The Book of Herbs

Bergamot (Monarda fistulosa).

It is extraordinary how little comment has been made on the handsome red flowers and fragrant leaves of Red Bergamot, or Bee-Balm—a name which Robinson gives it. Growing in masses, it makes a lovely bit of colour, and a very sweet border. Bergamot was a favourite flower in the posies that country people used to take to church, as Mrs Ewing observes in her story “Daddy Darwin’s Dove Cot.” The youthful heroine loses her posy of “Old Man and Marygolds” on the way to Sunday school, and is discovered looking for it by an equally youthful admirer. He at once offers to get her some more Old Man. “But Phœbe drew nearer. She stroked down her frock, and spoke mincingly but confidentially. ‘My mother says Daddy Darwin has red bergamot i’ his garden. We’ve none i’ ours. My mother always says there’s nothing like red bergamot to take to church. She says it’s a deal more refreshing than Old Men, and not so common.” A note gives the information that the particular kind of Bergamot meant here was the Twinflower Monarda Didyma. There are several varieties of Monarda.

The only superstition that I have ever heard in any way connected with the plant is, that in Dorsetshire it is thought unlucky, and that if it be kept in a house an illness will be the consequence.

Costmary (Tanacetum Balsamita).

Costmary or Alecost, and Maudeline (Balsamita Vulgaris), have so close a semblance that they may be taken together. The German name for Costmary, Frauen münze, supports the natural idea that it was dedicated to the Virgin, but Dr Prior says that the Latin name used to be Costus amarus, not Costus Marie, and that it was really appropriated to St Mary Magdaleine, as its English name Maudeline declares. Both plants were much used to make “sweete washing water; the flowers are tyed up with small bundles of lavender toppes; these they put in the middle of them, to lye upon the toppes of beds, presses, etc., for the sweet sent and savour it casteth.”[72] They were also used for strewing. In France Costmary is sometimes used in salads, and it was formerly put into beer and negus; “hence the name Alecost.”

Germander (Teucrium Chamœdrys).

Germander was grown as a border to garden “knots,” “though being more used as a strewing herbe for the house than for any other use.”[73] Culpepper says it is “a most prevalent herb of Mercury, and strengthens the brain and apprehension exceedingly;” and Tusser includes it amongst his “strewing herbs”; from which statements it may be gathered that the scent was pungent but agreeable. It is more often mentioned by old herbalists as “bordering knots” than in any other capacity, in spite of Parkinson’s remark, and now is very seldom seen at all. It may, very rarely, be found growing wild. Harrison, when he is declaiming against the over-praising of foreigners, says: “Our common Germander, or thistle benet, is found and knowne to bee so wholesome and of so great power in medicine as any other hearbe,” but it is not clear whether he really means Germander, or is not rather thinking of Carduus Benedictus.

Gilliflower (Dianthus Caryophyllus).

Gillyflowers are, of course, now excluded from the herb-border, but once housewives infused them in vinegar to make it aromatic, and candied them for conserves, and numbered them among their herbs, though that is not the reason that they are mentioned here. They have their place, because the general ideas about them are too pretty to leave out. First, they were the token of gentleness, as Robinson’s lover asserts most touchingly, and Drayton confirms in his line,

Then Gillyflowers (says Folkard) were represented in some old songs to be one of the flowers that grow in Paradise. He quotes from a ballad called “Dead Men’s Songs.” This verse:

There have been great discussions as to what flower was the original “Gillyflower” spoken of by early writers. Folkard says it was “apparently a kind of pet-name to all manner of plants.” Parkinson seems to have called Carnations, Clove-Gillyflowers, and Stocks, the Stock-Gillyflowers, and Wall-flowers, Wall-Gillyflowers. It is generally thought that the earlier writers called the Dianthus by this name, and later ones, the Cheiranthus cheiri, or Matthiola. Some of the names for them show how sadly imagination has waned since the seventeenth century. Think of a new flower being called “Ruffling Robin” or “The lustie Gallant,” or “Master Tuggie’s Princess,” or “Mister Bradshaw, his dainty Lady.” Even “the Sad Pageant” has romance about it, but we can match that by a name for Hesperides which, I believe, still survives, “The Melancholy Gentleman.” Culpepper calls Gillyflowers, “gallant, fine and temperate,” but says, “It is vain to describe a herb so well known.” So there we will leave them.

