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The old herbalist Dodoena says at once that culverkeys is the 

 Columbine, and so we should at once suppose from the analogy of 

 the word ; "columbine" means the "dove-plant," and "culverkeys" the 

 same. "Culver" is the old English for "dove," a dove-cot used to be 

 called a " culverhouse," and the mediaeval carpenter spoke of a 

 culver-tailed instead of a dove-tailed joint. But as the columbine 

 does not grow in meadows, and is a very doubtful British plant, it 

 is supposed that Walton must have meant some other plant, 

 perhaps the common meadow orchis. I think it, however, most 

 probable, that Dennys simply introduced the name as a pretty 

 poetical name, and that Walton copied it from him. 



Gander-grass in the same line is the weed that grows so 

 commonly by every woodside with white leaves, which we now call 

 goose weed or silver weed. 



There is another plant much named in poetry, the Eglantine, 

 about which I might find you many a passage in the old poets. I 

 will, however, only give you one. Herrick says — 



From this bleeding hand of mine 



Take this sprig of eglantine, 



Which, though sweet unto your smell, 



Yet the fretful briar will tell, 



He who plucks the sweets shall prove 



Many thorns to be in love. 



Modern poets still use the word, without, I think, always knowing 

 of what they speak. Ordinary people who speak prose, call it the 

 Bweet-briar. 



Shakespeare tells us that "the rose by any other name would smell 

 as sweet," but the opinion of all European nations is against him. 

 " Rose " in some slightly altered form is its almost universal name. 

 Greek, Roman, Italian, Spanish, French, German, Dutch, Polish, 

 English, Welsh, and other northern nations — all coming probably 

 from one Sanscrit root signifying red. It is the favourite flower of 

 all poets of all nations, and I cannot resist telling you the legend 

 of their origin — not the heathen legend which gave them to 

 Venus, but the Christian legend as told by Sir John Mandeville. 



" Between the city and the church of Bethlehem is the field 

 Floridus, i.t. to say, the field flourished; forasmuch as a fair maiden 



