruised, she died.

Love in pity of the deed,

And her loving luckless speed,

Turn’d her to this plant we call

Now the Flower of the Wall.”

From the fact that Wallflowers grew upon old walls, and were seen on

the casements and battlements of ancient castles, and among the ruins

of abbeys, the minstrels and troubadours were accustomed to wear a

bouquet of these flowers as the emblem of an affection which is proof

against time and misfortune.----Dreams of Wallflowers imply--to a lover

that the object of his affection will be true and constant; to a sickly

person that recovery will shortly follow; to a lady who dreams that

she is plucking the flower for her bouquet, that the worthiest of her

admirers has yet to propose to her.----According to astrologers, the

Moon governs the Wallflower.

=WALNUT.=--The origin of the Walnut-tree is to be found in the story of

Carya, the youngest of the three daughters of Dion, king of Laconia.

These sisters had received the gift of prophecy from Apollo as a reward

for the hospitality their father had shown to the god, but on the

condition that they were never to misuse the divine gift, and never to

enquire into matters of which it became their sex to remain ignorant.

This promise was broken when Bacchus convinced Carya of his love for

her. The elder sisters, being jealous, endeavoured to prevent Bacchus

from meeting Carya, and he in revenge turned them into stones, and

transformed his beloved Carya into the tree so called in Greek--the

_Nux_, or Walnut-tree of the Latins, the fruit of which was considered

by the ancients, in consequence of these intrigues, to promote the

powers of love.----It is necessary, in considering the folk-lore of the

Walnut, to separate the tree from the nut. The tree is feared as a tree

of ill omen, and is regarded as a favourite haunt of witches. The shade

of the Walnut-tree was held by the Romans to be particularly baneful.

The Black Walnut will not let anything grow under it, and if planted in

an orchard will kill all the Apple-trees in its neighbourhood. The Nut

is, on the contrary, considered propitious, favourable to marriage, and

the symbol of fecundity and abundance. The ceremony of throwing Nuts at

a wedding, for which boys scrambled, is said to have been of Athenian

origin. A similar custom obtained among the Romans, at whose marriage

festivities Walnuts were commonly strewed. Catullus exclaims:--

“Let the air with Hymen ring

Hymen, Io Hymen, sing.

Soon the Nuts will now be flung;

Soon the wanton verses sung;

Soon the bridegroom will be told

Of the tricks he played of old.

License then his love had got,

But a husband has it not:

Let the air with Hymen ring,

Hymen, Io Hymen, sing.”--_Leigh Hunt._

Virgil alludes to the custom of scrambling for Nuts at weddings, in his

Eighth Pastoral:--

“Prepare the lights

O Mopsus! and perform the bridal rites;

Scatter thy Nuts among the scrambling boys.”

Prof. De Gubernatis says, that the young bridegroom of modern Rome

throws Nuts on the pathway, evidently as a symbol of fecundity.

In Piedmont, there is a saying that “Bread and Nuts are food for

married people.” In Sicily, at Modica, they strew Nuts and Corn

in the path of the newly-married couple. In Greece, the bride and

bridegroom distribute Nuts among those assisting at the marriage

rites. In Roumania, Nuts are distributed at weddings; and among

the Lettish peasantry, Nuts and Gingerbread-Nuts are presented to

wedding-guests.----A Lithuanian legend recounts that at the deluge, as

men were being drowned, Perkun (the chief deity of the race) was eating

Nuts. He dropped the shells in the raging waters, and in the shells

certain virtuous people escaped, and afterward repeopled the earth. De

Gubernatis, referring to this legend, says that here the Walnut becomes

undoubtedly an emblem of regeneration: “This is the reason why, in

Belgium, on Michaelmas Day (a funereal day), young girls take marriage

auguries from Nuts. Having mingled some full Nuts with others which

have been emptied, and the shells carefully fastened together again,

they shut their eyes, and select one at hazard. If it happens to be

a full Nut, it betokens that they will soon be happily married, for

it is St. Michael who has given them good husbands.” In Italy, a Nut

with three segments is considered most lucky. Carried in the pocket,

it preserves its owner from lightning, witchcraft, the Evil Eye, and

fever; it facilitates conquest, gives happiness, and performs other

benign services. In Bologna, it is thought that if one of these Nuts

be placed under the chair of a witch, she will be unable to get up;

