OF BRITISH PLANTS. 135 



LIME, LINE, or LINDEN-TREE, called in all Germanic 

 languages, and in Chaucer, Linde, a word connected with 

 Ic. and Sw. linda, a band, and A.S. Iffie, pliant, which 

 stands in the same relation to the continental name, as, 

 e.g. hrffier, cattle, to G. rind, and tcfc to Fris. tond, that is 

 having a final d changed to 8, and the n omitted. The 

 name has evidently been originally applied to the inner 

 bark, or bast, of the tree so much used in the North for 

 cordage. In the Herbals, and all old works after Chaucer's 

 time, it is spelt Lyne or Line, as in the ballad of Kobin 

 Hood and Guy of Gisborne, where it rhymes to " thine," 

 " Now tell me thy name, good fellow," said he, 



" Under the leaves of lyne." 



The n has in later writers been changed to m, and lyne 

 become lime, as kollen holw, henep hewp, and mayne maiw. 

 Linden is the adjectival form of lind with 'tree' or ' timber' 

 understood, and it is to be remarked that the names of 

 most trees are properly adjectives, and in the Western 

 counties are generally used with an adjectival termination, 

 as elmen-tree, holmen-tree, &c. Tilia europsea, L. 



LINE and LINSEED, L. linum, Gr. \ivov, flax, probably a 

 word adopted from a language alien to the Greek, upon the 

 introduction of its culture, Linum usitatissimum, L. 



LINQ, Da. Nor. and Sw. lyng, a word which Holmboe 

 considers to represent Skr. gangala, by a replacing of g 

 with I, the common heath, possibly a form of A.S. lig, 

 fire, as implying " fuel," and connected with L. lignum, 

 firewood. This word is often combined with hede, a heath, 

 as in Sw. ljunghed, Da. lynghede, ericetum, a heath-land, 

 and conversely hedelyng, the heath-plant; leading to the 

 belief that heath was the waste land, and lyng the shrub 

 growing on it. See Diefenbach (Lex. Cornp. ii. 496.) 



Calluna vulgaris, L. 



LION'S-FOOT, or -PAW, from the shape of the leaf re- 

 sembling the impress of his foot, Alchemilla vulgaris, L. 



