POPULAR NAMES OF PLANTS.—WAYBRED. 13 
some connection with the staff of life, which is the support of 
all wayfarers, whether travelling along the highway from cities 
and towns to villages and hamlets, or jogging along through the 
occupations, employments, and cares of humanity, to that bourne 
whence no traveller returns. 
In reference to the first part of the compound term Way- 
brede, there is no difference of opinion among our etymological 
botanists. ‘ Waybrede,” says Mr. Fox Talbot, in his ‘ Etymo- 
logies,’ “is an old name for the Plantain, a weed which grows 
very commonly by roadsides in England. But what has it to do 
with bread? It affords no nourishment of any kind. The Ger- 
man name for it is Wegetritt, that is, Way-tread ; a good name, 
because it is trodden underfoot, growing on the hardest roads, 
etc. I conjecture that the word Waybrede was mistaken by our 
old herbalists for Way-tread, etc.””—Etym. p. 412. 
Dr. Johnston (Bot. Eastern Borders) states that the various 
terms “ Waybrede, Wayfron, Weyborn, Weybret, merely express 
the wayside habit of the plant, which is the child of roadsides 
and pathways.” ‘This is true, but it only accounts for the first 
- half of the name. Mr. Talbot’s conjecture, like the conjectures 
of many others fully as sapient as he, may be readily disposed of 
by the aid of a few etymological facts which were as accessible 
to the learned author of the ‘Htymologies’ as they are to his 
humble servant, who ventures to help both these learned pundits, 
to correct the gratuitous conjectural assumption of the one, and 
to supply the omission of the other. 
First, the term way in English is equivalent to weg or weg 
in Anglo-Saxon, este Bosworth, on the authority of Alfric and 
Somner. The other part of the term, drede, Dr. Johnston might 
have found among the peasantry of his ain countrie, for they still 
use the form braid for broad, as braid claith for broad cloth, 
teste Jamieson. The German name of the plant is Wegebreit, 
or Wegbreit (old German, Wegabreita), English, Waybread ; 
from breiten or ausbreiten, to dilate, or become or be broad ; 
auch das Wegeblatt, or the Wayleaf: teste Heyse, Dict. 1828, 
in voce Weg. The Swedish name of the plant is Grodlad, great 
or broad leaf. 'The Danish name of the same is Veibred, from 
vet, a way, and bred, broad. 
The applicability of the term broad to the Greater Plantain 
(Plantago major) is very obvious. The application of the term 
