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PERIWINKLE. — In France, the Periwinkle is considered 

 the emblem of the pleasures of memory and sincere friendship, 

 probably in allusion to Rousseau's recollecflion of his friend 

 Madame de Warens, occasioned, after a lapse of thirty years, by 

 the sight of the Periwinkle in flower, which they had once admired 



together. In Italy, garlands of Periwinkle are placed upon the 



biers of deceased children, for which reason the plant has acquired 

 the name of the Flower of Death; but in Germany it becomes the 



symbol of immortality. Culpeper, in his ' Herbal,' says that the 



Periwinkle is owned by Venus, and that the leaves eaten together 

 by man and wife, cause love between them. 



PESTILENCE WEED.— The Butterbur Coltsfoot {Trissi- 

 lago Petasites) obtained the name of Pestilence Weed from its having 

 in olden times been held in great repute as a sovereign remedy for 

 the plague and pestilent fever. 



PHYTOLACCA. — A species ol Phytolacca found by M. Levy 

 in Nicaragua in 1876, and named by him P. eledrtfica, may well be 

 called the eledlrifying plant. The discoverer, when gathering a 

 branch, experienced a veritable elecflric shock. Experimenting 

 with a compass, he found the needle was agitated at a distance of 

 eight paces, and became more so the nearer he approached ; the 

 acftion changing to a rapid gyratory motion when he finally placed 

 the compass in the midst of the shrub. There was nothing in the 

 soil to account for what maybe termed the "shocking" proclivities 

 of the shrub, which are slight in the night-time, becoming gradually 

 intensified until about two o'clock p.m. In stormy weather, the 

 intensity of adtion is increased, and the plant presents a withered 

 appearance until the fall of rain. Neither insedt nor bird was seen 

 by M. Levy to approach this terrible shrub. 



Pick-purse, or Pick-pocket. (See Shepherd's Purse). 



PIMPERNEL.- — The scarlet Pimpernel {Anagallis arvensis) 

 is well known as the Poor Man's Weather-glass, or Shepherd's 

 Barometer; both names having been given on account of the plant 

 invariably closing its petals before and during rain. Darwin 

 alludes to this peculiarity of the Pimpernel in the following lines : — 



" Closed is the pink-eyed Pimpernel ; 

 In fiery red the sun doth rise, 

 Then wades through clouds to mount the skies ; 

 'Twill surely rain — we see't with sorrow, 

 No working in the fields to-morrow." 



Besides being a barometrical, the Pimpernel is a horological, plant, 

 opening its petals about 7 a.m., and closing them about 2 p.m. 

 The plant was also considered a surgical plant, inasmuch as the 

 old herbalists ascribed to it the power of drawing out arrows which 

 were embedded in the flesh, as well as thorns and splinters, or 

 " other such like things." The bruised leaves were believed to cure 

 persons bitten by mad dogs, and the juices of the plant were con- 