Lavender (Lavandula vera).

Lavender is one of the few herbs that has always been in great repute and allusions to it are legion. From the custom of laying it among linen, or other carefully stored goods, a proverb has arisen—Timbs quotes from Earle’s Microcosm: “He takes on against the Pope without mercy and has a jest still in Lavender for Bellarmine.” Walton’s Coridon mentions that “the sheets” smell of lavender in a literal sense, and Parkinson says that it is much put among “apparell.” Oil of Lavender is still to be found in the British Pharmacopœia, and some of the old writers utter serious warnings against “divers rash and overbold Apothecaries and other foolish women,” who gave indiscriminately the distilled water, or composition that is made of distilled wine in which flower seeds have been steeped. Turner suggests using it in a curious manner. “I judge that the flowers of Lavander quilted in a cappe and dayly worne are good for all diseases of the head that come of a cold cause and that they comfort the braine very well.” Dr Fernie says it is of real use in a case of nervous headache. Lavender used to be called Lavender Spike or Spike alone, and French Lavender (L. Stæchas) Stickadove or Cassidony, sometimes turned by country people into Cast-me-down. La petite Corbeille tells us that the juice of Lavender is a specific in cases of loss of speech and adds drily, “une telle propriété suffirait pour rendre cette plante à jamais precieuse.” In Spain and Portugal it is used to strew churches and it is burned in bonfires on St John’s Day, the day when all evil spirits are abroad. In some countries it must still possess wonderful qualities! Tuscan peasants believe that it will prevent the Evil Eye from hurting children.

The pretty delicately-scented spikes of White Lavender are less well known than they should be, but like many other herbs they received more admiration in former days as has been already said, at the close of the sixteenth century, a literary guild was called after it. In the Parliamentary Survey (November 1649) of the Manor of Wimbledon, “Late parcel of the possessions of Henrietta Maria, the relict and late Queen of Charles Stuart, late King of England”—an exact inventory is made of the house and grounds (in which forty-four perches of land, called the Hartichoke Garden is named), and among other things, “very great and large borders of Rosemary, Rue and White Lavender and great varietie of excellent herbs” are noticed.

Lavender Cotton (Santolina).

Lavender Cotton is a little grey plant with “very finely cut leaves, clustered buttons of a golden colour and of a sweet smell and is often used in garlands and in decking up of gardens and houses.” The French called it Petit Cyprez and Guarde Robe, from which it may be inferred that it was one of the herbs laid in chests among furs and robes. Tusser counts it among his “strewing herbes,” and it is now chiefly used as an edging to beds or borders.

Meadow-Sweet (Spiræa Ulmaria).

Queen of the Meadow and Bridewort are two of this flower’s most appropriate names and a very pretty one is that which Gerarde tells us the Dutch give it, Reinette. The Herbalists do not say much about the “Little Queen,” but what they do say, is in the highest degree complimentary. Gerarde decides: “The leaves and flowers excel all other strong herbes for to deck up houses, to strew in chambers, hall and banquetting houses in the summer time; for the smell thereof makes the heart merrie, delighteth the senses, neither doth it cause headache” as some other sweet smelling herbes do. Parkinson, who says it “has a pretty, sharp sent and taste,” praises it for the same purpose and adds the interesting bit of gossip that “Queen Elizabeth of famous memory, did more desire it than any other sweet herbe to strew her chambers withal. A leafe or two hereof layd in a cup of wine, will give as quick and fine a rellish therto as Burnet will,” he finishes practically. Turner says that women, in the spring-time, “put it into the potages and mooses.” I have known it used medicinally by a Herbalist, and can strongly recommend it as an ingredient for pôt pourri. The scent is so sweet and clinging that it is surprising that meadow-sweet is not oftener in request when dried and scented flowers are wanted. The Icelander says that if taken on St John’s Day and thrown into water, it will help to reveal a thief, for if the culprit be a man, it will sink, if a woman, it will float.

Rosemary (Rosmarinus officinalis).

