LESnTEAN SOCIETY OF LONDON. 3 1 



' drugs.' ceased to be necessarily ' banes,' and gradually became 

 ' simples.' Witlt this disappearance of the sinister connotation 

 the once dreaded wizard of immeasurable power developed now 

 into the physician so able as to earn apotheosis, anon into the 

 humble herbalist who wandered from place to place in quest 

 of ' salve and balm and bane.' The ancient satirist could not 

 resist the temptation to remind the fashionable practitioner of 

 his kinship with the vagabond ' culler of simples.' Grateful 

 recognition of man's obligation to his physician was chiefly 

 manifested, then as now, by those in that condition whicli is said 

 to make even Satan contrite. Little in human experience is 

 really new. The whimsical if irreverent dialogue between Hei'cules 

 and ^^isculapius, concocted eighteen centuries ago by rtne who 

 just escaped being a 'maker of mercuries,' breathes the spirit of 

 the controversies of our own generation between combatant and 

 medical officers in our defensive services. 



The social vicissitudes of the honourable ' mystery of medicine ' 

 do not, however, concern us here. What is of interest now is that 

 the natural history of drugs, whicli has played such a part in 

 physic, and has been one of the inspirations to our botanical 

 pursuits, is a bye-prodi;ct of man's early search for articles that, 

 although not always good, may at least be eaten. 



As the search for such edible wildings supplied the impulse 

 that led man ' to grow corn and wine and oil,' so out of early 

 woodcraft and simpling came his care for ' herbs of faith and 

 grace.' Here, again, eVeira tu Tnev/jiaTtKoy. Mystic groves 

 hallowed man's high places, concealed his oracles and sheltered 

 his slirines. Plants of faith typify his beliefs, indicate his 

 kinship, and mark his last resting-place. The fate of Clytia ; 

 the recompense of Philemon and his spouse ; later still, Slavonic 

 appreciation of Teuton f rightfulness, illustrate the supernatural 

 side of this interest. On the natural side the attitude of modern 

 medical practice towards many old remedies bespeaks a faith 

 without foundation; the pages of the Pharm;icopoeia recoi'd cases 

 of faith sustained. 



This natural faith has stimulated nuin to acclin)atize. Prom 

 earlv times his garths gave harbourage to simples and sweet- 

 savoured herbs. In classic days his enclosures held all the 

 ancients knew that could be made to thrive. Renaissance 

 pleasaunces found space for other stocks from beyond what had 

 been the Roman pale. These plants of yesterday now welcome to 

 our lawns and borders a countless kindred from lands more 

 distant still. This 'wage of outland travel' includes denizens of 

 every temperate clime from Chile to Cathay. The care of these 

 iBsthetic essences affords ample scope for man's skill in garden- 

 craft and for the philosophical study of the form, nature and 

 distribution of plants of grace. As the philosophical student 

 knows, the literary interest thereby evoked often illustrates the 

 truth of the adage that those who wish to get new ideas should 