and it thus becomes an infallible means of discovering witches.----The

Walnut has become in Europe, and especially in Italy, an accursed

tree. The ancients thought it was dear to Proserpine and all the

deities of the infernal regions. In Germany, the Black Walnut is

regarded as a sinister tree, just as the Oak is looked upon as a tree

of good omen.----At Rome, there is a tradition that the church Santa

Maria del Popolo was built by order of Paschal II., on the spot where

formerly grew a Walnut-tree, round which troops of demons danced during

the night. Near Prescia, in Tuscany, we are told by Prof. Giuliani,

there is a Walnut-tree where witches are popularly supposed to sleep:

the people of the district say that witches love Walnut-trees. At

Bologna, the peasantry think that witches hold a nocturnal meeting

beneath the Walnut-trees on the Vigil of St. John. But among all other

Walnut-trees, the most infamous and the most accursed is the Walnut of

Benevento, regarding which there are many tales of its being haunted

by the Devil and witches. It is said that St. Barbatus, the patron of

Benevento, who lived in the time of Duke Romuald, was a priest who

was endowed with the power of exorcising devils by his prayers. At

that time the inhabitants still worshipped a Walnut-tree on which was

to be distinguished the effigy of a viper, and beneath this tree the

people performed many superstitious and heathenish rites. The Emperor

Constantius laid siege to Benevento; the citizens were in despair,

but Barbatus rebuked them, and persuaded them that God had taken this

means to punish them for their idolatry; so, with Romuald, they agreed

to be converted to Christianity, and made Barbatus bishop of the town.

Then Barbatus uprooted the accursed Walnut-tree, and the Devil was

seen in the form of a serpent crawling away from beneath its roots.

Upon being sprinkled with holy water, however, he disappeared; but

through his satanic power, whenever a meeting of demons is desired,

or a witches’ sabbath is to be held, a Walnut-tree as large and as

verdant as the original appears by magic on the precise spot where it

stood.----A Walnut-tree with very different associations once grew in

the churchyard on the north side of St. Joseph’s Chapel at Glastonbury.

This miraculous tree never budded before the feast of St. Barnabas

(June 11th), and on that very day shot forth leaves and flourished

like others of its species. Queen Anne, King James and many high

personages are said to have given large sums of money for cuttings from

the original tree, which has long since disappeared, and has been

succeeded by a fine Walnut of the ordinary sort.----According to an old

custom (which at one time prevailed in England), every household in the

district of Lechrain, in Bavaria, brings to the sacred fire which is

lighted at Easter a Walnut-branch, which, after being partially burned,

is carried home to be laid on the hearth-fire during tempests, as a

protection against lightning.----In Flanders, as a charm against ague,

the patient catches a large black spider, and imprisons it between the

two halves of a Walnut-shell, and then wears it round his neck.----In

our own land, it is a common belief among country people that whipping

a Walnut-tree tends to increase the crop and improve the flavour of the

Nuts. This belief is found embodied in the following curious distich:--

“A woman, a spaniel, and a Walnut-tree,

The more you whip them, the better they be.”

Evelyn, alluding to this custom, says it is thought better to beat

the Nuts off than to gather them from the tree by hand. “In Italy,”

he tells us, “they arm the tops of long poles with nails and iron for

the purpose, and believe the beating improves the tree, which I no

more believe than I do that discipline would reform a shrew.”----The

Brahmans of the Himalaya observe a festival called the Walnut Festival,

_Akrot-ka-pooja_, at which, after offering a sacrifice, the priest,

with a few companions, takes his place in the balcony of the temple,

and all the young men present pelt them liberally with Walnuts and

green Pine-cones, which the group in the balcony rapidly collect

and return in plentiful volleys.----To dream of Walnuts portends

difficulties and misfortunes in life: in love affairs, such a vision

implies infidelity and disappointment.