Rosemary has always been of more importance than any other herb, and more than most of them put together. It has been employed at weddings and funerals, for decking the church and for garnishing the banquet hall, in stage-plays, and in “swelling discontent,” of a too great reality; as incense in religious ceremonies, and in spells against magic; “in sickness and in health”; eminently as a symbol, and yet for very practical uses. It is quite an afterthought to regard it as a plant. In “Popular Antiquities,” Brand gives such an admirable account of it that one would like to quote in full, but must bear in mind the warning, quoted from “Eachard’s Observations,” in those pages: “I cannot forget him, who having at some time or other been suddenly cur’d of a little head-ache with a Rosemary posset, would scarce drink out of anything but Rosemary cans, cut his meat with a Rosemary knife.... Nay, sir, he was so strangely taken up with the excellencies of Rosemary, that he would needs have the Bible cleared of all other herbs and only Rosemary to be inserted.” At weddings it was often gilded or dipped in scented waters, or tied “about with silken ribbands of all colours.” Sometimes for want of it Broom was used. Mr Friend quotes an account of a sixteenth century “rustic bridal” at which “every wight with hiz blu buckeram bridelace upon a branch of green broom—because Rosemary iz skant thear—tyed on hiz leaft arm.” A wedding sermon by Robert Hacket (1607) is also quoted: “Rosemary... which by name, nature, and continued use, man challengeth as properly belonging to himselfe. It overtoppeth all the flowers in the garden, boasting man’s rule. Another property of the Rosemary is, it affecteth the hart. Let this Rosmarinus, this flower of men, ensigne of your wisdom, love and loyaltie, be carried not only in your hands, but in your heads and harts.” Ben Jonson says it was the custom for bridesmaids to present the bridegroom with “a bunch of Rosemary, bound with ribands,” on his first appearance on his wedding morn. Together with an orange stuck with cloves, it often served as a little New Year’s gift; and the same author mentions this in his Christmas Masque. The masque opens by showing half the players unready, and clamouring for missing properties; and Gambol, one of them, says, of New Year’s Gift: “He has an orange and Rosemary, but not a clove to stick in it.” A little later, New Year’s Gift enters, “in a blue coat, serving-man-like, with an orange and a sprig of Rosemary, gilt, on his head.” Wassel comes too, “like a neat sempster and songster, her page bearing a brown bowl drest with ribands and Rosemary before her.”

For less festive occasions it had other meanings: “As for Rosmarine, I lett it runne all over my garden walls, not onlie because my bees love it, but because it is the herb sacred to remembrance, and therefore to friendship; whence a sprig of it hath a dumb language that maketh it the chosen emblem of our funeral wakes and in our buriall grounds.” Sir Thomas More thought this, but others beside him “lett Rosmarine run all over garden walls,” though perhaps they had less sentiment about it; Hentzner (Travels) (1598) says that it was a custom “exceedingly common in England.” At Hampton Court, Rosemary was “so planted and nailed to the walls as to cover them entirely.”[74] The bushes were sometimes set “by women for their pleasure,[75] to grow in sundry proportions, as in the fashion of a cart, a peacock or such things as they fancy,” or the branches were twined amongst others to make an arbour. Brown refers to this:—

Rosemary was one of the chief funeral herbs. Herrick says:—

Sprigs of it were distributed to the mourners before they left the house, which they carried to the churchyard and threw on the coffin when it had been lowered into the grave. In Romeo and Juliet Friar Laurence says:—

Brand quotes passages from Gay, Dekker, Cartwright, Shirley, Misson, Coles, “The British Apollo” and “The Wit’s Interpreter,” which connect Rosemary with burials; and it was also planted on graves.

