90 ERYNGO AND ERUCA 



syllable. 1 Pursuing this clue, he discovered that in 

 the eighth century, two hundred years before the 

 Saxon Leech-book was compiled, the name of this plant 

 was written gunde-swilge, showing that the r in the 

 first syllable had got itself inserted because the 

 common folk knew how quickly this weed spread 

 over swallowed cultivated ground ; but the real 

 meaning was ' matter-swallower/ gund being the term 

 for a disease of the eye ophthalmia. One is reminded 

 of another instance of an intrusive r, namely the con- 

 version of Ptolemy's Ebudce into ' Hebrides,' through a 

 copyist mistaking the vowel u for ri, which easily 

 happened before the vowel i became distinguished in 

 the eleventh century by the dot which now sur- 

 mounts it. 



XXI 



It is a rare, and in my experience an unique, thing 

 Eryngoand to detect inaccuracy in the writings of my 

 Eruca Q \& friend and correspondent, Canon Henry 



Ellacombe ; for not only was his knowledge in botany 

 and horticulture encyclopaedic, but he was also an 

 enthusiast both in classical and English literature. 

 If I lay finger upon a single and singular slip in his 

 well-known work The Plant-lore and Garden-craft of 

 Shakespeare, it is from no lack of affectionate regard 

 for his memory, but because that slip leads up to the 

 misreading of a name for which he was in no degree 



1 The distinction may seem a trivial one, but mark the difference 

 in sense between 'Hun ' and ' honey,' ' bun ' and ' bunny.' 



