Chapter 15

“thou shalt not lackThe flower that’s like thy face, pale primrose; norThe azured harebell, like thy veins.”

Hemlock.In consequence of its bad and poisonous character, this plant was considered an appropriate ingredient for witches’ broth. In “Macbeth” (iv. 1) we read of

“Root of hemlock, digged i’ the dark.”

Its scientific name,conium, is from the Greek word meaning cone or top, whose whirling motion resembles the giddiness produced on the constitution by its poisonous juice. It is by most persons supposed to be the death-drink of the Greeks, and the one by which Socrates was put to death.

Herb of GraceorHerb Grace. A popular name in days gone by for rue. The origin of the term is uncertain. Most probably it arose from the extreme bitterness of the plant,which, as it had always borne the namerue(to be sorry for anything), was not unnaturally associated with repentance. It was, therefore, the herb of repentance,[507]“and this was soon changed into ‘herb of grace,’ repentance being the chief sign of grace.” The expression is several times used by Shakespeare. In “Richard II.” (iii. 4) the gardener narrates:

“Here did she fall a tear; here, in this placeI’ll set a bank of rue, sour herb of grace:Rue, even for ruth, here shortly shall be seen,In the remembrance of a weeping queen.”

In “Hamlet” (iv. 5), Ophelia, when addressing the queen, says, “There’s rue for you; and here’s some for me: we may call it herb-grace o’ Sundays: O, you must wear your rue with a difference.”[508]

Malone observes that there is no ground for supposing that rue was called “herb of grace” from its being used in exorcisms in churches on Sunday, a notion entertained by Jeremy Taylor, who says, referring to theFlagellum Dæmonum, “First, they (the Romish exorcisers) are to try the devil by holy water, incense, sulphur, rue, which from thence, as we suppose, came to be called ‘herb of grace.’”[509]Rue was also a common subject of puns, from being the same word which signified sorrow or pity (see “Richard II.,” iii. 4, cited above).

Holy Thistle.The Carduus Benedictus, called also “blessed thistle,” was so named, like other plants which bear the specific name of “blessed,” from its supposed power of counteracting the effect of poison.[510]Cogan, in his “Haven of Health,” 1595, says, “This herbe may worthily be calledBenedictus, orOmnimorbia, that is, a salve for every sore, not known to physitians of old time, but lately revealed by the special providence of Almighty God.” It is alluded to in “Much Ado About Nothing” (iii. 4):

“Margaret.Get you some of this distilled Carduus Benedictus, and lay it to your heart; it is the only thing for a qualm.Hero.There thou prickest her with a thistle.Beatrice.Benedictus! why Benedictus? you have some moral in this Benedictus.Margaret.Moral? no, by my troth, I have no moral meaning. I meant, plain holy-thistle.”

“Margaret.Get you some of this distilled Carduus Benedictus, and lay it to your heart; it is the only thing for a qualm.

Hero.There thou prickest her with a thistle.

Beatrice.Benedictus! why Benedictus? you have some moral in this Benedictus.

Margaret.Moral? no, by my troth, I have no moral meaning. I meant, plain holy-thistle.”

Insane Root.There is much doubt as to what plant is meant by Banquo in “Macbeth” (i. 3):

“have we eaten on the insane rootThat takes the reason prisoner?”

The origin of this passage is probably to be found in North’s “Plutarch,” 1579 (“Life of Antony,” p. 990), where mention is made of a plant which “made them out of their wits.” Several plants have been suggested—the hemlock, belladonna, mandrake, henbane, etc. Douce supports the last, and cites the following passage:[511]“Henbane ... is called insana, mad, for the use thereof is perillous; for if it be eate or dronke, it breedeth madness, or slow lykenesse of sleepe.” Nares[512]quotes from Ben Jonson (“Sejanus,” iii. 2), in support of hemlock:

“well, read my charms,And may they lay that hold upon thy sensesAs thou hadst snufft up hemlock.”

