i86 THE STORY OF PLANT LIFE 



" A gerlond hadde he sette upon his heed, 

 As gret as it were for an ale-stake." 



Ground Ivy is bitter and aromatic. It was 

 formerly used in beer to flavour it, and has also been 

 dried and used to make tea. The name Gill is from 

 the French guiller, to ferment. With the Groundsel 

 and Plantain the plant was used for ulcers of the eye, 

 and to remove the white specks in horses' eyes. 



Nepeta hederacea.— 7^1 Fig. 52 note the social 

 habit, the downy stem, rouftded, kidney -shaped leaves, 

 and scalloped margin, the whorls of leaves. 



Ground Pine or Yellow Bugle (Ajuga 

 ChamcBpitys). 



Pliny states that his name Ajuga, adopted by 

 Linnaeus, is a correction from ambiga, a Latin name 

 for a plant used in medicine (from abigo, expel). 

 The second Latin name means Ground Pine, in 

 allusion to the needle -like leaves and general 

 appearance like a branch of the Pine (Pinus). 



Rare in England, the Ground Pine, which is con- 

 sidered by Watson to be a colonist, is found only in 

 a few counties in the south-east and east of England, 

 such as Hants, Kent, Surrey, Essex, Herts, Bedford, 

 and Cambridge, or in the region of the chalk 

 escarpment. 



Chalky fields, dry places, cultivated stony fields, 

 waste places are the habitat of this plant. Some- 

 times, as in the case of other chalk plants, it grows 



