130 THE WILD-FLOWERS OF SELBORNE 



Black Notley, the general features of which have but 

 little changed since Ray lived there. The mediaeval 

 church with its low shingle-spire ; the churchyard 

 surrounded by rugged elms ; the blacksmith's forge ; 

 the wayside inn ; the osier-bed where Ray found " the 

 Almone-leaved Willow that casts its bark " ; the ponds 

 at the Hall where, as in the seventeenth century, the 

 great cat's-tail grows; the little stream below Dew- 

 lands, still full of watercress as when the aged natura- 

 list gathered it, together with brooklime and plantain, 

 to make a " diet-drink " for the benefit of his broken 

 health ; the grass lane towards the ancient Priory 

 down which he loved to wander — all may be visited ; 

 the very plants in the hedgerows remain, with a few 

 exceptions, the same as in the seventeenth century. 

 Butcher's broom may still be noticed in the thick 

 tangled hedges of " Leez Lane," and the linden tree 

 "called hereabouts Pry," and herb-paris in a copse 

 hard by ; but the writer failed to find " the wild Gar- 

 lick in a field called Westfield adjoining to Leez Lane," 

 and the musk-orchis " in the greens of a field belong- 

 ing to the hall called Wair-field." Here and there on 

 the roadside wastes the beautiful crimson grass vetch- 

 ling will attract notice ; and the " Stinking Gladdon or 

 Gladwyn " {Iris fxtidissima, L.) is abundant " in the 

 Hedges by the Road, not far from the Parsonage 

 towards Braintree " ; but unfortunately the wild black 

 currant, or " squinancy-berries," so called because of 

 its use in cases of quinsey and sore throat, has dis- 

 appeared from its ancient habitat " by the river-side 

 near the bridge called the Hoppet-bridge." Another 

 interesting plant which Ray came across in the neigh- 

 bourhood of Notley was the London Rocket, which, as 

 he says, " after the great Fire of London, in the years 



