PERIWINKLE TRIBE 237 



because of the laurel-like tint and texture of its glossy leaves. In Holland 

 wreaths of the Periwinkle are commonly worn about the heads of young 

 girls, and the plant is there called Maagdepalm. In France it has many 

 country names, several of them significant of the connection of the plant 

 with the practices of magic ; such is its name of Viohile des sorciers ; while 

 its old French name of Pucellage connects it with the Virgin, and in most of 

 the continental nations the flower is worn either in life or death by young 

 maidens. 



In Poland the Periwinkle is commonl}^ called FUcaria, because it has 

 been considered successful in arresting or curing that dreadful disease, the 

 Plica Polonica, in which the hair forms an entangled mass, which, if cut, is 

 said to cause the death of the patient. The plant is decidedly astringent, 

 though acrid, and our fathers valued its medicinal properties. Parkinson 

 tells us that the leaves held in the mouth will stay the bleeding of the nose ; 

 and the best of all our early naturalists, John Ray, recommends it not only 

 as a remedy for toothache, but as fitted to fasten the teeth which are loose. 

 Most of the old writers on plants praise its efFicacj^ as a gargle to heal the 

 diseased throat ; and Lord Bacon tells us that, in his days, bands of green 

 Periwinkle were bound about the limbs to prevent cramp. Coles, who wrote 

 in 1657, tells of a friend of his who was "vehemently tormented "\Wth the 

 cramp for a long while, which could be by no means eased till he had wrapped 

 some of the branches hereof about his limbs." 



Few who look at the Periwinkle clumps, so common now in gardens and 

 shrubberies, are aware that it is one of the oldest flowers of the English 

 garden, and the rival of those earliest favourites, the stock-gillyflower and 

 the rose. Chaucer, describing a garden in the olden time, says : — 



"There sjiranfif the violet al newe, 

 And fresh Pervincke riche of hewe, 

 And flouris yelowe, white, and rede, 

 Such plente grewe then in the mede ; 

 Ful gaie was al the ground, and quaint. 

 And poudred as men had it peint, 

 With manie a freshe and sundrie iloure, 

 That castin up full good savoure." 



And elsewhere we find this lover of birds and flowers saying : — 



" There lacked not 

 Ne not so muche as floure of brorae, 

 Ne violet, ne eke Pervinke, 

 Ne floure none that men can thinke ; 

 And manie a rose-lefe full long 

 Was entermeddled there emong ; 

 And also on his lieade was set 

 Of roses rcdde a chapilet." 



Mr. Phillips, in his "Flora Historica," descril^es the structure of the 

 pistil of this floM^er ; and this organ well deserves our attention, for it is 

 here, as well as in the smaller species, most beautiful. " The style of this 

 flower," he remarks, "is of a full orange colour, bearing two distinct circular 

 plates, the lower one of which is of a rich orange hue, and the top one white, 

 which may be compared to a shilling placed on a guinea. On the top of 

 the white plate there is a short green elevation which is croAvncd with five 



