The Stinging Power 



a common clover? The psoralea, with its 

 pitchy odour? The menyanthes, or uck-bean, 

 that inmate of the chilly peat-bogs? The 

 oxalis, the wood-sorrel of the country-side? 

 We cannot tell for certain. The botany of 

 those days was innocent of the descriptive 

 conscientiousness of ours. The plant which 

 acted as a poison-antidote grouped its leaves 

 by threes. That is its essential characteristic. 

 Again the cabalistic number, essential to 

 medical virtues as conceived by the first heal- 

 ers. The peasant, a tenacious conservative, 

 has preserved the ancient remedy, but, by a 

 happy inspiration, has changed the three 

 original leaves into three different herbs; he 

 has elaborated the -cpicpvk\ov into the three- 

 fold foliage which he crushes on the Bee's 

 sting. I seem to perceive a certain relation 

 between these artless ways and the crushing 

 of parsley as described by Reaumur, 



149 



