ANGELICA 249 



name of the cowslip, the herb-paralysis, also tell 

 their story clearly enough. The eyebright was also 

 called the euphrasy, and we meet with an interesting 

 reference to the old .belief in the efficacy of the 

 plant in the lines of Milton 



" Michael from Adam's eyes the film removed, 

 Which the false fruit, that promised clearer sight, 

 Had bred : then purged with euphrasy and rue 

 The visual nerve, for he had much to see." 



The Angelica was so called by the monks in 

 mediaeval days, their belief in its valuable medical 

 properties being sufficiently powerful to cause them 

 to regard it as an angelic gift to suffering mankind. 1 

 The tutsan is a corruption of toute saine, and the 

 herb-bennet, or avens, originally was the herba 

 benedicta, or blessed herb. The reseda, or mig- 

 nonette, was so-called originally by Pliny from its 

 supposed soothing qualities, the Latin verb reseda 



1 It has no reputation in the present day for possessing 

 any healing power, but in the Middle Ages belief in it seems 

 to have stood even the test of experiment. An old writer, 

 for instance, commends it as a a singular remedie against 

 poison, and against the plague, and all infection taken 

 by euill and corrup aire ; if you do but take a peece of the 

 root and holde it in your mouth it doth most certainly driue 

 away the pestilentiall aire, yea, although that corrup aire 

 have possessed the hart yet it driueth it out againe. The 

 root is auailable against witchcrafts and inchantments if a 

 man carrie the same about with him. It cureth the bitings of 

 mad dogs and all other venemous beasts." 



