_Names of Plants_ (Vol. viii., p. 37.).--Ale-hoof means useful in, or to,
ale; Ground-ivy having been used in brewing before the introduction of
hops. "The women of our northern parts" (says John Gerard), "especially
about Wales or Cheshire, do tunne the herbe Ale-hoof into their ale ...
being tunned up in ale and drunke, it also purgeth the head from rhumaticke
humours flowing from the brain." From the aforesaid tunning, it was also
called Tun-hoof (_World of Words_); and in Gerard, Tune-hoof. {137}
Considering what was meant by Lady in the names of plants, we should
refrain from supposing that _Neottia spiralis_ was called the Lady-traces
"sensu obsc.," even if those who are more skilled in such matters than I am
can detect such a sense. I cannot learn what a lady's _traces_ are; but I
suspect plaitings of her hair to be meant. "Upon the spiral sort," says
Gerard, "are placed certaine small white flowers, _trace_ fashion," while
other sorts grow, he says, "spike fashion," or "not _trace_ fashion."
Whence I infer, that in his day _trace_ conveyed the idea of spiral.