pfanC Tsore, T^eqcT^/, anal "hi^ncj, 209 



somewhat complicated. If we may believe Culpeper, it is a herb 

 under Jui)iter and the sign Cancer, and strengthens those parts 

 under the planet and sign, and removes diseases in them by 

 sympathy; and those under Saturn, Mars, and Mercury by anti- 

 pathy, if they happen in any part of the body governed by 



Jupiter, or under the signs Cancer, Sagittarius, or Pisces. 



Michael Drayton, in his ' Muse's Elysium,' thus refers to Agrimony, 

 among other herbs dear to simplers: — 



" Next these here Egrimony is, 



That helps the serpent's biting; 

 The blessed Betony i)y this. 

 Whose cures deserving writing. 



*'This All-heal, and so named of right, 

 New wounds so quickly healing ; 

 A tht^usand mor^ I could recite 

 Most worthy of revealing." 



ALDER. — The origin of the Alder is to be found in the 

 following lines from Rapin's poem on Gardens: — 



" Of watery race Alders and Willows spread 

 O'er silver brooks their melancholy shade, 

 Which heretofore (thus tales have been believed) 

 Were two poor men, who by their fishing lived ; 

 Till on a day when Pales' feast was held, 

 And all the town with jjious mirth was filled. 

 This impious pair alone her rites despised, 

 Pursued their care, till she their crime chastised : 

 While from the banks they gazed upon the flood, 

 The angry goddess fixed them where they stood. 

 Transformed to sets, and just examples made 

 To such as slight devotion for their trade. 

 At length, well watered by the bounteous stream, 

 They gained a root, and spreading trees became ; 

 Yet pale their leaves, as conscious how they fell. 

 Which croaking frogs with vile reproaches tell." 



In Germany, Alders have often a funereal and almost diabolic 

 chara(fler. It is a popular belief that they commence to weep, to 

 supplicate, and to shed drops of blood if there is any talk of cuttirig 



them down. A legend of the Tyrol narrates how a boy who had 



climbed a tree, overlooked the ghastly doings of certain witches 

 beneath its boughs. They tore in pieces the corpse of a woman, 

 and threw the portions in the air. The boy caught one, and kept 

 it by him. The witches, on coimting the pieces afterwards found 

 that one was missing, and so replaced it by a scrap of Alder- wootl, 



when instantaneously the dead came to life again. Of the wood 



of the Alder, Virgil tells us, the first boats were made: — Tunc Alms 



primum fiiivii sensere cavatas. The Alder, or AUer, is said to be a 



tree of Venus, under the celestial signs of either Cancer or Pisces. 



Alecost. — See Costmary. 



Alehoof, Ground-Ivy.- — See Ivy. 



