OF BRITISH PLANTS. 191 



cella, a dim. of L. porcus or porca, used in a figurative 

 sense, as explained by Diez and Scheler. In Latin the 

 plant was called portulaca, and this word seems to have 

 been confounded with the more familiar porcellana. It 

 certainly bears no resemblance to porcelain. Fuchs (Hist, 

 plant, p. Ill) derives its German name of Portzel kraut 

 from L. porcettus, a pig. Portulaca oleracea, L. 



PURSLANE, SEA-, Atriplex portulacoides, L. 



PYBRIE, the pear-tree, A.S. pirige, 



Pyrus communis, L. 



QUAKERS and SHAKERS, QUAKE-, or QUAKING-GRASS, 

 from its trembling spikelets, Briza media, L. 



QUEEN OP THE MEAD, L. Eegma prati, from its flowers 

 resembling ostrich feathers, the badge of royalty, 



Spiraea ulmaria, L. 



QUICK-IN-THE-HAND, that is "Alive in the hand," the 

 Touch-me-not, from the sudden bursting and contortion of 

 its seed-pods upon being pressed, 



Impatiens Noli me tangere, L. 



QUICKEN or QUICK-BEAM, or WICKEN, a tree ever moving, 

 A.S. civic-beam, from civic, alive, and beam, tree, translated 

 in ^Elfric's glossary " tremulus," a name applied by him to 

 the aspen, but which has been transferred to this, the wild 

 service, or roan tree, probably through some confusion 

 between civic and wicce, a witch, and the roan being re- 

 garded as a preservative against witch-craft. See KOAN. 

 Wicken is merely a different spelling of the same word. 

 Whick is given in Levin's Manipulus as meaning " alive," 

 " vivus." Pyrus aucuparia, L. 



QUICK-SET, from its being set to grow in a hedge, a 

 quick or living plant, and forming what Hyll calls " a 

 livelye hedge," as contrasted with a paling or other fence 

 of dead wood, the hawthorn, 



Cratsegus Oxyacantha, L. 