WATER LILY.--See Nymphæa.

WAYBREAD.--See Plantain.

=WHORTLEBERRY.=--Whort or Whortleberry (the Anglo-Saxon _Heorutberge_

is another name for the Bilberry or Blaeberry, (_Vaccinium Myrtillus_).

A species of Whortleberry, called Ohelo (_Vaccinium reticulatum_), is

found in Hawaii, springing up from the decomposed lava of the volcanoes

of that island. Its flame-coloured berries are sacred to Pélé, the

goddess of the volcano, and in heathen days no Hawaiian dared taste

one till he had offered some to the goddess, and craved her permission

to eat them. Miss Gordon Cumming relates that when Mr. Ellis visited

the island in 1822, he and his trusty friends rejoiced on discovering

these large juicy berries, but the natives implored them not to touch

them lest some dire calamity should follow. Though themselves faint and

parched, they dared not touch one till they reached the edge of the

crater, where, gathering branches loaded with the tempting clusters,

they broke them in two, and throwing half over the precipice, they

called Pélé’s attention to the offering, and to the fact that they

craved her permission to eat of her _Ohelos_. (See also BILBERRY.)

=WIDOW’S FLOWER.=--The Indian or Sweet Scabious (_Scabiosa

atropurpurea_) is called by the Italians _Fior della Vedova_, and by

the French _Fleur de Veuve_, or Widow’s Flower. Phillips says of these

flowers that they present us with “corollas of so dark a purple, that

they nearly match the sable hue of the widow’s weeds; these being

contrasted with anthers of pure white gives the idea of its being an

appropriate bouquet for those who mourn for their deceased husbands,

and this we presume gave rise to the Italian and French name of Widow’s

Flower.”

=WILLOW.=--The Willow seems from the remotest times to have been

considered a funereal tree and an emblem of grief. So universal is

the association of sadness and grief with the Willow, that “to wear

the Willow” has become a familiar proverb. Under Willows the captive

Children of Israel wept and mourned in Babylon. Fuller, referring to

this melancholy episode in their history, says of the Willow:--“A

sad tree, whereof such as have lost their love make their mourning

garlands; and we know that exiles hung their harps on such doleful

supports. The very leaves of the Willow are of a mournful hue.” Virgil

remarks on

“The Willow with hoary bluish leaves;”

and Shakspeare, when describing the scene of poor Ophelia’s death,

says:--

“There is a Willow grows ascant the brook,

That shows his hoar leaves in the grassy stream.”

Chatterton has a song of which the burden runs:--

“Mie love ys dedde,

Gone to his death-bedde

Al under the Wyllowe-tree.”

Spenser designates the gruesome tree as “the Willow worn of forlorn

paramours;” and there are several songs in which despairing lovers

invoke the Willow-tree.

“Ah, Willow, Willow!

The Willow shall be

A garland for me,

Ah, Willow! Willow.”

Herrick tells us how garlands of Willow were worn by neglected or

bereaved lovers, and how love-sick youths and maids came to weep out

the night beneath the Willow’s cold shade. The following wail of a

heart-broken lover is also from the pen of the old poet:--

“A Willow garland thou did’st send

Perfumed, last day, to me,

Which did but only this portend--

I was forsook by thee.

Since it is so, I’ll tell thee what:

To-morrow thou shalt see

Me wear the Willow; after that,

To die upon the tree.

As hearts unto the altars go,

With garlands dressed, so I,

With my Willow-wreath, also

Come forth and sweetly die.”

