SOME MAY FLOWERS 53 



mountains and herbes for the use Wood, not far from Droxford, where 



of men, and hath not only stamped Izaak Walton spent a portion of the 



upon them a distinct forme, but also last years of his long life, the plant, 



given them particular signatures, in company with the whortleberry, 



whereby a man may read ever in is abundant, but some years it is 



legible characters the use of them." scarcely possible to find a single 



Now if the rootstock of Solomon's flower. A curious use of this species 



Seal be cut across, some marks will in the sixteenth century is mentioned 



be observed not unlike the impressions by old Gerarde : " The floures put into 



of a seal ; hence the plant was of a glasse, and set in a hill of ants, close 



" singular vertue in sealing or healing stopped for the space of amoneth, and 



up wounds, broken bones, and such then taken out, therein you shall finde 



like." On the same principle the a liquor that appeaseth the paine and 



purple marshwort was " an excellent griefe of the gout, being outwardly 



remedy against the purples," and the applied, which is commended to be 



quaking-grass and the aspen specifics most excellent." 



for the ague, while the pretty little Many of our most beautiful native 



herb-Robert of our hedgerows, from plants have suffered, nearly to extinc- 



the red hue of its fading leaves, was tion, as already noticed in the case 



a " wonderful stauncher of blood." of Daphne Mezereum, from being 



The Lily-of-the-valley (Convallaria transplanted from their natural haunts 



majalis) is a far rarer plant than into gardens. This has been specially 



Solomon's Seal, but it is often abundant the case with the handsome Fritillary 



where it occurs, as in some of the woods or Snake's-Head (Fritittaria meleagris), 



of Lincolnshire. In the days of Queen called by our early botanists " the 



Elizabeth it grew, we learn, on " Hamp- Checquered Daffodil or Ginney-hen 



sted heath, foure miles from London Floure." The petals of this most 



in great abundance, and upon Bushie choice flower are, as an old writer 



heath, thirteene miles from London, says, " checquered most strangely, 



and many other places." In Hamp- surpassing the curiousest painting that 



shire it is confined to a few localities, Art can set downe. One square is of 



and like the Wild Tulip which still a greenish yellow colour, the other 



remains with us, is strangely shy of purple, keeping the same order as well 



flowering. In a wood known as Lily on the backside of the floure as on 