Ivy.It was formerly the general custom in England, as it is still in France and the Netherlands, to hang a bush of ivy at the door of a vintner.[513]Hence the allusion in “As You Like It” (v. 4, Epilogue), where Rosalind wittily remarks:“If it be true that good wine needs no bush, ’tis true that a good play needs no epilogue.” This custom is often referred to by our old writers, as, for instance, in Nash’s “Summer’s Last Will and Testament,” 1600:

“Green ivy bushes at the vintner’s doors.”

And in the “Rival Friends,” 1632:

“’Tis like the ivy bush unto a tavern.”

This plant was no doubt chosen from its being sacred to Bacchus. The practice was observed at statute hirings, wakes, etc., by people who sold ale at no other time. The manner, says Mr. Singer,[514]in which they were decorated appears from a passage in Florio’s “Italian Dictionary,” invoce tremola, “Gold foile, or thin leaves of gold or silver, namely, thinne plate, as our vintners adorn their bushes with.” We may compare the old sign of “An owl in an ivy bush,” which perhaps denoted the union of wisdom or prudence with conviviality, with the phrase “be merry and wise.”

Kecksies.These are the dry, hollow stalks of hemlock. In “Henry V.” (v. 2) Burgundy makes use of the word:

“and nothing teems,But hateful docks, rough thistles, kecksies, burs,Losing both beauty and utility.”

It has been suggested[515]that kecksies may be a mistaken form of the plural kex; and that kex may have been formed from keck, something so dry that the eater would keck at it, or be unable to swallow it. The word is probably derived from the Welsh “cecys,” which is applied to several plants of the umbelliferous kind. Dr. Prior,[516]however, says that kecksies is from an old English word keek, or kike, retained in the northern counties in the sense of “peep” or “spy.”

Knotgrass.[517]The allusion to this plant in “A Midsummer-Night’sDream” (iii. 2)—

“Get you gone, you dwarf!You minimus, of hindering knot-grass made;You bead, you acorn!”—

refers to its supposed power of hindering the growth of any child or animal, when taken in an infusion, a notion alluded to by Beaumont and Fletcher (“Coxcombe,” ii. 2):

“We want a boy extremely for this function,Kept under for a year with milk and knot-grass.”

In “The Knight of the Burning Pestle” (ii. 2) we read: “The child’s a fatherless child, and say they should put him into a strait pair of gaskins, ’twere worse than knot-grass; he would never grow after it.”

Lady-smocks.This plant is so called from the resemblance of its white flowers to little smocks hung out to dry (“Love’s Labour’s Lost,” v. 2), as they used to be at that season of the year especially

“When daisies pied, and violets blue,And lady-smocks all silver white,And cuckoo-buds of yellow hue,Do paint the meadows with delight.*****When shepherds pipe on oaten straws,*****And maidens bleach their summer smocks.”

According to another explanation, the lady-smock is a corruption of “Our Lady’s Smock,” so called from its first flowering about Lady-tide. This plant has also been called cuckoo-flower, because, as Gerarde says, “it flowers in April and May, when the cuckoo doth begin to sing her pleasant notes without stammering.”

Laurel.From the very earliest times this classical plant has been regarded as symbolical of victory, and used for crowns. In “Titus Andronicus” (i. 1) Titus says:

“Cometh Andronicus, bound with laurel boughs.”

And in “Antony and Cleopatra” (i. 3) the latter exclaims:

“upon your swordSit laurelled victory.”[518]

Leek.The first of March is observed by the Welsh in honor of St. David, their patron saint, when, as a sign of their patriotism, they wear a leek. Much doubt exists as to the origin of this custom. According to the Welsh, it is because St. David ordered his Britons to place leeks in their caps, that they might be distinguished in fight from their Saxon foes. Shakespeare, in “Henry V.” (iv. 7), alludes to the custom when referring to the battle of Cressy. Fluellen says, “If your majesties is remembered of it, the Welshmen did good service in a garden where leeks did grow, wearing leeks in their Monmouth caps, which your majesty know to this hour is an honourable badge of the service; and I do believe your majesty takes no scorn to wear the leek upon Saint Tavy’s day.”[519]Dr. Owen Pughe[520]supposes the custom arose from the practice of every farmer contributing his leek to the common repast when they met at the Cymmortha, an association by which they reciprocated assistance in ploughing the land. Anyhow, the subject is one involved in complete uncertainty, and the various explanations given are purely conjectural (see p. 303).