Jason, in his voyage in search of the golden fleece, passed the weird

grove of Circe, planted with funereal Willows, on the tops of which the

voyagers could perceive corpses hanging. Pausanias speaks of a grove

consecrated to Proserpine, planted with Black Poplars and Willows; and

the same author represents Orpheus, whilst in the infernal regions, as

carrying a Willow-branch in his hand. Shakspeare, in allusion to Dido’s

being forsaken by Æneas, says:--

“In such a night,

Stood Dido, with a Willow in her hand,

Upon the wild sea-banks, and waved her love

To come again to Carthage.”

The Willow was considered to be the tree of Saturn. The Weeping Willow

(_Salix Babylonica_), as being a remedy for fluxes, was, however,

consecrated to Juno Fluonia, who was invoked by Roman matrons to stop

excessive hemorrhage.----The Flemish peasantry have a curious custom

to charm away the ague. The sufferer goes early in the morning to an

old Willow, makes three knots in one of its branches, and says “Good

morning Old One; I give thee the cold, Old One.”----The Willow wand

has long been a favourite instrument of divination. The directions

are as follows:--Let a maiden take a Willow-branch in her left hand,

and, without being observed, slip out of the house and run three times

round it, whispering all the time, “He that’s to be my gude man come

and grip the end of it.” During the third run, the likeness of her

future husband will appear and grasp the other end of the wand.----De

Gubernatis says that at Brie (Ile-de-France), on St. John’s Eve, the

people burn a figure made of Willow-boughs. At Luchon, on the same

anniversary, they throw snakes on a huge effigy of a Willow-tree made

with branches of Willow; this is set on fire, and while it is burning

the people dance around the tree.----In China, the Willow is employed

in their funeral rites, the tree having been there considered, from

the remotest ages, to be a symbol of immortality and eternity. On

this account they cover the coffin with branches of Willow, and plant

Willows near the tombs of the departed. They also have a custom of

decorating the doors of their houses with Willow-branches on Midsummer

Day. With them the Willow is supposed to be possessed of marvellous

properties, amongst which is the power of averting the ill effects of

miasma and pestilential disorders.----To dream of mourning beneath a

Willow over some calamity is considered a happy omen, implying the

speedy receipt of intelligence that will cause much satisfaction.----By

astrologers the Willow is placed under the dominion of the moon.

WIND FLOWER.--See Anemone.

WITCH-HAZEL.--See Hornbeam. WITCH- or WYCH-ELM, _Ulmus montana_.

WOLF’S BANE.--See Monk’s Hood.

WOODBINE.--See Honeysuckle.

=WORMWOOD.=--The old Latin name of Wormwood was _Absinthium_, and

a variety known as _A. Ponticum_ is alluded to by Ovid as being

particularly bitter:--

“Untilled barren ground the loathsome Wormwood yields,

And well ’tis known how, through its root, bitter become the fields.”

Johnston, in his _Thaumatographia naturalis_, notes a curious

superstition, according to which we are assured that an infant will

not during its life be either hot or cold provided that its hands are

rubbed over with the juice of Wormwood before the twelfth week of its

life has expired. The ancients mingled Wormwood in their luscious

wines, or used it before or after drinking them in order to counteract

their effects. Sprays of Wormwood are often seen suspended in cottages

to drive away moths and other insects.

“Where chamber is sweeped, and Wormwood is throwne,

No flea for his life dare abide to be knowne.”

Its powerful odour is so disliked by all kinds of insects that

country people often place Wormwood in their drawers to protect

their clothes, &c., from moths: hence its French name, _Garde-robe_.

Gerarde says that, mixed with vinegar, it is a good antidote to the

poison of Mushrooms or Toadstools, and taken with wine counteracts

the poisonous effects of Hemlock and the bites of the shrew mouse

and sea dragon.----Branches of Sea Wormwood (_Absinthium marinum_)

were, according to Pliny, carried in processions by Egyptian priests

dedicated to the service of the goddess Isis. A species called

_Sementina_ was formerly called Holy Wormwood, and its seed Holy

Wormseed (_semen sanctum_)--for what reason is not known.----Dreams

connected with Wormwood are considered of good augury, implying

happiness and domestic enjoyment. Astrologers adjudge Wormwood to be a

herb of Mars.

