156 FAMILIAR WILD FLOWERS. 



for the most part, or a little pale whayish, which doth 

 plainly express the difference/' The old authors often call 

 our species the bastard-hemp. 



Critical zoologists have been known to object to the 

 popular name for the common cockroach or black-beetle, 

 on the ground that the creature is not black, and that it 

 is not a beetle ; and we may in the same way be allowed 

 to point out that our present plant is neither hemp nor 

 nettle. The true nettles belong to a wholly different order. 



The plant "dronken in wine comforteth the hart 

 and driueth away all melancholic and sadnesse." But, 

 as the charge against us as a nation by our foreign 

 critics centuries ago was that we were the victims of 

 phlegm we can only conclude either that our critics were 

 mistaken, or that our forefathers had not the courage of 

 their opinions, and were wanting in the needful faith in this 

 and several other plants that were equally commended 

 as antidotes to the " melancholic." 



