114 CAEYOPHYLLE^ 



Poppy, Shore-weed, and Saltwort, are all appropriate and expressive names, 

 and serve to indicate the spots on which we may find the plants growing. 



Many of our common wild flowers received their names as expressive of 

 the pious feelings of our ancestors. In these days, Eevelation has come to 

 almost every home of our land, teaching us no longer to adore fallible men, 

 but to trust our sins and sorrows to Him who alone could atone, who alone 

 can mediate. But in former days men mingled up strangely and darkly the 

 intercessions of the saints and the Saviour; and the names of the flowers 

 prove at least the religious thought Avhich possessed the mind of him who so 

 called them. The mother of our Lord, she who to latest days must be loved 

 and honoured as "blessed among women," shared then, in the fond idolatry 

 of human hearts, in a reverence accorded to holy men of old, or to others of 

 whom we know nothing, save such legends as were traced by the hand of 

 superstition. Wherever Ave find the word Mary or Lady in any way con- 

 nected with the flower, we may generally infer that the latter is but the 

 remains of " Our Lady," and that both refer to the Virgin. Nor was it the 

 flower alone which received this associating name ; the little insect which 

 the merry child bids "fly away home," the Lady-bird, La vache de la Vierge 

 of the French, was named, too, after "Our Lady." Lady's Tresses, Lady's 

 Mantle, Lady's Slipper, Marygold, and Eosemary, Herb Bennet, Herb Eobert, 

 St. Peter's and St. James's-wort, Sweet Cicely, Sweet Basil, are but a few 

 of the names which probably originated from the monastery ; and ancient 

 associations are recorded in the names of Holy Herb, Holy Oak, Star of 

 Bethlehem, Procession-flower, Herb of Grace, Trinity Herb, and many others ; 

 while a remembrance of old superstitions lurks in such names as that of 

 Enchanter's Nightshade. 



But our Meadow Lychnis, our Cuckoo-flower, has been long forgotten in 

 the remarks which its name suggested. It is a very pretty flower, often 

 sprinkling the grass far over the moist meadows with its rose-coloured jagged 

 petals, Avhich grow on a reddish-coloured stem, two or three feet high, during 

 June and July. The lower part of the stem is hairy, and the upper part 

 clammy. It is often, in country places, called Eagged Eobin, or Bachelor's 

 Buttons, a kind of button having been formerly Avorn which was made of 

 pieces of cloth cut someAvhat in the form of its petals. 



2. Red German Catchfly (Z. nscdm).— Petals slightly notched at 

 the extremity ; stem clammy at the joints ; leaves lance-shaped and pointed. 

 Plant perennial. This plant, Avhich groAvs on dry Alpine rocks, is found on 

 Craig Breiddin, Montgomeryshire, and in the neighbourhood of Edinburgh, 

 and some other parts of Scotland. Its floAvers are large, and grow in a 

 panicle, on a stem about a foot in height. They are of a bright rose-colour, 

 and the floAvers appear in June. 



3. Red Alpine Catchfly (Z. a//7m«).— Petals cleft; flowers growing 

 in a corymbose head. This is a rare plant — so rare, indeed, that only three 

 places of its groAvth in this kingdom have been recorded by botanists. One 

 is on the summit of Little Kilrannoch, l)etAveen Glen Prosen and Glen Cal- 

 later ; another is lioljcaster Fell, Cumberland ; and the third in Lancashire. 



4. White Campion {L. mspertina). — FloAvers having usually the pistils 

 and stamens on separate plants; petals S-cleft and crowned; capsule Avith 



