was called butchers' prickwood. Myrica gale,
yielding from its fruits a wax of which candles
are made, is called candleberry. Juncus acutus,
the pith of which is used for rushlights, is named
candlerush. Childing cudweed and childing
pink, are parturient plants. Clown's all-heal
(Stachys palustris) cures wounds; and clown's
lungwort (Lathnea squamaria) is used in
pulmonary diseases. Knit-back (Symphytum
officinale), from the Latin confirma comfrey, is
supposed to be strengthening. Of cord-grass
(Spartina stricta) ropes are made. Corn-hone-wort
cures the hone, or boil in the cheek. Tussilago
farfara is called coughwort. Salicornia herbacea
is called crabgrass, because it is said the
crabs eat it. Cress (Lepidium) is a word which
Mr. Wedgewood derives from the French,
crisser, to grind the teeth, the name coming
from the crunching sound in eating them.
Triticum caninum is called dog-grass, being the
grass eaten by dogs. Duckweed (Lemna minor)
is eaten by ducks. Atropa belladonna, being
administered as a sleeping draught, is called
trance, or dwale berry. Genista tinctoria is
called dyer's green, being the herb which tinges
green, the celebrated Lincoln green of the Robin
Hood ballads. Reseda luteola, used to dye
woollen stuffs yellow, was called dyers' rocket.
Earthnut (Bunium flexuosum) is an esculent
tuber. Elder means kindler, being used to blow
up a fire. Eringo was said by the herbalists to
be a specific against eryngion, or hickup. The
bitter sweet being used in curing whitlows, or
felons, is called felonwort. Feverfew is supposed
to be a febrefuge. Fir, the most inflammable of
woods, is the fire-tree. Saponaria officinalis,
taking the stains out of cloth, is called fullers'
herb. Lycopus Europæus is called gipsy-wort,
"because," says Lyte, "the rogues and runagates
which call themselves Egyptians do colour
themselves black with this herbe." Grass, from
the Sanscrit gras, to devour, means the herb
which yields the grain, and which is eaten.
Veronica officinale, having the repute of curing
a kind of grind or leprosy, is called groundheale.
Carex paniculata, a large sedge, having been
used in matting footstools, the plant has been
called hassocks. The hazel staff was the symbol
of the authority of the master who "holds in
hand a hazel staff," and the hazel rod of the
diviner's mystery; hæs being Anglo-Saxon for a
behest, and the verb hælsian, signifying to
foretel. As the word fir with fire, heath seems to
be related to heat. Every Highlander knows
the warmth of the heather. Honeysuckle is a
name now given in books to the Lonicera, but
Culpeper, Parkinson, and other herbalists, the
inhabitants of the western counties of England,
and Scottish children, apply it to the meadow
clover, from the flowers of which children suck
sweetness like honey. However dissimilar the
trees may be, Dr. Prior is of opinion that ivy
and yew were, in reality, originally one word.
Fucus nodosus, or knobtang, is called kelpware,
from its supplying kelp. Lavender (Lavandula
spica) is a name derived from lavare, to wash,
the plant being used to scent newly-washed linen.
The lime, linden, or lime-tree, derives its name
from the inner bark, or bast, being used for
cordage; lyne is the name used in the Robin
Hood ballads, where it rhymes with thine:

        Now tell me thy name, good fellow, said he,
        Under the leaves of lyne.

Ling comes from the Anglo-Saxon lig, fire or
fuel. Viburnum lantana, whose branches tie
bundles, is called lithytree. Madder, a red dye
plant (Rubra tinctorum), is a word of a singular
derivation. Mad is the old word for a worm.
The red dye formerly called vermilion was
obtained from an insect said to be a worm, or in
French, a ver, hence as a red dye was called
vermilion in English, a plant yielding a red dye
was called after the old word for a worm, madder.
The maple is called the maser-tree, from masers
or bowls being made of it. Meadow sweet
(Spiræa ulmaria) ought to be called meadwort, or
meadflower, the flowers mixed with the wine of
honey giving it the flavour of the Greek wines.
Milk vetch (Astragalus), it was believed,
increased the milk of the cows which fed on it.
Thalaspi arvense was called Mithradate mustard,
this plant having been an ingredient in the
theriaca, or treacle, invented by Mithradates,
King of Pontus, as an antidote to all poisons.
Vipers, and venomous reptiles, forming part of
the seventy-two ingredients composing it, tales
were popular in the middle ages of sorcerers
eating poisons. More is an old name for an
eatable root such as a parsnip, carrot, or skirret.
Mushroom (Agaricus), in French moucheron, or
mousseron, means fly poison, Agaricus muscarius
having been used to destroy flies. By one of
those changes not uncommon in the history of
words, the name of a poisonous species has come
to mean all this group of plants, and the
wholesome kinds exclusively. Mustard comes from
the Spanish mastuerzo, a nose-twister, from the
sneezing and wry faces it causes. Whitlow
grass being supposed to cure agnail, was called
nailgrass. Nettle and needle are the same word,
the plant supplying the thread, and one of the
products being a net. Down to the seventeenth
century, nettle thread was used in Scotland, and
still later in Friesland, until it was superseded
by flax and hemp. Nightshade, from the Anglo-
Saxon nihtscada, means a soother or anodyne.
Oak egg, aye and eye, are one word, fundamentally.
The acorn is the egg of the oak, there
is a resemblance between an eye and an egg; an
eyeland stands in the sea like an eye, and an egg,
having neither beginning nor ending, is the
symbol of aye. Oat is the grain eaten. Osier
grows where water oozes. Setterwort, or oxheel
(Helleborus fœtidus), is used by farmers in making
setons in the dewlap of cattle. Pea or pease is
the thing brayed in a mortar, in Greek, pison.
Peach or pesh is the Persian apple. Tussilago
petasitis, "a sovereign medicine against the
plague and pestilent fever," is called pestilence