Lily.Although so many pretty legends and romantic superstitions have clustered round this sweet and favorite flower, yet they have escaped the notice of Shakespeare, who, while attaching to it the choicest epithets, has simply made it the type of elegance and beauty, and the symbol of purity and whiteness.

Long Purples.This plant, mentioned by Shakespeare in “Hamlet” (iv. 7) as forming part of the nosegay of poor Ophelia, is generally considered to be the early purple orchis (Orchis mascula), which blossoms in April or May. It grows in meadows and pastures, and is about ten inches high.Tennyson (“A Dirge”) uses the name:

“Round thee blow, self-pleached deep,Bramble roses, faint and pale,And long purples of the dale.”

Another term applied by Shakespeare to this flower was “Dead Men’s Fingers,” from the pale color and hand-like shape of the palmate tubers:

“Our cold maids do dead men’s fingers call them.”

In “Flowers from Stratford-on-Avon,” it is said, “there can be no doubt that the wild arum is the plant alluded to by Shakespeare,” but there seems no authority for this statement.

Love-in-Idleness, or, with more accuracy,Love-in-Idle,[521]is one of the many nicknames of the pansy or heart’s-ease—a term said to be still in use in Warwickshire. It occurs in “Midsummer-Night’s Dream” (ii. 1),[522]where Oberon says:

“Yet mark’d I where the bolt of Cupid fell:It fell upon a little western flower,Before milk-white, now purple with love’s wound,And maidens call it love-in-idleness.”

The phrase literally signifies love in vain, or to no purpose, as Taylor alludes to it in the following couplet:

“When passions are let loose without a bridle,Then precious time is turned tolove and idle.”

That flowers, and pansies especially, were used as love-philters,[523]or for the object of casting a spell over people, in Shakespeare’s day, is shown in the passage already quoted. where Puck and Oberon amuse themselves at Titania’s expense.Again, a further reference occurs (iv. 1), where the fairy king removes the spell:

“But first I will release the fairy queen.Be as thou wast wont to be:See as thou wast wont to see:Dian’s bud[524]o’er Cupid’s flower[525]Hath such force and blessed power.Now, my Titania; wake you, my sweet queen.”

“It has been suggested,” says Mr. Aldis Wright,[526]“that the device employed by Oberon to enchant Titania by anointing her eyelids with the juice of a flower, may have been borrowed by Shakespeare from the Spanish romance of ‘Diana’ by George of Montemayor. But apart from the difficulty which arises from the fact that no English translation of this romance is known before that published by Young in 1598, there is no necessity to suppose that Shakespeare was indebted to any one for what must have been a familiar element in all incantations at a time when a belief in witchcraft was common.” Percy (“Reliques,” vol. iii. bk. 2) quotes a receipt by the celebrated astrologer, Dr. Dee, for “an ungent to anoynt under the eyelids, and upon the eyelids eveninge and morninge, but especially when you call,” that is, upon the fairies. It consisted of a decoction of various flowers.

MandragoraorMandrake. No plant, perhaps, has had, at different times, a greater share of folk-lore attributed to it than the mandrake; partly owing, probably, to the fancied resemblance of its root to the human figure, and the accidental circumstance ofmanbeing the first syllable of the word. An inferior degree of animal life was assigned to it; and it was commonly supposed that, when torn from the ground, it uttered groans of so pernicious a character, that the person who committed the violence either went mad ordied. In “2 Henry VI.” (iii. 2) Suffolk says:

“Would curses kill, as doth the mandrake’s groan,I would invent,” etc.

And Juliet (“Romeo and Juliet,” iv. 3) speaks of

“shrieks like mandrakes’ torn out of the earth,That living mortals, hearing them, run mad.”

To escape this danger, it was recommended to tie one end of a string to the plant and the other to a dog, upon whom the fatal groan would discharge its whole malignity. The ancients, it appears, were equally superstitious with regard to this mysterious plant, and Columella, in his directions for the site of gardens, says they may be formed where

“the mandrake’s flowersProduce, whose root shows half a man, whose juiceWith madness strikes.”

