Dyer’s Weed is like a very large upright plant of Mignonette, to which sweet exotic it is nearly related, both being members of the reseda family. The Reseda odorata, or Mignonette, is a native of Egypt, and was introduced into England in 1752. The word reseda is from resedo, to calm, to appease. The plants were thought useful applications to external bruises, to ease pain. There are two species growing wild in England. Reseda lutea, or Base-rocket, likes a chalky soil, but R. luteola, the Dyer’s Weed, is often found on waste ground everywhere. It is much used by dyers, particularly in France. It affords a most beautiful yellow dye, for cotton, woollen, mohair, silk, and linen. Blue cloths dipped in a decoction of it become green. The entire plant, when about to flower, is pulled up, and employed both fresh and dried. Like the Coltsfoot, this plant is among the first which spring from the rubbish thrown out of coal-pits. Linnæus observed, that the nodding spike of flowers always follows the sun, even on a cloudy day, pointing eastward in a morning, southward at noon, westward in the afternoon, and northward at night. If this be true, it may supplant the sunflower in the favour of sentimental florists, for the inconstancy of that has long been proved. Good old Gerarde, who evidently did his best to believe all things, says, that he has seen four sunflowers on one stem, pointing to the four cardinal points. I am wandering from my subject, but must remind you of some sweet lines by that poet of nature—Clare, where he groups the sunflower so nicely; and you may look at that cottage, where the children are playing, and see the picture nearly realized:
The Nasturtion is a native of Europe and the East. The flowers are of a very brilliant golden yellow, and present a beautiful appearance. The plant is said to emit flashes of light in the morning before sunrise, and also at twilight. Its pure, glowing hue recalls that ardent feeling, so clear of self, which leads men to lay down their lives and fortunes for their country’s safety and glory.
According to the belief of the ancients, Truth was the mother of Virtue, the daughter of Time, and queen of the world. It is a frequent saying, that Truth lies at the bottom of a well, and that she always mingles some bitterness with her sweet blessings; and we have chosen for her emblem a plant which, like her, delights in the shade, and is evergreen. The Nightshade is the only plant in England which loses and reproduces its leaves twice a year.
Thomas Miller thus speaks of the “bonny Broom,” in his Romance of Nature:—
Beautiful art thou, O Broom! waving in all thy rich array of green and gold, on the breezy bosom of the bee-haunted heath. The sleeping sunshine, and the silver-footed showers, the clouds that for ever play about the face of Heaven, the homeless winds, and the crystal-globed dews, that settle upon thy blossoms like sleep on the veined eyelids of an infant, are ever beating above and around thee, as if to tell that they rejoice in thy companionship, and that, although a thousand years have strided by with silent steps, time hath not abated an atom of their love. Who can tell the thoughts of Saxon Alfred when, wandering alone, crownless and sceptreless, he stretched himself on the lonely moor beneath the shadow of thy golden blossoms, sighing for the fair queen he had left far behind? When he bowed his kingly head, and, musing on thy beauty, buried in a solitary wild, thought how even regal dignity would be enhanced by humility, and that, although thou didst grow there unmarked and unpruned, not a more princely flower waved in his own English garden.
This plant is an appropriate emblem of superstition; for it has always been regarded with reverence by the peasantry of Europe, on account of its real and supposed virtues. It was supposed to possess the power of defending persons from phantoms and spectres, and driving away all evil spirits. Its large, yellow flower grows close to the earth, and resembles a small wheel of fireworks.
Vervain was employed by the ancients in various kinds of divinations. They ascribed to it a thousand properties, and, among others, that of reconciling enemies. Whenever the Romans sent their heralds to offer peace or war to nations, one of them always carried a sprig of Vervain. The Druids, both in Gaul and Britain, regarded the Vervain with the same veneration as the misletoe, and offered sacrifices to the earth before they cut this plant in spring, which was a ceremony of great pomp. Though the Druids and their religion have passed away, the Vervain is still the plant of spells and enchantment. In the northern provinces of France, the shepherds gather it with ceremonies and words known only to themselves, and express its juices under certain phases of the moon. They insist that this plant enables them to cure their ailments, and to cast a spell on their daughters and cattle, by which they can make them conform to their wishes.
Ceres, the goddess of Corn and harvest, was represented with a garland of ears of Corn on her head. The commemoration of the loss of her daughter Proserpine, was celebrated about the beginning of harvest; that of her search after her, at the time of sowing Corn. A whole straw has been made the emblem of union; and a broken straw, of rupture. The custom of breaking a straw, to express the rupture of a contract, may be traced back to an early period of French history, and may be said to have had a royal origin. When Charles the Simple, of France, was abandoned by his principal lords, they broke a straw to express that they would no longer acknowledge him as their king. Corn may be regarded as an appropriate emblem of wealth; since, wherever it grows, it leads us to infer plenty and comfort.