=YARROW.=--The Yarrow, or Milfoil (_Achillea Millefolium_), is a

plant which delights to find a home for itself in churchyards.

Probably on account of this peculiarity it has been selected to play

an important part in several rustic incantations and charms. In the

South and West of England, damsels resort to the following mode of

love-divination:--The girl must first pluck some Yarrow from a young

man’s grave, repeating the while these words:--

“Yarrow, sweet Yarrow, the first that I have found,

In the name of Jesus Christ I pluck it from the ground;

As Jesus loved sweet Mary, and took her for His dear,

So in a dream this night, I hope my true love will appear.”

She must then sleep with the Yarrow under her pillow, and in her dreams

her future husband will appear.----Another formula states: The Yarrow

must be plucked exactly on the first hour of morn: place three sprigs

in your shoe or glove, saying:--

“Good morning, good morning, good Yarrow,

And thrice good morning to thee;

Tell me, before this time to-morrow,

Who my true love is to be.”

Observe, a young man must pluck the Yarrow off a young maiden’s grave,

and a female must select that off a bachelor’s. Retire home to bed

without speaking another word, or it dissolves the spell; put the

Yarrow under your pillow, and it will procure a sure dream on which

you may depend.----In another spell to procure for a maiden a dream of

the future, she is to make a posey of various coloured flowers, one

of a sort, some Yarrow off a grave, and a sprig of Rue, and bind all

together with a little hair from her head. She is then to sprinkle the

nosegay with a few drops of the oil of amber, using her left hand,

and bind the flowers round her head when she retires to rest in a bed

supplied with clean linen. This spell it is stated will ensure the

maid’s future fate to appear in a dream.----The Yarrow acquired the

name of Nosebleed from its having been put into the nose to cause

bleeding, and to cure the megrim, as we learn from Gerarde. Dr. Prior

adds, that it was also called Nosebleed from its being used as a means

of testing a lover’s fidelity, and he quotes from Forby, who, in his

‘East Anglia,’ says that, in that part of England, a girl will tickle

the inside of the nostril with a leaf of this plant, crying:--

“Yarroway, Yarroway, bear a white blow;

If my love love me, my nose will bleed now.”

By a blunder of the mediæval herbalists, the name and remedial

character of the Horse-tail, which was formerly called _Herba

sanguinaria_ and Nosebleed, were transferred without reason to the

Yarrow, which has since retained them.----The Yarrow is also known as

Old Man’s Pepper, and was formerly called the Souldier’s Woundwort. The

Highlanders make an ointment from it; and it was similarly employed

by the ancient Greeks, who said that Achilles first made use of this

plant as a wound herb, having learnt its virtues of Chiron, the

Centaur--hence its scientific name _Achillea_.----Astrologers place

the herb under the dominion of Venus.----To dream of gathering Yarrow

for medicinal purposes denotes that the dreamer will shortly hear of

something that will give him or her extreme pleasure.

=YEW.=--The dark and sombre Yew-tree has from the remote past been

invested with an essentially funereal character, and hence is

appropriately found in the shade of churchyards and in propinquity to

tombs. Blair, addressing himself to the grave, says:--

“Well do I know thee by thy trusty Yew,

Cheerless, unsocial plant, that loves to dwell

’Midst skulls and coffins, epitaphs, and worms;

Where light-heeled ghosts, and visionary shades,

Beneath the wan cold moon (so fame reports),

Embody’d, thick, perform their mystic rounds.

No other merriment, dull tree, is thine.”