Pliny[527]informs us that those who dug up this plant paid particular attention to stand so that the wind was at their back; and, before they began to dig, they made three circles round the plant with the point of the sword, and then, proceeding to the west, commenced digging it up. It seems to have been well known as an opiate in the time of Shakespeare, who makes Iago say in “Othello” (iii. 3):

“Not poppy, nor mandragora,Nor all the drowsy syrups of the world,Shall ever medicine thee to that sweet sleepWhich thou ow’dst yesterday.”

In “Antony and Cleopatra” (i. 5), the queen pathetically says:

“Give me to drink mandragora.Char.Why, madam?Cleo.That I might sleep out this great gap of time,My Antony is away.”

“Give me to drink mandragora.

Char.Why, madam?

Cleo.That I might sleep out this great gap of time,My Antony is away.”

Lyte, in his translation of “Dodoens” (1578), p. 438, tells us that “the leaves and fruit be also dangerous, for theycause deadly sleepe, and peevish drowsiness, like opium.” It was sometimes regarded as an emblem of incontinence, as in “2 Henry IV.” (iii. 2): “yet lecherous as a monkey, and the whores called him—mandrake.” A very diminutive figure was, too, often compared to a mandrake. In “2 Henry IV.” (i. 2), Falstaff says: “Thou whoreson mandrake, thou art fitter to be worn in my cap, than to wait at my heels.” Tracing back the history of this plant into far-distant times, it is generally believed that it is the same as that which the ancient Hebrews called Dudain.[528]That these people held it in the highest esteem in the days of Jacob is evident from its having been found by Reuben, who carried the plant to his mother; and the inducement which tempted Leah to part with it proves the value then set upon this celebrated plant. According to a curious superstition, this plant was thought to possess the properties of making childless wives become mothers, and hence, some suppose, Rachel became so desirous of possessing the mandrakes which Reuben had found. Among the many other items of folk-lore associated with the mandrake, there is one which informs us that “it is perpetually watched over by Satan, and if it be pulled up at certain holy times, and with certain invocations, the evil spirit will appear to do the bidding of the practitioner.”[529]In comparatively recent times, quacks and impostors counterfeited with the root briony figures resembling parts of the human body, which were sold to the credulous as endued with specific virtues.[530]The Germans, too, equally superstitious, formed little idols of the roots of the mandrake, which were regularly dressed every day, and consulted as oracles—their repute being such that they were manufactured in great numbers, and sold in cases. They were, also, imported into this country during the time of Henry VIII., it being pretended that they would, with the assistance ofsome mystic words, increase whatever money was placed near them. In order, too, to enhance the value of these so-called miracle-workers, it was said that the roots of this plant were produced from the flesh of criminals which fell from the gibbet, and that it only grew in such a situation.[531]

Marigold.This flower was a great favorite with our old writers, from a curious notion that it always opened or shut its flowers at the sun’s bidding; in allusion to which Perdita remarks, in “Winter’s Tale” (iv. 3):

“The marigold, that goes to bed wi’ the sun,And with him rises weeping.”

It was also said, but erroneously, to turn its flowers to the sun, a quality attributed to the sunflower (Helianthus annuus), and thus described by Moore:

“The sunflower turns on her god when he setsThe same look which she turn’d when he rose.”

A popular name for the marigold was “mary-bud,” mention of which we find in “Cymbeline” (ii. 3):

“winking Mary-buds beginTo ope their golden eyes.”

Medlar.This fruit, which Shakespeare describes as only fit to be eaten when rotten, is applied by Lucio to a woman of loose character, as in “Measure for Measure” (iv. 3): “they would else have married me to the rotten medlar.”

Chaucer, in the “Reeve’s Prologue,” applies the same name to it:

“That ilke fruit is ever lenger the wers,Till it be roten in mullok, or in stre.We olde men, I drede, so faren we,Till we be roten can we not be ripe.”

