94 OUR ROCK-GAKDEN 



out of place. In each kind the flower is of a 

 lilac-blue, larger or smaller in size according to 

 the species. Chaucer and other old poets call the 

 plant pervinke, the name, like our modern periwinkle, 

 being from the monkish Latin pervinca, which in 

 turn was derived from the Latin words per 

 and vincire, to bind about. Some would tell us 

 that the name arose from the use of the plant in 

 garlands, but such an employment of the plant is 

 scarcely monastic, nor is it a flower of sufficient 

 brilliancy and attractiveness to suggest such a festal 

 use. We may more readily accept the second 

 explanation a suggestion obvious enough to those 

 who found a place for it in the herb-garden of the 

 monastery, that its long stems, all-embracing, made 

 its name of binding plant specially appropriate. In 

 Italy it is true that at the present day it is called 

 the flower of death Fior di Morto since it is used 

 to deck the bier of dead infants, while in France it 

 is the Violette des Sorciers, certain magical qualities 

 being popularly ascribed to it. 



"Parvenke is an erbe grene of colour; 

 In tyme of May he beryth bio flour. 

 His stalkys are so feynt and feye, 

 That never more groweth he h ye. 

 On the grownde he rennyth and growe, 

 As doth the erbe that hyth tunhowe, 

 The lef is thicke, schinende and styf, 

 As is the grene ivy leef." 



