40 LABIATE 



some for the lungs," while Grerarde said that a garland of the plant worn 

 about the head would "cure giddiness." The leaves of this herb often curve 

 downwards, and are sometimes covered with short hairs. The whole plant 

 is pungent, with a slight flavour of camphor, and its odour, especially when 

 bruised, is very powerful. Parkinson says of this herb : "It used to be put 

 in puddings and such like meates of all sortes, and therefore in divers places 

 they call it Pudding-grasse. The former age of our great-grandfathers had 

 all these hot hearbes in much and familiar use, both for their meates and 

 medicines, and therewith preserved themselves in long life and much health ; 

 but this delicate age of ours, which is not pleased with anything almost, be 

 it meat or medicine, that is not pleasant to the palate, doth wholly refuse 

 these almost, and therefore cannot be partakers of the benefit of them." 



Many writers have believed the Penny-royal to be the Dictamne of the 

 ancients. Virgil told how the deer ate of the plant, and were cured of the 

 wounds inflicted by the huntsmen's arrows, a legend often alluded to by our 

 own poets. Thus Stirling, in his "Aurora," says : 



" And whilst I wander, like the wounded deer. 

 That seeks for Dictamne to i-ecure his scarre." 



4. Thyme {Thymm). 



Wild Thyme {T. serpyU-um). — Flowers in heads or whorled ; stems pros- 

 trate, branched, hairy ; leaves flat, egg-shaped, blunt, more or less fringed at the 

 base, stalked ; floral leaves similar ; upper lip of the corolla notched ; peren- 

 nial. Those who love to wander over breezy hills, where the sheep are 

 scattered far and wide about the landscape, well know the Wild Thyme. 

 During July and August, many an open, lonely tract of our country is 

 purpled over with its flowers, which are liringing fragrance to wide-spread 

 heath, or grassy moorland, or sunny bank, or chalky sea-cliflf, and forming 

 aromatic cushions on which the rambler may repose to listen to murmuring 

 bees and low whispering airs. Often as we have gone over such hills on 

 some Sabbath morning, summoned by the welcome bell to the House of 

 Prayer, we have, as we looked on the flock, been reminded of the shepherd's 

 boy whom Graham describes as watching his sheep, on the thymy hills of 



Scotland : — 



"Nor yet less pleasing at the Heavenly Throne 

 The Sabbath service of the shepherd boy, 

 In some lone glen where every sound is liiU'd 

 To slumber, save the tinkling of the rill, 

 Or bleat of lamb, or falcon's hovering cry ; 

 Stretch'd on the sward he reads of Jesse's son. 

 Or sheds a tear o'er him to Egypt sold, 

 And wonders why he weeps ; the volume closed. 

 With Thyme-sprig laid between the leaves, he singa 

 The sacred lays, his weekly lesson, conn'd 

 With meikle care, beneath the lowly roof 

 Where humble lore is learnt. 

 Thus reading, hymning, all alone, unseen, 

 The shepherd boy the Sabbath holy keeps." 



So refreshing is the perfume of the Thj'me, that we wonder not that the 

 old Greeks gave to the plant a name expressive of strength or courage, in 

 the belief that it renewed the spirits both of man and animals, though they 