The Egyptians regarded it as a symbol of mourning, and the idea

descended to the Greeks and Romans, who employed the wood as fuel for

their funeral pyres. The Britons probably learned from the Romans to

attach a funereal signification to the Yew, and inasmuch as it had

been employed in ancient funeral rites, they regarded the tree with

reverence and probably looked upon it as sacred. Hence, in course of

time, the Yew came to be planted in churchyards, and, on account of its

perpetual verdure, was, like the Cypress, considered as a symbol of the

resurrection and immortality.

“Dark Cypresses the skirting sides adorned,

And gloomy Yew-trees, which for ever mourned.”--_Harte._

R. Turner remarks that if the Yew “be set in a place subject to

poysonous vapours, the very branches will draw and imbibe them: hence

it is conceived that the judicious in former times planted it in

churchyards on the west side, because those places being fuller of

putrefaction and gross oleaginous vapours exhaled out of the graves by

the setting sun, and sometimes drawn into those meteors called _ignes

fatui_, divers have been frightened, supposing some dead bodies to

walk; others have been blasted, &c.” Prof. Martyn points out that a

Yew was evidently planted near the church for some religious purpose;

for in the ancient laws of Wales the value of a _consecrated_ Yew is

set down as £1, whilst that of an ordinary Yew-tree is stated as only

fifteen pence. “Our forefathers,” says he, “were particularly careful

to preserve this funereal tree, whose branches it was usual to carry in

solemn procession to the grave, and afterwards to deposit therein under

the bodies of their departed friends. Our learned Ray says, that our

ancestors planted the Yew in churchyards because it was an evergreen

tree, as a symbol of that immortality which they hoped and expected

for the persons there deposited. For the same reason this and other

evergreen trees are even yet carried in funerals, and thrown into the

grave with the body; in some parts of England and in Wales, planted

with flowers upon the grave itself.” Shakspeare speaks of a “shroud

of white, stuck all with Yew,” from which one would infer that sprigs

of Yew were placed on corpses before burial. Branches of Yew were, in

olden times, often carried in procession on Palm Sunday, instead of

Palm, and as an evergreen Yew was sometimes used to decorate churches

and houses at Christmas-time.----Parkinson remarks that in his time it

was used “to deck up houses in Winter; but ancient writers have ever

reckoned it to be dangerous at the least, if not deadly.” Many of the

old writers were of Parkinson’s opinion as to the poisonous character

of the Yew. Cæsar tells how Cativulcus, king of the Eburones, poisoned

himself by drinking a draught of Yew. Dioscorides says that a decoction

of the leaves occasions death; Galen pronounces the tree to be of a

venomous quality and against man’s nature; and White, in his ‘History

of Selborne,’ gives numerous instances in which the Yew has proved

fatal to animals. Gerarde does not consider the berries poisonous, but

thinks non-ruminating animals are injured by eating the foliage. He

tells us that “Nicander, in his booke of counter-poisons, doth reckon

the Yew-tree among the venomous plants, setting downe also a remedy,

and that in these words, as Gorræus hath translated them:--

‘Shun the poys’nous Yew, the which on Oeata grows,

Like to the Firre, it causes bitter death,

Unlesse besides they use pure wine that flowes

From empty’d cups, thou drinke, when as thy breath

Begins to fade, and passage of thy life

Grows straight.’”

Virgil attributed the notoriously unwholesome qualities of the honey of

Corsica to the bees feeding upon the Yew, and he warns bee-keepers to

be careful that no Yew-trees grow near their hives. Owing to its being

so frequently found in churchyards, a ghastly superstition has arisen

respecting this sinister tree: it is said that it preys and invigorates

itself upon the dead who lie beneath its sombre shade. Thus, in ‘_In

Memoriam_,’ we read:--

“Old Yew, which graspest at the stones

That name the underlying dead,

Thy fibres net the dreamless head,

Thy roots are wrapt about the bones.”

Even in the principal use the Yew was put to, the tree maintained its

connection with death, for from its wood man fashioned an instrument

of warfare and destruction. Its great pliancy and toughness made it

particularly suitable for bows, and for this purpose it was unrivalled.

