82 FAMILIAR WILD FLOWERS. 



poorer, a certain wild, straggling look, and thinness of 

 appearance being too evident to be altogether pleasing. 

 The plant, like most other wild flowers, is rather variable, 

 some specimens being much larger than others, though the 

 smallness of the less developed specimens renders them no 

 less beaiitiful. In one plant we gathered while looking out 

 examples for our plate, the total height was less than four 

 inches, and yet in a space no larger than a shilling would 

 cover it had seven fully expanded blossoms, besides others 

 in various stages more or less forward. The plant is the 

 Veronica Chamcedrys of the botanist. Whatever force of 

 meaning was originally supposed to rest in this name 

 would now appear to be lost, for while some writers think 

 the name to be eastern in origin, and to signify good 

 remembrance, others trace in the flowers some resemblance 

 to a face, and think the name to be derived from the Greek 

 words signifying sacred and a picture, in allusion to the 

 monkish legend of St. Veronica, who wiped the drops of 

 agony from the Saviour's brow with her handkerchief, 

 which ever after bore the impress of His features. The 

 meaning of the common English name is equally obscure. 

 In some parts of the country the children call the plant 

 bird's eye, probably from its brilliant colour, the pupil of 

 the eye of the jackdaw being-, for example, very much the 

 same tint, and probably other birds may supply a further 

 optical proof of its fitness as a name for the plant, though 

 we cannot ourselves at the moment recall a second example 

 of the occurrence of the colour. The flowers occasionally 

 are of a somewhat pinkish purple, and are more rarely met 

 with almost or entii-ely white ; in fact, almost all plants, 

 if they have any tendency at all to depart from the 

 normal and typical colouring, will at times be found with 