Coles says it was used with other evergreens to decorate churches at Christmas-time, and Folkard that, “In place of more costly incense, the ancients often employed Rosemary in their religious ceremonies. An old French name for it was Incensier. It was conspicuous on a very remarkable occasion in history. In “A Perfect Journall, etc., of that memorable Parliament begun at Westminster, Nov. 3, 1640,” is the following passage, “Nov. 28. That afternoon Master Prin and Master Burton came in to London, being met and accompanied with many thousands of horse and foot, and rode with rosemary and bayes in their hands and hats; which is generally esteemed the greatest affront that ever was given to the courts of justice in England.” The “affront” lay in the general rejoicing that attended this overthrowing of the sentence passed by the Star Chamber, and the causes which led to this enthusiasm were these: “Some years before,” Prynne, Burton, and Bastwick had written against the Government and the Bishops, and for this offence had been sentenced to pay a fine of £5000 each, to have their ears cut off, to stand in the pillory and to be imprisoned for life. “All of which,” says Clarendon, “was executed with rigour and severity enough.” “After being first imprisoned in England, Mr Pyrnne was sent to a castle in the island of Jersey, Dr Bastwick to Scilly, and Mr Burton to Guernsey.” Bastwick’s wife seized the first moment that the Commons were assembled (in Nov. 1640) to present a petition, with the result that on the fourth day after Parliament met, orders for their release were sent to the Governors of the respective castles. Clarendon, who, of course, had no sympathy, but much dislike for them, admits: “When they came near London, multitudes of people of several conditions, some on horseback, others on foot, met them some miles from the town; very many having been a day’s journey; and they were brought about two of the clocke in the afternoon in at Charing Cross, and carried into the city by above ten thousand persons with boughs and flowers in their hands, the common people strewing flowers and herbs in the ways as they passed, making great noise and expressions of joy for their deliverance and return; and in those acclamations, mingling loud and virulent exclamations against the bishops, “who had so cruelly persecuted such godly men.” An appendix,[76] devoted to this incident, further describes their entry, “The two branded persons riding first, side by side, with branches of rosemary in their hands, and two or three hundred horse closely following them, and multitudes of foot on either side of them, walking by them, every man on horseback or on foot having bays or rosemary in their hats or hands, and the people on either side of the street strewing the way as they passed with herbs, and such other greens as the season afforded, and expressing great joy for their return.” This splendid reception must have revealed very plainly to the Government the mind and temper of the people. Nowadays the exuberance of the mob in greeting popular heroes is much what it seems to have been then, only they do not generally express it in such a pretty way as strewing rosemary and bays.

Culpepper writes that Rosemary was used “not only for physical but civil purposes,” and among other uses, was placed in the dock of courts of justice. The reason for this was that among its many reputed medicinal virtues, “it was accounted singular good to expel the contagion of the pestilence from which poor prisoners too often suffered. It was also especially good to comfort the hearte and to helpe a weake memory,” and was generally highly thought of. Rosemary is still retained in the pharmacopœia and is popularly much valued as a stimulant to making hair grow. L’eau de la reine d’Hongrie, rosemary tops in proof spirit, was once famous as a restorative and is mentioned in Perrault’s fairy story of “The Sleeping Beauty.” After the princess pricks her hand with the spindle and falls into the fatal sleep, among the means taken to bring back consciousness, “en lui frotte les tempes avec de l’eau de la reine d’Hongrie; mais rien ne lui faisait revenir.” Rosemary is also an ingredient in Eau de Cologne. Its efficacy in magic is mentioned in another chapter. In the countries where it grows to a “very great height”[77] and the stem is “cloven out into thin boards, it hath served to make lutes, or such like instruments, and here with us carpenter’s rules, and to divers other purposes.”

Rue (Ruta graveolens).

“Ruth was the English name for sorrow and remorse, and to rue was to be sorry for anything or to have pity, ... and so it was a natural thing to say that a plant which was so bitter and had always borne the name Rue or Ruth must be connected with repentance. It was therefore the Herb of Repentance, and this was soon transformed into the Herb of Grace.”[78] Canon Ellacombe’s explanation makes clear why rue was often alluded to symbolically, especially by Shakespeare, to whom the thought of repentance leading to grace seems to have been an accustomed one. It has been often stated the actual origin of the name was the fact that rue was used to make “the aspergillum, or holy-water brush, in the ceremony known as the asperges, which usually precedes the Sunday celebration of High Mass; but for this supposition there is no ground.”[79] Rue was supposed to be a powerful defence against witches, and was used in many spells, and Mr Friend describes a “magic wreath” in which it is used by girls for divination. The wreath is made up of Rue, Willow and Crane’s-bill. “Walking backwards to a tree they throw the wreath over their heads, until it catches on the branches and is held fast. Each time they fail to fix the wreath means another year of single blessedness.” In the Tyrol, a bunch of Rue, Broom, Maidenhair, Agrimony and Ground Ivy will enable the wearer to see witches. Lupton adds a tribute to its powers of magic: “That[80] Pigeons be not hunted nor killed of Cats at the windowes, or at every passage and at every Pigeon’s hole, hang or put little Branches of Rew, for Rew hath a marvellous strength against wilde Beasts. As Didymus doth say.” Milton refers to a belief, very widely spread, that Rue was specially good for the eyes, when he says:

