THE FOXGLOVE. 241 



FOXGLOVE (properly FOLK'S-GLOVE). 



Digitalis. 



Welsh, Menyg ellyllon, Bysedd cochion, Bysedd y cwn, Ffion 

 dail, Ffion flrwyth. French, Gants de notre dame, Doigts 

 de la Virge. German, Fingerhut. Italian, Aralda. 

 Spanish, Dedalera. Danish, Fingerbor, Yingerhoed. 



LINNJEAN. NATURAL. 



Dydinamia. Scrophuralinece. 



Ungiospernia. 



THE foxglove is, as Gerarde tells us, " good for 

 them that have fallen from high places," but the 

 old herbalist, in his simplicity, does not explain 

 whether the healing to which he alludes is for cases 

 of a moral or a physical character, so that we are at 

 liberty to experimentalise with the plant for either. 

 Premising however, that, though considered by 

 modern practitioners a most dangerous medicine, 

 on account of its positive effect in depressing the 

 action of the heart ; it was, in the time of Gerarde, 

 highly esteemed for coughs, as well as for all mala- 

 dies of the spleen and liver. It is also, as Blanchard 

 tells us, employed by the country people of Somer- 

 setshire, in fevers ; for which " some confide very 

 much in the flowers ;" and putting a " great many 

 of them in May butter they set them in the sun/' 

 while " others mingling them with lard, put them 



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