Mistletoe.This plant, which, from the earliest times, has been an object of interest to naturalists, on account of its curious growth, deriving its subsistence entirely from the branch to which it annexes itself, has been the subject ofwidespread superstition. In “Titus Andronicus” (ii. 3), Tamora describes it in the graphic passage below as the “baleful mistletoe,” an epithet which, as Mr. Douce observes, is extremely appropriate, either conformably to an ancient, but erroneous, opinion, that the berries of the mistletoe were poisonous, or on account of the use made of this plant by the Druids during their detestable human sacrifices.[532]

“Demetrius.How now, dear sovereign, and our gracious mother,Why doth your highness look so pale and wan?Tamora.Have I not reason, think you, to look pale?These two have ’tic’d me hither to this place:—A barren detested vale, you see, it is;The trees, though summer, yet forlorn and lean,O’ercome with moss and baleful mistletoe:Here never shines the sun; here nothing breeds,Unless the nightly owl, or fatal raven.”

“Demetrius.How now, dear sovereign, and our gracious mother,Why doth your highness look so pale and wan?

Tamora.Have I not reason, think you, to look pale?These two have ’tic’d me hither to this place:—A barren detested vale, you see, it is;The trees, though summer, yet forlorn and lean,O’ercome with moss and baleful mistletoe:Here never shines the sun; here nothing breeds,Unless the nightly owl, or fatal raven.”

Mushroom.Besides his notice of the mushroom in the following passages, Shakespeare alludes to the fairy rings[533]which are formed by fungi, though, as Mr. Ellacombe[534]points out, he probably knew little of this. In “The Tempest” (v. 1), Prospero says of the fairies:

“you demi-puppets, thatBy moonshine do the green-sour ringlets make,Whereof the ewe not bites; and you, whose pastimeIs to make midnight mushrooms;”

the allusion in this passage being to the superstition that sheep will not eat the grass that grows on fairy rings.

Mustard.Tewksbury mustard, to which reference is made in “2 Henry IV.” (ii. 4), where Falstaff speaks of “wit as thick as Tewksbury mustard,” was formerly very famous. Shakespeare speaks only of its thickness, but others have celebrated its pungency. Coles, writing in 1657, says: “In Gloucestershire, about Teuxbury, they grind mustard and make it into balls, which are brought to London, and otherremote places, as being the best that the world affords.”

Narcissus.The old legend attached to this flower is mentioned by Emilia in “The Two Noble Kinsmen” (ii. 1):

“That was a fair boy certain, but a fool,To love himself; were there not maids enough?”

Nutmeg.A gilt nutmeg was formerly a common gift at Christmas and on other festive occasions, a notice of which occurs in “Love’s Labour’s Lost” (v. 2), in the following dialogue:[535]

“Armado.‘The armipotent Mars, of lances the almighty,Gave Hector a gift,—’Dumain.A gilt nutmeg.”

“Armado.‘The armipotent Mars, of lances the almighty,Gave Hector a gift,—’

Dumain.A gilt nutmeg.”

Oak.A crown of oak was considered by the Romans worthy of the highest emulation of statesmen and warriors. To him who had saved the life of a Roman soldier was given a crown of oak-leaves; one, indeed, which was accounted more honorable than any other. In “Coriolanus” (ii. 1), Volumnia says: “he comes the third time home with the oaken garland.” And again (i. 3): “To a cruel war I sent him; from whence he returned, his brows bound with oak.” Montesquieu, indeed, said that it was with two or three hundred crowns of oak that Rome conquered the world. Although so much historical and legendary lore have clustered round the oak, yet scarcely any mention is made of this by Shakespeare. The legend of Herne the Hunter, which seems to have been current at Windsor, is several times alluded to, as, for instance, in “Merry Wives of Windsor” (iv. 4):

“Mrs. Page.There is an old tale goes, that Herne the hunter,Sometime a keeper here in Windsor forest,Doth all the winter time, at still midnight,Walk round about an oak, with great ragg’d horns.*****Page.... there want not many, that do fearIn deep of night to walk by this Herne’s oak.”