that Adam’s eyes should be made clear. (Euphrasie is Eyebright.) Rue was also an antidote to poison, and preserved people from contagion, particularly that of the plague, and was thought to be of great virtue for many disorders. “Some doe rippe up a beade-rowle of the vertues of Rue, as Macer the poet and others” who apparently declared it to be good for almost every ill. Mr Britten remarks: “It was long, and probably still is the custom to strew the dock of the Central Criminal Court at the Old Bailey with Rue. It arose in 1750, when the contagious disease known as jail fever, raged in Newgate to a great extent. It may be remembered that during the trial of the Mannings (1849), the unhappy woman, after one of the speeches of the opposing counsel, gathered up some of the sprigs of Rue which lay before her, and threw them at his head.”

Turner recommends Rue “made hott in the pyll of a pomegranate” for the “ake of the eares.”

Southernwood (Artemisa Abrotanum).

Southernwood has many sobriquets, among which are Lads or Boy’s Love, Old Man, and Maiden’s Ruin; the last a corruption of Armoise du Rône, Mr Friend says. The French have contracted the same title to Auronne and also call the plant Bois de St Jean and Citronelle. Dutch people used to call it Averonne (another form of the French contraction) and the Germans, Stab-wurtz. The name Bois de St Jean is given it, because in some parts of France it is one of the plants dedicated to St John the Baptist, and the German title came from their faith in it as a “singular wound-hearb.” Turner considered that the fumes of it being burned, would drive away serpents, and credits it with many valuable properties, chiefly medicinal; and Culpepper calls it “a gallant, mercurial plant, worthy of more esteem than it hath.” It has also been supposed to have great virtue to prevent the hair falling out. In later days Hogg has declared it to have an agreeable, exhilarating smell,” and to be “eminently diaphoretic.” But Thornton, who loves to shatter all favourite herbal notions, remarks that these good results are chiefly because it “operates on the mind of the patient,” and that as a fomentation it is hardly more useful “than cloths wrung out of hot water.” So transitory is good report!

Wood-ruff (Asperula Odorata).

The wood-ruff or wood-rowell has its leaves “set about like a star, or the rowell of a spurre,” whereby it gains its name. English people also called it Wood-rose and Sweet-Grass; the French, Hépatique étoilée, and the Germans, Waldmeister and Herzfreude, and they steep it in “Bohle,” a kind of “cup” made of light wine.

In England it used to be “made up into garlands or bundles and hanged up in houses in the heate of summer, doth very wel attemper the aire, coole and make fresh the place, to the delight and comfort of such as are therein.”[81] Wood-ruff was employed to decorate churches, and churchwardens’ accounts still exist (at St Mary-atte-Hill, London) including wood-ruff garlands and lavender in the expenses incurred in keeping St Barnabas’ Day. Johnston says[82]: “The dried leaves are put among linen for their sweet smell, and children put a whorl between the leaves of their books with a like purpose, and many people like to have one neatly dried laid in the case of their watch.” Sensible, as well as pretty customs! It was one of the herbs recommended to “make the hart merrye,” and Tusser puts it among his “stilling herbs,” thus: “Wood-roffe, for sweet waters and cakes.” Country people used to lay it a little bruised to a cut, and its odour of new made hay must have made it a pleasanter remedy than many that they used.

Wormwood (Artemisia Absinthium).