Virgil tells us that in his time “the Yews were bent into Ituræan

bows”; Chaucer speaks of “the Shooter Yew;” and Browne writes of

“The warlike Yewgh by which more than the lance

The strong-armed English spirits conquered France.”

Camden has recorded a grim legend in connection with the name of

Halifax. It seems that a certain amorous clergyman fell in love with

a pretty maid who refused his addresses. Maddened by her refusal he

cut off her head, which being hung upon a Yew-tree till it was quite

decayed, the tree was reputed as sacred, not only whilst the virgin’s

head hung on it, but as long as the tree itself lasted: to which the

people went in pilgrimage, plucking and bearing away branches of it

as a holy relique, whilst there remained any of the trunk; persuading

themselves that those small veins and filaments resembling hairs were

the hairs of the virgin. But what is yet stranger, the resort to

this place, then called Houton, a despicable village, occasioned the

building of the now famous town of Halifax, in Yorkshire, the name of

which imports “holy hair.”----In the cloister of Vreton, in Brittany,

there grew a Yew-tree which was said to have sprung from the staff of

St. Martin. Beneath it the Breton princes were accustomed to offer up

a prayer before entering the church. This tree was regarded with the

highest reverence; no one ever plucked a leaf from its sombre boughs,

and even the birds refrained from pecking the scarlet berries. A band

of pirates, however, happening to visit the locality, two of them

spied the tree, and forthwith climbed into its venerable boughs and

proceeded to cut bow-staves for themselves: their audacity speedily

brought about its own punishment, for they both fell and were killed

on the spot.----Both in old Celtic and in Anglo-Saxon the Yew-tree was

called _Iw_. By early English authors its name was variously spelt

Yew, Yeugh, Ewgh, Ugh, and Ewe. In Switzerland, it is known as William

Tell’s Tree.----Dream oracles state that there is but one signification

to dreams concerning the Yew, viz., that it is the certain forerunner

of the demise of an aged person, through which the dreamer will derive

substantial benefits.

=YGGDRASILL.=--The mythical Scandinavian World-tree, or Mundane Ash,

is the greatest and best of all trees: beneath it the gods assemble

in counsel; its branches spread over the whole world and reach above

heaven; and its roots penetrate to the infernal regions. On its summit

is perched an all-seeing eagle, with a hawk between his eyes. A

squirrel continually carries news to him, while serpents coiled round

the vast trunk endeavour to destroy him. Serpents, also, constantly

gnaw the roots, from which come the fountains of wisdom and futurity.

The Norns always keep a watch upon the Yggdrasill: they fix the

lifetime of all men, and dispense destinies. Under the tree is hidden

the horn which shall be sounded and rouse the world at the last great

conflict.

[Tailpiece]

[Headpiece]

Index to Legends and Myths.

