THE FAERY YEAR 



shelter in the cold season it is better than either. 

 It has, too, a beauty all its own when re-leafing in 

 the spring and early summer, in its two distinct 

 shades of green. 



A Housewife's Herbs 



Many of the wild thymes and mints linger 

 in bloom till late autumn. I have found solitary 

 plants of wood sage flowering in November, and 

 this season the faint purple blossoms of common 

 calamint are still seen on sunny roadside banks. 

 Calamint, like basil thyme, is very aromatic. 

 Bruised between the fingers, it gives out a fragrance 

 equal to the marjoram's, if not quite to the citron- 

 scented thyme's, which in some places grows wild. 

 In old days, when to be the good housewife was 

 to be versed in the virtues of a hundred herbs, cala- 

 mint was brewed into a tea. To the wild basil 

 the housewife looked both for cookeries and cures. 

 Its volatile oil she applied to the "carious tooth," 

 its spice flavoured the food. 



Calamint and basil have gone out, not because 

 they have been shown to be without efficacy, but 

 because other pot herbs as good or better and 

 other cures quicker and surer have come in. It 

 is the same with hundreds of old-fashioned uses 

 for wild plants. Sorrel they used at the cottage, 

 even the comfortable farmhouse perhaps, for a 

 salad. Lettuce seed is too cheap to-day for the 

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