98 FAMILIAR WILD FLOWERS. 



date for nine years being- the 30th of April, or one day 

 after the saint's day. The plant when once found in 

 flower may be met with throughout the whole of summer 

 and autumn, and even at times almost to the close of the 

 year, as we find in the records of the society above 

 referred to that it has been found in blossom as 

 late as the 2nd of December, and it is always pos- 

 sible, and in fact probable, that others of a still later 

 date may have escaped notice. It is evidently much 

 simpler to record the first appearance of a plant when its 

 blossoms burst newly on the eye, than to say when the 

 gradual disappearance becomes total. 



Many plant-names owe their interest to their con- 

 nexion with mediaeval leg-ends or from the plants being 

 dedicated, as was the custom, to certain saints ; thus the 

 yellow rocket, dedicated to St. Barbara, is on that account 

 also called Herb -Barbara ; the cowslip is called Herb-Peter 

 from the pendant flowers faintly suggesting in form a 

 bunch of keys, the badge of that apostle ; the daisy is also 

 called Margaret from its being in flower as early as the 

 22nd of February, St. Margaret's Day. The St. John's 

 wort derives its name from the custom of gathering it 

 with much ceremony upon St. John's Day, the 24th of 

 June, for the purpose of keeping it in the house as a " pre- 

 servative from thunder and the wiles of evil spirits/' 



In the Middle Ages the plant was held to possess con- 

 siderable remedial efficacy ; a theory has, therefore, been 

 advanced that it may possibly owe its name to Robert, 

 Duke of Normandy, for whom the " Ortus Sanitatis," a 

 standard work for some hundreds of years, was written. 

 It has long been a botanical custom to confer the name of 

 any one whom it is desired to honour upon some plant, 