Acis and Galatea, 532

Adam, Eve, the Wolf, and the Dog, 362

Adam’s Tree, 303

Ajax, 404

Albertus Magnus, 133

Ali Baba and the Sesame, 544

Amaracus, 433

Amaranthus, 212

Andromeda, 214

Arabian Priests and Cinnamon, 283

Argonauts, 81, 249

Arjuna, the Betel Thief, 251

Aroth, Maroth, and the Beauty, 577

Aspen and the Flight into Egypt, 230

„ „ Passion, 229

Aspic and Balm-tree, 239

Asses and Hemlock, 145

Atalanta and Hippomenes, 218

Atys and Agdistis, 210

„ „ Cybele, 495

Baldr and the Mistletoe, 440

Balm Trees of Cairo, 124

Bachelier and the Anemone, 216

Bacchus and the Pomegranate, 499

Batou and the Cedar, 275

Bertram and the Heartsease, 484

Birth of Vishnu, 241

Blacksmith changed to a Bear, 250

Bonze and the Mouse, 513

Bosworth Field, 360

Buddha, 4, 420, 491

„ and Mâra, 4

Bushman Rice, 514

Callimachus and the Acanthus, 206

Calchas and Mopsus, 335

Ceres and Proserpine, 504

Chang Ching and the Fairy, 449

Charlemagne and the Thistle, 269

Chinese Trees of Love, 274

Clairon and the Violets, 581

Clovis, 387

Clytie and Phœbus, 365

Cosmogonic Lotus, 419

Cossacks and Tartars, 286

Crocus and Smilax, 299

Crown Imperial, 347

Cyanus and the Cornflower, 277

Cyparissus, 302

Czekanka, 326

Danes and the Thistle, 562

Daphne and Phœbus, 404

Daughter of the Laurel, 408

Death of Buddha, 539

Devil and Blackberries, 258

„ „ the Oats, 472

„ „ the Reed, 512

Devil’s Brother, 451

Dewadat and Buddha, 268

Diarmuid and Grainne, 531

Duke of Tuscany’s Gardener, 392

Dryope, 417

Earl of Essex’s Horses, 445

Elm of Ethiopia, 131

Emperor of China, 447

Envious Sisters, 436

Erisichthon, 77

Esthonian Peasant, 254

Eugénie and Napoleon III., 581

Eve and the Snowdrop, 546

Fairy Wife, 356

„ Widower, 333

Faithful Wife, 551

Falcon and Soma, 439

Fatal Elopement, 582

Father Garnet’s Straw, 134

Fig of Paradise, 127

Fir-tree Elf, 65

First Roses, 515

Flora and Zephyr, 215

Forget-me-not, 342

Fulke and the Plantagenets, 260

Garden of the Lower Regions, 223

Gefroi and the Broom, 260

Glastonbury Thorn, 352

Glaucus, 541

Golden Apples, 477

Grey Horse, 265

Hanpang and Ho, 274

Hercules and Cerberus, 442

Holy Family and Date Palm, 312

„ Rose of Jericho, 528

Honor Garrigan and the Blackberries, 259

Hoopoe and Springwort, 142

Hop-o’-my-Thumb, 263

Hulda and the Selige Fräulein, 340

Hyacinthus, 383

Ianthis, 578

Ice Mountain, 223

Iduna and the Apples, 217

Indra and Namuchi, 207

Io, 578

Iosbert, 519

Isabella and the Basil, 246

Iseult and Tristan, 389

Isis and Osiris, 560

James, Duke of Monmouth, 257

Jehanghir and Attar of Roses, 521

Jesus Christ and the Broom, 260

„ „ „ Apples, 222

Juno and Hercules, 397, 412

Jussieu and the Cedar, 274

Kang Wou and the Cassia, 271

Khatties, The, 116

King Midas and the Barber, 511

„ Oswald and the Moss, 445

Kissos, 388

La Cour and the Tuberose, 568

Ladislas and the Plague, 350

Laurel Maiden, 75

Leucothea, 346

Lieschi, the Geni of the Forest, 253

Life-giving Herb, 144

Lords of Linden, 416

Lotus and Priapus, 417

Luckflower, 112

Lycurgus and the Cabbage, 264

Macbeth and Sweno, 546

Magic Fern-seed, 330

„ Flute, 431

„ Mustard-seed, 453

„ Pumpkin, 507

„ Thistle, 562

„ Violin-bow, 81

Main de Gloire, 428

Malvina and Oscar, 308

Mandrake, 426

Maria Theresa and the Camellia, 266

Maschia and Maschiäna, 301

McDonough’s Baby, 361

Melampus and Hellebore, 368

Melius and the Apple, 218

Mercury and his Rod, 362

Mexican Water Age, 435

Mignonette, 437

Milkmaid and Enchanted Cow, 288

Millet-thief, 438

Milto, 518

Minerva and the Olive, 473

Monastery of St. Christine, 257

Murdered Virgin, 591

Myrene, 454

Myrrha, 453