250 LILIACEiE 



shaped and lanceolate, stalked ; bulb slender, compressed. This is the most 

 common of all our species of Garlic. It is somewhat local, but found in 

 abundance in moist woods and hedges in many a rural district. The 

 wanderer in the wood in April, who sees its one or two broad, bright green 

 leaves, may at first glance believe them to be the foliage of the lily of the 

 valley ; but an inadvertent footstep would soon, as it bruised the plant and 

 drew forth its odour, remind him of the presence of Garlic. When the 

 pretty white cluster of blossoms rises on a stalk about half a foot high, from 

 between the two-leaved spathe, Ave are tempted to mingle it with the nosegay 

 of wild flowers; though were we to do so, its offensive scent would quite 

 overpower their sweetness. The plant continues in blossom till about Mid- 

 summer. Our fathers called this herb Ramsies, Ramsons, Bear's Garlic, and 

 Buckrams. The last name is very old, and one of those by which the plant 

 was known to the Anglo-Saxons. It was esteemed in early times so beneficial 

 to health, that one of our oldest proverbs says — 



" Eat Leekes in Lide, and Ramsins in May, 

 And all the year after physitians may play." 



And Aubrey remarks, " The vulgar in the AVest of Englande doe call the 

 month of March, Lide." Gerarde tells us that, in his time, the leaves were 

 "stamped and eaten by divers in the Low Countries with fish, for a sauce, 

 even as we do eate greene sauce with sorrill." He adds, "that many labour- 

 ing men in this country eat them, in April and May, with butter." They 

 are still commonly used in villages, when infused in brandy, as a tonic 

 medicine. 



The plant is believed to be injurious to the vegetation around it. It 

 gives its unpleasant flavour to the milk of cows which eat it ; and a friend 

 residing in Somersetshire informs the author, that this plant proves very 

 troublesome when in the hedges and grass of pasture-lands, rendering it 

 necessary in spring to tether the cows, which, being just turned out, would 

 eat it readily among the grass. He adds that he has known the flesh of 

 calves to be flavoured by this Garlic. Sheep altogether refuse the plant. 



The late Professor Johnston remarks of this plant, "that when distilled 

 in a retort, a heavy volatile oil passes over and collects beneath the water 

 which condenses in the receiver ; and which is the same as that of onion, 

 shallot, etc. This oil is of a brownish-yellow colour, heavier than water, and 

 possesses the peculiar smell of the plants which yield it, but in a highly 

 pungent and concentrated form. It is their strong-smelling principle or 

 ingredient. The strength of its odour may be judged from the fact, that 

 powerfully smelling as garlic is, from thirty to forty pounds of it are required 

 to yield an ounce of the oil ;" so that a hundredweight of garlic is needed to 

 procure three or four ounces of oil. 



The A. roseum, a species of Garlic of Southern Europe, and an old garden- 

 flower, has been found near Rochester in Kent, Inxt is not truly wild. 



9. Squill (Sdlla). 



1. Wild Hyacinth, or Blue-bell (^S*. nutans). — Flowers drooping in 

 a raceme; segments turning backwards; bracts in pairs; leaves linear, 



