20 

44. TARRAGON (Artemisia Dracunculus) imparts a characteristic 
flavor to salads, fines herbes, and to tarragon vinegar. The brand 
de Maille is the most famous, for its fine bouquet. It is made cor- 
rectly by steeping fresh young tops and leaves of tarragon in white 
wine vinegar, for three weeks, then straining off the vinegar into 
small bottles. Tarragon loses its value when dried, therefore it is 
only used fresh, or it can be bottled in vinegar and the pickled leaves 
used when needed. 
Cuttings of tarragon may be taken in the spring, or the old 
plants divided and reset then. True tarragon does not set seed. 
Some say it does not tolerate other varieties of plants in the same 
bed! 
45. Tansy (Tanacetum vulgare) has been said to have its name 
from Athanasia (ammortality).t It was and is used to flavor pud- 
dings in Lent. A delicious modern counterpart of Samuel Pepys’s 
tansy for [aster, is a vanilla soufflé colored a pale green with 
vegetable coloring, with a teaspoonful of finely chopped young 
tansy leaves added to the four-egg mixture before the well-beaten 
whites are folded in. Served with thick cream and powdered maple 
sugar, it may reconcile us to sugarless sweets and dispel the humors 
of winter agreeably. It is repellent to flies. It may be dried for 
winter tea, for rheumatism. 
Tansy grows luxuriantly, to 3 or 4 feet, in any soil not too light 
and may be grown from seed or root division. It self-sows and if 
not given a fence-post or a corner to support it, throws its length 
to the ground. Tanacetum crispum is shorter and more compact 
in growth, more finely ferny as to leaf, and therefore more desirable. 
46. TuymMe (Thymus vulgaris) has a reputation for imparting 
1“Tanacetum; possibly from Greek, athanatos, immortal, in allusion to 
he long-lived flowers.” (Johnson and Maeself, Plant names simplified. 
London, 1931.) “Vanacetuim, Pliny. Formerly called also G[reek] Atha- 
nasia, immortality. Tanacetum is according to Linnaeus an altered sb 
oO thanasia, but it seems a rather far-fetched eee (Alc 
Randal H., Botanical names of English readers. Lond 70.) ie 
French athanasie, now contracted to tanacée and one ... LTanacetiun, 
its systematic name, is properly a bed of tansy, and is a word of modern 
origin.” (Prior, R.C. A., On the popular names of British plants, being 
an explanation of the ortgin and meaning of the names of our indigenous 
Ed.) 
~ 
and qnost commonly cultivated species. London, 1870.) 
