182 OUR ROCK-GARDEN 



The very vine-like form of the leaves and the 

 far-extending growth of the plant led some of the 

 older herbalists to call the hop the Vitis septer- 

 trionalium, or northern vine, and probably the fact 

 that it supplied the northerners with a beverage as 

 acceptable to them as was the juice of the grape to 

 the southern folk, tended towards the acceptance of 

 the name. Parkinson, discoursing "on Hoppes," 

 tells us that " these are more frequent in these colder 

 than in the hotter countries, which sheweth the 

 goodnesse of God unto us, to provide for every 

 Countrey such things as are fit for the sustentation 

 of life : for where Vines grow not, and the water too 

 cold and rawe to drinke simply of it selfe, there are 

 these Hoppes chiefly bred to make drinke to serve 

 in stead of wine or water." 



The hop is what is botanically termed dioecious, 

 that is to say in one plant all the flowers are 

 stamen-bearing, and in another they are all pistil- 

 late, and it is these latter plants that produce the 

 cones. 



Our forefathers used to eat the young shoots of 

 the hop in the Spring, " after the same manner," 

 Parkinson tells us, " that the buds of asparagus are, 

 and with as great delight to the taste, yet they have 

 little nourishment in them." Pliny, too, tells us that 

 the ancients made no use of the plant, except to 

 ornament their gardens, but that in his time they 

 ate the young tops as a vegetable, As he was born 