Herne’s Oak, so long an object of much curiosity and enthusiasm, is now no more. According to one theory, theold tree was blown down August 31, 1863; and a young oak was planted by her Majesty, September 12, 1863, to mark the spot where Herne’s Oak stood.[536]Mr. Halliwell-Phillipps, however, tells us, “the general opinion is that it was accidentally destroyed in the year 1796, through an order of George III. to the bailiff Robinson, that all the unsightly trees in the vicinity of the castle should be removed; an opinion confirmed by a well-established fact, that a person named Grantham, who contracted with the bailiff for the removal of the trees, fell into disgrace with the king for having included the oak in his gatherings.”[537]

Olive.This plant, ever famous from its association with the return of the dove to the ark, has been considered typical of peace. It was as an emblem of peace that a garland of olive was given to Judith when she restored peace to the Israelites by the death of Holofernes (Judith, xv. 13). It was equally honored by Greeks and Romans. It is, too, in this sense that Shakespeare speaks of it when he makes Viola, in “Twelfth Night” (i. 5), say: “I bring no overture of war, no taxation of homage; I hold the olive in my hand, my words are as full of peace as matter.” In Sonnet CVII. occurs the well-known line:[538]

“And peace proclaims olives of endless age.”

Palm.As the symbol of victory, this was carried before the conqueror in triumphal processions. Its classical use is noticed by Shakespeare in “Coriolanus” (v. 3). Volumnia says:[539]

“And bear the palm, for having bravely shedThy wife and children’s blood.”

In “Julius Cæsar” (i. 2), Cassius exclaims:

“Ye gods, it doth amaze me,A man of such a feeble temper shouldSo get the start of the majestic world,And bear the palm alone.”

Pilgrims were formerly called “palmers,” from the staff or bough of palm they were wont to carry. So, in “All’s Well That Ends Well” (iii. 5), Helena asks:

“Where do the palmers lodge, I do beseech you?”

Pear.In his few notices of the pear Shakespeare only mentions two by name, the warden and the poperin: the former was chiefly used for roasting or baking, and is mentioned by the clown in the “Winter’s Tale” (iv. 3):

“I must have saffron, to colour the warden pies.”

Hence Ben Jonson makes a pun upon Church-warden pies. According to some antiquarians, the name warden is from the Anglo-Saxonwearden, to preserve, as it keeps for a long time; but it is more probable that the word had its origin from the horticultural skill of the Cistercian monks of Wardon Abbey, in Bedfordshire, founded in the 12th century. Three warden pears appeared on the armorial bearings of the abbey.[540]It is noticeable that the warden pies of Shakespeare’s day, colored with saffron, have been replaced by stewed pears colored with cochineal.

The poperin pear was probably introduced from Flanders by the antiquary Leland, who was made rector of Popering by Henry VIII. It is alluded to by Mercutio in “Romeo and Juliet” (ii. 1), where he wishes that Romeo were “a poperin pear.” In the old dramas there is much attempt at wit on this pear.

Peas.A practice called “peascod wooing” was formerly a common mode of divination in love affairs. The cook, when shelling green peas, would, if she chanced to find a pod having nine, lay it on the lintel of the kitchen-door, and the first man who entered was supposed to be her futurehusband. Another way of divination by peascod consisted in the lover selecting one growing on the stem, snatching it away quickly, and if the good omen of the peas remaining in the husk were preserved, in then presenting it to the lady of his choice. Touchstone, in “As You Like It” (ii. 4), alludes to this piece of popular suggestion: “I remember the wooing of a peascod[541]instead of her.” Gay, who has carefully chronicled many a custom of his time, says, in his “Fourth Pastoral:”

“As peascods once I pluck’d, I chanc’d to see,One that was closely fill’d with three times three,Which when I cropp’d I safely home convey’d,And o’er my door the spell in secret laid.”

We may quote, as a further illustration, the following stanza from Browne’s “Pastorals” (bk. ii. song 3):

“The peascod greene, oft with no little toyle,He’d seek for in the fattest, fertil’st soile,And rende it from the stalke to bring it to her,And in her bosom for acceptance wooe her.”[542]

Plantain.The leaves of this plant were carefully valued by our forefathers for their supposed efficacy in healing wounds, etc. It was also considered as a preventive of poison; and to this supposed virtue we find an allusion in “Romeo and Juliet” (i. 2):

“Benvolio.Take thou some new infection to thy eye,And the rank poison of the old will die.Romeo.Your plantain leaf is excellent for that.Benvolio.For what, I pray thee?Romeo.For your broken shin.”[543]

“Benvolio.Take thou some new infection to thy eye,And the rank poison of the old will die.

