CENTAURY. 207 



taught mankind tlic use of plants and medicinal 

 herbs. It is also related that he cured a wound, 

 which was inflicted by a poisoned arrow of Her- 

 cules', by the aid of one of the species of these 

 plants, from which circumstance it was called Cen- 

 taury. 



Ancient fable informs us, that the Bluebottle of 

 our corn-fields was called Cyanus, after a youth so 

 named, who was so devoted to corn-flowers, that 

 his chief employment was that of making garlands 

 of them : and he seldom left the fields so long as 

 his favourite flower was to be found, always dress- 

 ino^ himself in the same fine blue colour of the 

 flower he so much admired. Flora was his god- 

 dess, and of all her gifts this was the one he most 

 admired. At length, he was found dead in a corn- 

 field, surrounded with the Bluebottles he had ga- 

 thered ; soon after ^^■hich Flora changed his body 

 into this flower, out of gratitude for the veneration 

 he had for her divinity. 



The Bluebottle, Centaurea Cyanus, has been 

 taken from the fields to the garden, where the art 

 of the florist has multiplied its florets, and varied 

 its colour so much, that it is now become one of the 

 summer favourites of the parterre, flowering from 

 the middle of June to the end of September. In 

 its natural wild state the flowers are of a fine ultra- 

 marine blue, and hence it was, we presume, ori- 



