THE COltN MARIGOLD. 79 



excellent work on the popular names of British plants, tells 

 us signifies tinsel or false gold, applied to the present 

 species because it is not the true golde, or Calendula 

 officiualis. The white ox-eye, or C. leucanthemum, a plant 

 we have already figured and described, belongs to the same 

 genus, so that our marigold naturally sometimes gets called 

 the yellow ox-eye. Gerarde calls it the golden cornflower, 

 and its association with the true cornflower, or blue-bottle 

 (Centaurea cyanus), in the harvest has, in some parts of 

 the country, earned for it the name of yellow-bottle. 



The corn marigold is almost everywhere abundant, 

 farmers would say too abundant, and will be found in 

 flower throughout the summer and autumn, until the 

 sharp sickle of the reaper lays it low. On turning over 

 our -own botanical notes, we see it recorded that we 

 found a specimen, still well in flower, on December the 

 thirty-first ; but June to October, inclusive, would be 

 about the normal state of affairs. Both here and abroad, 

 the strong arm of the law has been invoked for its 

 destruction ; Threlkeld tells us that, in Britain, "Mannour 

 courts do amerce careless tennants who do not weed it out 

 before it conies to seed," and we find enactments against 

 those who do not keep it under in their fields, not only in 

 England and Scotland, but in Denmark and Germany. 



Gerarde's description is very pithy ; it is as follows : 

 " Corne marigold, or golden corne floure, hath a soft 

 stalke, hollow, and of a greene colour, whereon do grow 

 great leaves, much hackt and cut into divers sections, and 

 placed confusedly, or out of order ; vpon the top of the 

 branches stand faire starlike floures, yellow in the middle, 

 and such likewise is the pale or border of leaves that 

 compasseth the soft bal in the middle, of a reasonable 