Traditions cluster round Artemisia Absinthium and A. Vulgaris, Mugwort. Canon Ellacombe says that the species are called after Diana, as she was supposed to “find them and delivered their powers and leechdom to Chiron the Centaur... who named these worts from the name of Diana, Artemis;” and he thinks therefore that “Dian’s bud,” spoken of in the Midsummer Night’s Dream was one of them. The plant was of some importance among the Mexicans, and when they kept the festival of Huixtocihuatl, the Goddess of Salt, they began with a great dance of women, who were joined to one another by strings of different flowers, and who wore on their heads garlands of wormwood. This dance continued all night, and on the following morning the dance of the priests began. (Nineteenth Century, Sept. 1879.)

According to the ancients, Wormwood counteracts the effects of poisoning by toadstools, hemlock, and the biting of the shrew mouse or sea-dragon; while Mugwort preserves the wayfarer from fatigue, sun-stroke, wild beasts, the Evil Eye in man, and also from evil spirits! Lupton says that it is “commonly affirmed that, on Midsummer Eve, there is found at the root of Mugwort a coal which keeps safe from the plague, carbuncle, lightning, and the quartan ague, them that bear the same about them; and Mizaldus, the writer hereof, saith that it is to be found the same day under the Plantain, which is especially and chiefly to be found at noon.”[83] Later writers have unkindly insisted that these wonderful “coals” were no more nor less than old dead roots! Gerarde and Parkinson are both dignified and contemptuous over these stories. Gerarde says, “Many other fantasticall devices invented by poets are to be seen in the works of ancient writers. I do of purpose omit them, as things unworthy of my recording or your reviewing.” Parkinson is still more severe on “idle superstitions and irreligious relations,” and abuses this special “idle conceit,” which Gerarde has not deigned to repeat. It is told even by “Bauhinus, who glorieth to be an eye-witnesse of this foppery. But oh! the weake and fraile nature of man! Which I cannot but lament.” Turner devotes a great deal of space to the disputes of writers as to the identity of the “true Ponticke Wormwood,” and says that “he himselfe is certainly accurate on the point, having been taught it by Gerhardas de Wyck, at that tyme the Emperour’s secretary” at Cologne. “This noble Clerk was afterwards sent by Charles the fyft, Embassator to the great Turke.”

It is from wormwood that Absinthe is made; and it has been used instead of hops in making beer. It used to be laid among stuffs and furs to keep away moths and insects—by its bitterness, ordinary folk supposed, but Culpepper knew better, and gives an astrological reason: “I was once in the tower and viewed the wardrobe and there was a great many fine cloaths (I can give them no other title, for I was never either linen or woolen draper), yet as brave as they looked, my opinion was that the moths might consume them. Moths are under the dominion of Mars; this herb Wormwood (also an herb of Mars) being laid among cloaths will make a moth scorn to meddle with the cloaths as much as a lion scorns to meddle with a mouse, or an eagle with a fly.” One would not expect to find a moth a “martial creature,” but evidently he is, and this explanation of the working of the law of “sympathies,” not only tells us so, but kindly shows us a sure means of safeguarding our goods from an ubiquitous enemy.

Mugwort has many reputed medical virtues, and Dr Thornton who usually crushes any pretension to such claims, says it “merits the attention of English physicians, in regard to gout.” It is with this plant that the Japanese prepare the Moxa that they use as a cautery to a great extent.

Mugwort is said to be a good food for poultry and turkeys. De Gubernatis tells a Russian legend about this plant which they call Bech. Once the Evil One offended his brother, the Cossack Sabba, who seized and bound him, and said he should not be released till he had done him some great service. Presently, some Poles came close by and made a feast, and were happy, leaving their horses to graze. The Cossack Sabba coveted the horses and promised the Evil One his liberty if he could manage to get them. The Evil One then sent other demons to the field and caused Mugwort to spring up, whereupon the horses trotted away, and as they did so, the Mugwort moaned “bech, bech.” And now when a horse treads on it, the plant remembers the Pole’s horses and still moans “bech, bech!” for which reason, in the Ukraine it is still called by that name. It is left untold whether the flight of the horses was due to the magical nature of the plants, or to their usual bitterness. The latter is likely enough, as according to Dr Thornton, horses and goats are not fond of it, and cows and swine refuse it.

Other well-known varieties of Wormwood are H. pontica, Roman wormwood whose leaves are less bitter; and A. Maritima, sea-wormwood, and A. Santonica, Tartarian wormwood.