86 A GARDEN OF HERBS 



In Italy the peasants still use mugwort to know if a sick 

 person will recover. They put it under his pillow without 

 telling him, and if he goes to sleep it means he will recover. 

 If he lies awake it is a sure sign he will die. Nearly every- 

 where on the Continent mugwort is called the herb of St. 

 John the Baptist. Lupton, in his Notable Things, relates 

 this superstition. "It is commonly affirmed that on mid- 

 summer eve, there is found under the root of mugwort a 

 cold which keeps safe from the Plague, carbuncle, lightning, 

 and the quartan ague, them that bear the same about them, 

 and Mizaldus, the writer hereof, saith that it is to .be found 

 the same day under the root of Plaint ain, which I know for 

 a truth, for I have found them the same day under the root 

 of Plaintain, which is especially and chiefly to be found at 

 noon." The following is an old Russian legend about 

 mugwort : In the district of Starodubsk, on the day of the 

 exaltation of the Cross, a young girl was searching for 

 mushrooms in a forest, when she saw a number of serpents 

 curled up. She endeavoured to retrace her steps, but fell 

 into a deep pit, which was the abode of the serpents. The 

 pit was dark, but at the bottom she found a luminous stone ; 

 the serpents were hungry ; the queen of the golden-horned 

 serpents guided them to the luminous stone, and the serpents 

 licked it, and satisfied their hunger ; the young girl did the 

 same, and remained in the pit till the Spring. On the 

 arrival of Spring, the serpents interlaced themselves in such 

 a manner as to form a ladder on which the young girl 

 ascended to the mouth of the pit. But in taking her leave 

 of the queen of the serpents, she received, as a parting gift, 

 the power of understanding the language of plants, and of 

 knowing their medicinal properties, on the condition that 

 she should never name the Mugwort, or Tchornobil (that 

 which was black) ; if she pronounced that word, she would 

 forget all that she had come to know. The damsel soon 

 understood all that the plants talked about ; but one day, 

 a man suddenly asked her, " What is the plant which grows 

 in the fields by the side of the little footpaths ? " Taken by 

 surprise, the girl replied, "Tchornobil; " and at the same 



