HERBS CHIEFLY USED IN THE PAST 67 



most highly recommended as an excellent pot-herb ! 

 indeed all wild mallows may be used in that capacity, and 

 the Romans are said to have considered them a delicacy. 



Marsh Mallow (Althcea officinalis) has very soothing 

 qualities, and was, and is, much used by country people 

 for inflammation outwardly and inwardly. It contains a 

 great deal of mucilage, in the root particularly. Timbs 

 says : " Dr Sir John Floyer mentions a posset (hot 

 milk curdled by some infusion) in which althoea roots 

 are boiled " ; and it must have been a " comforting " one. 

 In France, the young tops and leaves are used in spring 

 salads. " Many of the poorer inhabitants of Syria, 

 especially the Fellahs, the Greeks, and the Armenians, 

 subsist for weeks on herbs, of which the Marsh Mallow 

 is one of the most common. When boiled first, and 

 then fried with onions and butter, they are said to form 

 a palatable dish, and in times of scarcity, consequent 

 upon the failure of the crops, all classes may be seen 

 striving with eagerness to obtain the much desired plant, 

 which fortunately grows in great abundance." ^ In Job 

 XXX. 3, 4 we read: "For want and famine they were 

 solitary, fleeing into the wilderness in former time 

 desolate and waste. "Who cut up mallows by the 

 bushes." Smith's " Dictionary of the Bible," however, 

 casts doubt on this mallow being a mallow at all, and 

 though admitting that it would be quite possible, 

 decides that the evidence points most clearly to Atriplex 

 Halimus. 



Gerarde says the Tree Mallow " approacheth nearer 

 the substance and nature of wood than any of the others ; 

 wherewith the people of Olbia and Narbone in France 

 doe make hedges, to sever or divide their gardens and 

 vineyards which continueth long ; " and these hedges 

 must have been a beautiful sight when in flower. 



The Hollyhock, of course, belongs to this tribe, and 



1 Hogg. 