Romeo.Your plantain leaf is excellent for that.

Benvolio.For what, I pray thee?

Romeo.For your broken shin.”[543]

In the “Two Noble Kinsmen” (i. 2) Palamon says:

“These poor slight soresNeed not a plantain.”

Poppy.The plant referred to by Shakespeare in “Othello”(iii. 3) is the opium poppy, well known in his day for its deadly qualities. It is described by Spenser in the “Fairy Queen” (ii. 7, 52) as the “dead-sleeping poppy,” and Drayton (“Nymphidia,” v.) enumerates it among the flowers that procure “deadly sleeping.”

Potato.It is curious enough, says Nares,[544]to find that excellent root, which now forms a regular portion of the daily nutriment of every individual, and is the chief or entire support of multitudes in Ireland, spoken of continually as having some powerful effect upon the human frame, in exciting the desires and passions; yet this is the case in all the writings contemporary with Shakespeare. Thus Falstaff, in “Merry Wives of Windsor” (v. 5), says: “Let the sky rain potatoes; let it thunder to the tune of ‘Green Sleeves,’ hail kissing comfits,” etc. In “Troilus and Cressida” (v. 2), Thersites adds: “How the devil luxury, with his fat rump and potato finger, tickles these together.”[545]It appears, too, that the medical writers of the times countenanced this fancy. Mr. Ellacombe[546]observes that the above passages are of peculiar interest, inasmuch as they contain almost the earliest notice of potatoes after their introduction into England.

Primrose.Although the early primrose has always been such a popular and favorite flower, yet it seems to have been associated with sadness,[547]or even worse than sadness; for, in the following passages, the “primrose paths” and “primrose way” are meant to be suggestive of sinful pleasures. Thus, in “Hamlet” (i. 3), Ophelia says:

“like a puff’d and reckless libertine,Himself the primrose path of dalliance treads,And recks not his own rede.”

And in “Macbeth” (ii. 3), the Porter declares: “I hadthought to have let in some of all professions, that go the primrose way to the everlasting bonfire.” Curious to say, too, Shakespeare’s only epithets for this fair flower are, “pale,” “faint,” “that die unmarried.” Nearly all the poets of that time spoke of it in the same strain, with the exception of Ben Jonson and the two Fletchers.

Reed.Among the uses to which the reed was formerly applied were the thatching of houses and the making of shepherds’ pipes. The former is alluded to in the “Tempest” (v. 1):

“His tears run down his beard, like winter’s dropsFrom eaves of reeds;”

and the latter in “Merchant of Venice” (iii. 4), where Portia speaks of “a reed voice.” It has generally been regarded as the emblem of weakness, as in “Antony and Cleopatra” (ii. 7): “a reed that will do me no service.”

Rose.As might be expected, the rose is the flower most frequently mentioned by Shakespeare, a symbol, in many cases, of all that is fair and lovely. Thus, for instance, in “Hamlet” (iii. 4), Hamlet says:

“Such an act ... takes off the roseFrom the fair forehead of an innocent love,And sets a blister there.”

And Ophelia (iii. 1) describes Hamlet as,

“The expectancy and rose of the fair state.”

In days gone by the rose entered largely into the customs and superstitions of most nations, and even nowadays there is an extensive folk-lore associated with it.

It appears that, in Shakespeare’s time, one of the fashions of the day was the wearing of enormous roses on the shoes, of which full-length portraits afford striking examples.[548]Hamlet (iii. 2) speaks of “two Provincial roses on my razed shoes;” meaning, no doubt, rosettes of ribbon in the shape of roses of Provins or Provence. Douce favors the former, Warton the latter locality. In either case, it was a large rose. TheProvence, or damask rose, was probably the better known. Gerarde, in his “Herbal,” says that the damask rose is called by someRosa Provincialis.[549]Mr. Fairholt[550]quotes, from “Friar Bacon’s Prophecy” (1604), the following, in allusion to this fashion:

Back to Index Next